Watch as four of the world's best mahjong players representing China, Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong compete for the title of World Champion at the Grand Final of the World Series of Mahjong at the Venetian Macao. And the winner is...
Trust me it's not as hard as you think. I got so overwhelmed doing Yakuza Kiwami but I got all of the requirements within 3-5 hours of play split into 2 days and it ended up being extremely fun when you know how to play
@@DeathfromUav If you're on Yakuza Kiwami 1 you don't need to beat hard table you need to fet rank 1. But trust me it took me 1 week to finish all chinese games & Mahjong. You need to really get used to whats best to discard and follow and remember some repeating things thay the AI does then its easy game just matter of time
@@BlazerT48 same here Yakuza 0 damn that full straight completion point but damn if I didn't end up getting into it... Mahjong is actually pretty damn cool
@@donna-lg5cp lol but I wanted to believe!!! Even if she is just translating, she’s still damn good at her job! Translating that fast and smooth is no small feat
That moment when the world champion says "更重要的是运气". There you have it. He's polite enough to say he doesn't think he's got the skills, but he's being realistic.
@@aidan6029 Yeah but in poker there's betting, through which you can kinda read deep into your opponent to see what he's got, and even win a lost hand if you pull a bluff. In mahjong if you don't play well and you don't get good tiles, you're dead, no matter what you do. A poker champion would never say that luck is what's most important. So no, it's not like poker.
Here's a basic rundown from what I learned playing mahjong. You get 13 tiles at the beginning of play. There are two ways to win - by having all doubles or by having 4 triples and one double. If you look at their tiles you can see they're kind of 'numbered'. They also look different. Some are like spots like dominos, some are up and down lines. These represent the type and number - think of cards with numbers and suits. So to win, you need all doubles, that means two of the same tile, or 4 triples of the same suit and one double - this would be like having cards A 2 3 diamonds, J Q K spades, 2 3 4 clubs, 5 6 7 clubs, and a pair of whatever, let's just say 7 7 hearts. You can win by picking up the 14th tile to complete your set which you see the players taking turns or by taking it from another player. Imaging in cards you needed the king of hearts to complete a royal flush and someone throws it away, you can take it to win the game. Each player takes turn picking up a tile and discarding a tile. You need to be careful because certain tiles will become hotter as the game goes along - meaning a higher chance someone needs it to win. If you discard it, they will take it and win with it. There are a few other rules involved that come naturally with play. For example, if you have two of the same tile and someone throws that same tile away, you can 'peng' it which means you lay down your two tiles, add their tile to those three, and discard another. This is why you may see players having sets of tiles that seem to get smaller. There's also 'gang' which is when you have three of a tile in your hand and someone throws the 4th (there are only 4 of every tile) you can take it, add it to your three, but instead of discarding another tile you pick one up from the back (sometimes rules use a dice to determine which tile you pick up). Some locations have varying rules. In some places for example, if you have 1 and 3 and someone throws down 2, you can 'chi' which means "eat" the tile. It's the same principle as 'peng', just instead of adding a third of the same tile, you're taking a tile that sits between your numbers. This may sound confusing but once you play a few times it becomes insanely easy and really fun. Word of warning though - do NOT play for money. The issue with this game is it's an insane form of gambling which is different to most gambling games I know. You don't pay to play, or pay a particular number that you choose like in poker where you only play/win with the chips you put in, but instead Mahjong has 'combos'. These combos lead to the loser having to pay out more. To give you an example, there's a tile combo called dragon which is when you have 1 - 9 of the same suit. There's one called Hong Qi piao piao or Red Flag, which is when you have the 4 'zhong' symbols and the 4 square symbols. There are other crazy combos that will absolutely have your wallet empty. The other reason this form of gambling is dangerous is because it is very easy to cheat or have 2 or 3 people 'gang up' on one player to take their money. Imagine in poker you were playing against 5 friends all determined to take your money and they intentionally fold good hands or find ways to move chips around to each other. All in all, it's a very entertaining game and everyone should play it.
Seriously there are better places to read up on how to play, and the many regional variants: Hong Kong, Chinese, Japanese (richi), Singaporean, and Western (American) to name a few. The origins of the game are legendary, and depending on whose version you ascribe to, itʻs no wonder players gamble to make it interesting.
Don't need to know anything about this game. Us Chinese play it just to gamble. And the rules are insanely complex. Some people may say its easy to play, but if you want to win money, you need to learn all the money winning tiles combination and also how to win in high level plays.
@@kennyljs Its not TOO complicated, its just that there are so many variations depending on the region. I learned to play Mahjong in Shanghai and then tried it one time in Beijing and it was totally different.
@@kennyljs It's not complex. All you want to do is get consecutive numbers or three-of-a-kinds (or four-of-a-kinds). Better combos get better points. I summed it up in two sentences.
Imo I think this showed up for me because I've been looking stuff up for Yakuza Kiwami. One of the minigames has several checklists for simple mahjong.
I loved playing mahjong as a kid… like 1995. This was fun to watch. Mainly because I’m surprised how well-translated everything is. It was not a very well-known game for Americans back then. So this is awesome to see. And the commentators’ reaction to breaking up their hand, “oh, what a shame,” lmao; I feel the pain. I would play this with a group of old aunties in my mom’s village during summer breaks when I went to visit. But since I didn’t speak a lick of village language, everyone just assumed I was a beginners 7 year old from the states. Little did they know I played regularly with my dad. Hohoho, won quite a few bucks from the old ladies and then later bought candy with it for the other kids in the village just to gloat. Don’t worry, I lose it all back plus change to the old ladies before I leave. My dad calls it good etiquette.
I learned to play Mahjong from my mother and it is a shame she passed away. She was a cut throat player and she rarely lost, having played at least 3x/week.
This is well filmed and with excellent commentary. Interestingly, very few discards were picked up. This is the first tournament game I've watched, I expected it to be much much faster but this almost felt like chess or at least poker.
It’s the final if they pick up discards it will show their hand and lose their concealed points and disqualify them from other hands and also give their opponent the opportunity to figure out what they have in their hand. Not a good idea to steal at this level unless they actively think they are blocking someone’s tile they estimate they need. It was a good game though
There's a superstition about the 13 terminals. It's considered the "least lucky" hand because you can't do anything with the hand. It's said that people who win that hand will be cursed with bad luck for the rest of their lives. So, I suppose that's one more reason why it takes guts to play it.
I'm only used to riichi (Japanese) mahjong but I'm curious about other rulesets. It's surprising to see Suzuki Tarou playing in the finals! He's a very strong riichi player, but I didn't know he also played Chinese mahjong.
@@lastburning It is actually NOT Zung Jung as you know. The ruleset is called MCR (Mahjong Competition Rules) as three of the main rules of competition mahjong in the world. And the other two is Riichi and Bloody.😃
Not surprising since Richi is a Japan-ized version of Mandarin Chinese mahjong. During the Chinese Communist regime, mahjong was considered "subversive" so it was driven underground. Eventually the government reversed its stance, and standardized rules which are the Mahjong Competition Rules used these days.
I can feel the frustration of the commentator when the 3 Red dragons were thrown XD I felt frustrated too. But she is amazingly fast at analyzing the board and each player's hand and what they're attempting to do and whether something was a good or a bad move (b/c she sees all the tiles).
I leaned how to play at a young age from my dad. He never arranged his tiles. I asked him why and he said that in parlors, people sometimes cheat by having people sit behind and giving signals, so,that’s just how I learned to play. I got so used to looking at it that way. I do put tiles on the end for the ones that I need to win.
"The last hand of the grand final was played at the fast pace and it's over wow we want more...", I'm calling the cops, she had murdered all the punctuations.
You don't yell out the silly ass Kan and Pong and chows. You yell out the names of your winning hand. Fancy ones like Thirteen Orphans. Nine Gates of Heavens. But let's face it, those are never ever going to happen against a good player. You will probably end up yelling Prevailing Wind. Blossoming Flower.
@Xavian Stormfang This looks very very similar to Japanese Mahjong though? Riichi seems to have more rules; the Riichi where you can call it if you have one tile left that you need, the Dora tile, and the Winds having importance. But otherwise the part about making sets, stealing tiles, and so on, seems the same.
Akagi took place a couple of years after WW2, so maybe back then the chips were smaller but also easier to cheat with. Looks like the game went through plenty of evolutions, but I wonder if there are still smaller Mahjong chips somewhere?
@@thewanderingwriter4448 chips? Do you mean tiles? Hong Kong mahjong still uses small tiles and I'm not sure about other variants but my local variant comes in varying sizes to choose from. There are tilesets that are even smaller than the standard size (mini tiles lol)
@@yopin7026 Right! Tiles! Sorry about calling them chips. On the subject of tile size, which do you prefer - big or small? And has there been anyone caught cheating with small tiles these days?
Japanese tiles are smaller than Chinese tiles and the rules are slightly different. Well, no matter the version you're playing, you probably won't pay either blood unless you're named Akagi or Washizu 😂
If you have to compare Mahjong to Poker here's the rundown. 1. They both require luck, (i.e. luck of the draws whether it's hole cards, tiles gathered, community cards etc. 2. They both are played for the long game if you want to play pro 3. Mind game is a bit different. Whilst you read people on the table in both games. A. Poker you, have size betting and value bets, bluffs etc. How much is won is dependent on how much value is in the pot. B. Mahjong, early, mid and late game tile formation. Knowing what tiles are discarded or face up made hands are the key. You have to read if the opponent is close to winning or not. Also how much is won depends on what tile combination they win on.
Filipino style mahjong is way more exciting - a variety of side bets, you get major points for 7 pairs, “escalera”, “bisaklat “, last card bunot, extra points for jai-alai (5 wins), etc. You should try it sometime.
How does youtube would ever recommend this game to me? Well, my late father used to play it when i was young and sometimes threw them badly picked tiles. What a sore loser! Miss u pops 🥴🎲🀄
Anyone knows the mark of the set? (Perdon si mi ingles es malo pero quiero saber la marca de las piezas, y si saben en donde comprarlas, las que he visto son muy pequeñas, estas parecen ser de tamaño aceptable, gracias)
I look up how to play Mahjong for Yakuza 0, and suddenly I have a video on a championship in my recommendations. Not complaining, I just think it's funny.
Don't know anything about Mahjong -- basically learned it from this video lol. Very interesting; hope I get opportunities to play this a lot in Japan. I imagine learning rulesets beyond ZJ is very complex though.
"I must speak as quickly as possible during my commentary of the game and try to fit as many words in to a sentence as humanly possible without taking a breath whilst describing the action for the audience as failure to speak long sentences quickly without taking a breath will bring dishonour and humiliation to my ancestors and living family and most of all bring the game of mahjong into disrepute. one must therefore always fit as many words and speak as quickly as humanly possible without taking a breath before the next sentence at all times for the glory of china. Failing that I will become an international interpretor for politicians because I have the perfect tone of voice for it"
@@Ejohrik commentating an event is nvr from a script. To say she's reading off a script is to infer that all the tiles are premeditated, the players were in on the premeditated moves, as were the results
@@viajaycay It is not live commentary. It is even a very brief summary of the full game. So yes, the tiles, the moves and the results were known beforehand.
It's a wonky variation of the Asian Pacific version played here. There's a league which dictates new winnable hands each year, the flowers and seasons are used, and there are 8 "Joker" tiles which can be played in pungs & kongs.
great game and commentary. Only way it would be better is if some scoring was displayed periodically to help the viewer remember who has what score. (Speaking as a beginner)
