The Basics

At its core this is a Mahjong solitaire game (in which the goal is to clear a pile of tiles by removing pairs of identical tiles that are free (not blocked by tiles on top or on both right and left side), but the levels of puzzles that should be completed are combined in mystery cases that need to be solved. There are various boosters that you can win by completing stages, or purchase for money, that make it easier to complete the more challenging puzzles.

Difficulty

The puzzles start of very easy, but quite soon become more of a challenge. I have only played the first 20 levels of the Murder on the Orient Express story line, so not yet sure how hard it will get, so far they have all been doable without using boosters.

Variation

It is hard to make Mahjong puzzles have a lot of variation, but in this game they have managed to do a good job. There are new game concepts introduced (like tiles that only show the symbol when you click on them), and the mystery story line is integrated with the puzzles by for example containing tiles with detective symbols, or exposing letters so that a clue to the mystery will become visible.

Visually

The Mahjong tiles are well made, making it very east to distinguish them. The visuals if the story line are well made as well, making it quite tempting to follow the story line in between the levels as opposed to quickly clicking the Skip button.

Free vs Paid

So far I have not had any problem playing this game for free. There are boosters in the game that you can purchase that make it easier to complete levels, but so far I have not even used the boosters I got for free. There is an occasional ad between levels, but nothing too annoying.

Is It Any Good?

I give Mahjong Crimes: Mahjong & Mystery 9 out of 10 stars. Having the Mahjong puzzle levels combined in mystery cases makes this game stand out from the many plain Mahjong games.