The Collection Chamber: DISNEY'S MAHJONGG

Classic Mahjongg fun with a Disney Twist! Play mind-boggling strategy games in this thoroughly modern Mahjongg experience featuring your favourite Disney characters! Devise and deploy strategies against yourself or others, as you engage in this competition of cleverness. These tricky tiles will never fail to test your skill or leave you smiling!
Six different Disney Tile Sets!
Customized play, adjustable skill levels, special hidden levels!
Bonus Disney-themed arcade games!

~ from the back of the CD Jewel case

Disney's Mahjongg arrived on PC in 2003 during that prolific media blitz era when Disney Interactive was happy stick their mouse ears on a bunch of budget titles aimed at parents looking to silence their sprogs with a cheap impulse purchase. These aren't grand reinventions or lost classics from the company's vault, but rather a comfortable, uncomplicated time killer. The magic of Mahjongg fits right into this lineup pretending to be nothing more than it is - a mildly fun distraction.

From the moment you hit the main menu, the presentation is clean, friendly, and incredibly Disney. You're given a handful of modes and mini-games presented with zero text so pre-schoolers can get in on the fun too. There's a surprisingly generous selection of tile sets, ranging from a traditional Shanghai look to themed sets featuring Mickey & Friends, Pooh, Disney Princesses, Disney Villains, and a general "Film Classics" assortment. Each set comes in two sizes, effectively acting as difficulty levels; big, chunky tiles for beginners or younger players, and smaller, more traditional tiles for those who want a denser board. The visuals are bright without being garish, the animations are smooth but minimal, and the whole thing plays just as you'd expect a game of Mahjongg to play.

A one-player game of Mahjongg using the The Mickey Mouse tile set (left).
I swapped over to the Disney Princesses theme to play a turn-based two-player game (right).

At its core, Disney's Mahjongg is a straightforward take on Shanghai-style Mahjongg. You're matching identical tiles and clearing the board as long as those tiles are free on one side and not buried beneath another. There's a respectable number of layouts to cycle through, optional timers, and a limited hint system that can be unlocked if you don't want to engage you're brain. If there's no matching tiles left, a pop-up will give you the option to reshuffle or - as is tradition - lose the game and quit to the main menu. Also included is a two-player mode, which is a nice touch. It turns the game into a pass-the-mouse affair with timed turns and colour-coded cursors. It's not exactly a party game, but it does add a little competitive spice to what is otherwise a solitary, meditative experience.

The first mini-game is where Disney's Mahjongg tries something a bit out of the ordinary. This mode has you sliding tiles around a board to form horizontal or vertical lines of matching tiles - four or five depending on difficulty - within a strict time limit. Clearing a line causes new tiles to drop in, occasionally chaining into bonus clears and precious extra seconds on the clock. Later levels introduce locked tiles that can be matched but not moved, adding just enough difficulty to keep you engaged like any good puzzler should. Controls are simple point-and-click affairs, but the escalating speed and shrinking timer give rise to panic-based mistakes giving it a tension that the main game lacks.

Match the same tile horizontally or vertically to score points in this sliding mini-game (left).
Remove adjacent tiles then squish, shuffle or replenish them to match some more (right).

The second mini-game leans even harder into that arcade mentality. Here, you're matching tiles that are directly adjacent either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally while racing against the clock to clear the board. Tiles cycle in from a reserve pile, and when you hit a dead end you can squish the board together, add more tiles, or reshuffle the lot, though shuffles are strictly limited. It's a surprisingly compelling mode, and when the later levels shrink the time limit, the introduction of timer-expanding compass bonus tiles give it more of a strategy than you might expect.

In the end, Disney's Mahjongg is pleasant, competent, and entirely disposable. In a good way. It's the kind of game you boot up to unwind, not to be impressed or challenged. There's nothing here that will stick in your memory, but there's also very little to complain about. There may be better Mahjongg games out there - there's more than enough to choose from - but how many cater to you're average Disneyphile? That alone makes it worth a quick play in my book.

To download the game, follow the link below. This custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses dgVoodoo to run on modern systems. Help File included. Read the ChamberNotes.txt for more detailed information. Tested on Windows 10.

File Size: 59.3 Mb. Install Size: 132 Mb. Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

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