Filed under: Gaming, iPod Family, iPhone, App Store
First Looks: Blackjack 21 and Shanghai Mahjong
Today, I got a chance to play Mobile Age's two App Store games: Blackjack 21 and Shanghai Mahjong. As the names suggest, these two familiar classics were ported to the iPhone platform. I started off with the Mahjong, which is a solitaire game the goal of which is to remove all the tiles on-screen by matching pairs.
The game itself is beautifully presented but the interaction falls short. Rather than re-design the game for iPhone, it was ported. The tiles are tiny. When I placed my finger tip on top of the display, I covered about 6 tiles at once. The presentation made selecting individual tiles tricky and identifying them harder -- especially for one as myopic as myself. Two on-board buttons at the bottom left and right of the screen proved particularly difficult to tap. The game does not offer zooming. In the end, I was unable to enjoy playing the game.
To play Blackjack 21, you need to learn an odd swipe language. Swipe down to hit, swipe across to stay, double-tap to double-down, and so on. Although it was a bit confusing to pick up (and a little anti-intuitive, since in our family games, we double tap the table to hit and swipe our hands to stay), I soon was betting, hitting, standing and so forth. In Blackjack 21, most of the gameplay is about the animation and sound effects. There are plenty of both. I'm not a huge gambler so I can't really say much about the gameplay relative to real life. It seems to follow Vegas rules, offering you insurance, etc. at the proper places.
Neither game really blew me away. I was more disappointed in Mahjong because that's normally a game I adore. Many wasted hours in Graduate School were dedicated to multi-player timed challenges. By porting the game rather than redesigning to meet the iPhone's small interaction space, Mobile Age missed an opportunity to deliver a hit.
Blackjack 21 and Shanghai Mahjong each sell for $4.99 at the iPhone App Store and can be played on both iPhone and iPod touch.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Rubbinz said 5:34PM on 7-14-2008
Personally, I'd like to see an App that bundles the casino/card games into one single app. Instead of having to buy 1 game at a time.
Reply
clinton Logan said 5:52PM on 7-14-2008
Erica I just wanted to add come comments about our games to correct some inaccuracies in your brief overview.
Neither games are ports of anything; they have been designed and developed from the ground up specifically for the iPhone platform.
I'm sorry you consider the tiles a little small for your eyes. Did you know you can get a popup to display what is selected under your finger by just holding it there for a split second? We mention that in the online help. It works just like the keyboard.
We decided against zoom or pan because of how Mahjong players like to see the whole board. Early playability tests just didn't favour panning and so we opted to put all out energy into making the tiles near photorealistic. We still have larger tiles than competing games.
Again if you find the standard tiles a little hard for your eyes there are plenty of other tileart options available for you to download. Did you discover those?
We are working on making the info button (to access the prefs) more responsive and this will be made available to all owners later this week. The problem is they were set a little close to the screen edge.
Also the "odd swipe language" you mention in Blackjack 21 is actually very much how the game of Blackjack is played in Vegas.
Reply
Damage said 6:04PM on 7-14-2008
Also the "odd swipe language" you mention in Blackjack 21 is actually very much how the game of Blackjack is played in Vegas.
Yea, very much so. But how about splitting? Would that be multiswipe?
Camperton said 6:57PM on 7-14-2008
I like it. Don't change a thing.
Mike said 10:12PM on 7-14-2008
I'm so glad to see Blackjack 21 on the AppStore! I loved it when I was using a Jailbroken iPod Touch. Glad to see all the refinements! (especially being able to split) I was disappointed that my winnings haven't shown up in my actual bank account yet though. Actually, I just remembered that I would prefer that you wait to release that feature - I had to call a Loan Shark in the first 20 minutes of play...
My wife wants a Mahjong game so I'll probably buy yours based on how much I like Blackjack 21.
Thanks!
clinton Logan said 6:20PM on 7-14-2008
Splitting is done with an upwards swipe. This is the closest parallel to what happens in the actual game (moving the card to another spot)
One of our most important goals with blackjack 21 was to capture the fluid gameplay of a REAL game. So in order to achieve this we decided on using gestures that mimicked the *actual* game rather than clutter the UI with function buttons fior these actions.
.
Reply
elby said 6:27PM on 7-14-2008
Erica,
That odd swipe language is kinda like when you swiped your Zune for an iPhone.
But thanks for telling us about the game. I compared all of the Blackjack games and this one seems to be the best. But who knows. It's downloading now.
Reply
elby said 6:51PM on 7-14-2008
Clinton,
I downloaded and installed the game but it does not seem to be responding the my gestures. Such as hit or stay. The only one it recognizes is the double tap to double down. What am I doing wrong? Thanks.
Reply
clinton Logan said 9:40PM on 7-14-2008
elby, swiping your finger from the top of the screen to the bottom (or from the dealer cards to yours at a minimum) will instruct the dealer to deal another card. Swiping across the width of the screen will stand.
If this is still not working for you then this is pretty bizarre and we might want to try a few other things offline. I presume you can swipe to delete mail etc. You are welcome to call us at the numbers listed here http://mobileage.com/company/ if you still need assistance.
Camperton said 6:55PM on 7-14-2008
I like the Shanghai Mahjong game. It loads fast and you can have a quick game. Prefer it to the Aki Mahjong which is more level based but less suited to casual play, also I felt the tiles were too small in that one. I'm a Mahjong fan and if I had to recommend one on the iphone so far it'd be Shanghai.
Reply
Stace said 7:06PM on 7-14-2008
This is going to sound snarky, and I don't intend it to. The iPhone App reviews are coming a bit too frequently. I feel like instead of TUAW, it's The Unofficial iPhone App Clearinghouse.
I know it's all new and sexy, but I hope this calms down a bit.
Reply
Rubbinz said 7:15PM on 7-14-2008
I appreciate the mini-reviews. Since, thus far, Apple isn't allowing devs to offer trial periods for their apps, I'd rather let folks like TUAW and other Apple sites take the bite first before I blind buy something I may not like.
yellowhouse said 8:16PM on 7-14-2008
Erica, your review feels as if you didn't read through the built-in help for both games. I liked both games a lot. Initially there were a couple of things that weren't totally intuitive to me, but with the help guide, I figured everything out no problem. Every game works just a little differently, and it only took a quick read through to figure things out. Your comments read like a reviewer who only took 1 min. to look at the game. Strong reviews thoroughly go through the information presented and add valuable feedback.
I particularly liked the extra art on both games, which change the game - making it harder or easier.
Reply
Odog4ever said 1:16AM on 7-15-2008
Maybe someone mention this already but "Mahjong Solitaire" by Sunsoft allows you to zoom in and pan, so if tiles look a little small you can enlarge things. That and the ability to save my progress mid-game are the main reasons I bought this version of mahjong over the others.
Also I purchased BlackJack 21. I enjoyed the graphics and controls plus the additional card/table themes are a nice addition. Sometimes I have to swipe several times to stand.but I'm not sure if that's my fault or the software/hardware.
Reply
Alex said 10:16AM on 7-17-2008
You can try here: http://www.blackjackencyclopedia.com/
The games look nice and work for iPhone, no need to learn learn an odd swipe language
Reply