"Green Mahjong". Looking for translations!

[danbeck]

I would like to introduce you to our new game, Green Mahjong. Green Mahjong is a solitaire mahjong game, for smartphones, tablets (thanks to the HD graphics) - and even for the desktop (Firefox and Chrome). We currently support Android, Iphone, Ubuntu touch, FirefoxOS and Jolla. The game features three nice looking (fruits, classic, modern) and six layouts of varying difficulty. It has adaptative graphics, so that the highest resolution graphics is chosen for the screen estate.

The goal of the game is to match open pairs of identical tiles and remove them from the board, exposing the tiles under them for play. The game is finished when all pairs of tiles have been removed from the board or when there are no exposed pairs remaining.

Screenshot:

Game Screenshot. Theme "fruit".

Features overview:
- hints
- undo
- 6 layouts
- 3 themes
- animations
- highscore and game statistics
- original 3d like graphic
- available in many languages

License:
GPLv3, graphics CC-BY-NC

Developers:
Daniel Beck, Karin Beck

Graphics:
Daniel Beck

Contributions sought:
- Translators. English, German and French is done. It would be nice if the following two files could be translated in another language:
* https://github.com/danbeck/green-mahjon ... iption.txt
* https://github.com/danbeck/green-mahjon ... properties
- Playtesters

Source code: https://github.com/danbeck/green-mahjong
The game can be played in the webbrowser: http://greenmahjong.daniel-beck.org

We are looking for translators! Please help us!

Edit: Added links to the apple store
Download the game from the Play store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... eenmahjong
Download the game from the Apple store: https://itunes.apple.com/app/id933634500

[Julius]

some more included play-tips would be nice for those who have never played such games. Also: is it in the Ubuntu Phone store?

[danbeck]

Hi Julis,

some more included play-tips would be nice for those who have never played such games. Also: is it in the Ubuntu Phone store?

Yes, the game is available in the Ubuntu Phone store. It's even the first store where it was available :-). Simply search for "mahjong".

About including play-tips: It's a good idea. We already thought at including some kind of tutorial too and will do that in a future release.

[danbeck]

The game got reviewed and is now available in the Apple store. Link: https://itunes.apple.com/app/id933634500

[c_xong]

Nice game! Some thoughts:

- There are dozens of other mahjong games in the app store, the one thing special about this is it's FOSS. Perhaps you can prominently show this, in the icon or title?
- In the non-fruit tiles, it's very hard to tell whether tiles are at the top layer. You should increase the shadowing or use some other graphical techniques
- Shame about the NC license; why not go with CC-BY-SA?
- Add sounds please!
- The scrolling is very annoying, is it needed?

[danbeck]

Hey c_xong,

thanks for the feedback!

- There are dozens of other mahjong games in the app store, the one thing special about this is it's FOSS. Perhaps you can prominently show this, in the icon or title?

The suggestion is a really good one. I'll change the icon. The name "Green Mahjong Opensource" might be too long, though.

- In the non-fruit tiles, it's very hard to tell whether tiles are at the top layer. You should increase the shadowing or use some other graphical techniques

I'll try to play around with the shadows and see if I can improve it. I will post a screenshot of the changes.

- Shame about the NC license; why not go with CC-BY-SA?

The graphics was quite a lot of work and I wouldn't really like if someone makes money with it (especially if the same game-binary is reselled without any improvements). If someone wants to use the graphic in a commercial product, he can send me an email.

- Add sounds please!

Sounds are underway and should be available in the next version. :-)

- The scrolling is very annoying, is it needed?

We had the choice to either 1) have very small tiles and no scrolling 2) have bigger tiles and scrolling.
We tried both versions and found the second way more usuable.

[acme_pjz]

The game got reviewed and is now available in the Apple store. Link: https://itunes.apple.com/app/id933634500

How does your game get approved by Apple store? It's GPL licensed. AFAIK GPL is not compatible with Apple store

[Julius]

I think in a long discussion over at OpenGameArt someone recently posted that Apple changed their license agreement to be less hostile to copyleft projects, but please double check/IANAL.

[danbeck]

acme_pjz: I didn't know about the GPL problem with the app-store. Would the problem be solved if I used the MIT license instead?

[onpon4]

Things can be dual-licensed. You can put a binary on the app store under Apple's terms regardless of how you licensed it elsewhere, because you hold the copyright to it (I presume). Switching to a lax permissive license is completely unnecessary.

[acme_pjz]

Things can be dual-licensed. You can put a binary on the app store under Apple's terms regardless of how you licensed it elsewhere, because you hold the copyright to it (I presume). Switching to a lax permissive license is completely unnecessary.

I agree, the code could be GPL/commercial dual licensed if you are the original author.

I didn't know about the GPL problem with the app-store.

As long as Apple doesn't complain about it

[danbeck]

We are looking for translations now. Actually, the game is available in french, german and english. Portuguese, bulgarian, chinese, and polish are available too, they are however only partly done.

The following properties file contains the strings to be translated: https://github.com/danbeck/green-mahjon ... properties
A translation of the product description is needed too. Link: https://github.com/danbeck/green-mahjon ... iption.txt

[Wuzzy]

On topic: You forgot to mark a string for translation: “Game Paused” (Why not “Game paused.”, by the way? It’s not a proper name and not (really) a title).

This string’s translation into German is “Spiel pausiert.”.

EDIT:
Here’s a German translation for the app description:

Finden sie die passenden Paare in diesem Mah-Jongg-Solitär-Spiel!
Green Mahjong ist ein freies, kostenloses und Open-Source-Solitär-Mahjong-Spiel (manchmal auch »Mahjong« genannt). Es
hat drei nett aussehende Themen (Früchte, Klassisch, Modern) und sechs Layouts mit unterschiedlicher Schwierigkeit.
Das Ziel des Spiels ist es, offene Paare gleicher Klötzchen zu finden und sie vom Brett zu entfernen, um die Klötzchen
darunter fürs Spiel freizulegen.
Das Spiel ist beendet, wenn alle Paare vom Brett entfernt wurden oder wenn keine freiliegenden Paare mehr übrig sind.
Das Spiel sieht dank der hochauflösenden Grafiken gut auf Smartphones und Tablets aus.
Features:
• Tipps
• Zug zurücknehmen
• 6 Layouts
• 3 Themen
• Animationen

Notes: I took the freedom to translate “phone” with “Smartphone” (German for “smartphone”). I guess you better change “phone” to “smartphone” in the original text for clarity.
I also took the freedom to use the bullet sign (U+2022 BULLET) instead of “-” and the original text should, too.
Also I guess this description could be improved. Someone who never heard of solitaire mahjong before does not know what to do. It is not defined what constitues an “open tile”. I haven’t played this particular game, but I am not new to solitaire mahjong. You may also have forgotten to mention the special rule about the 4 seasons and the 4 flowers.

END OF EDIT


Off topic:
What HTML5 technologies exactly does my browser need to run this game?

It doesn’t work properly in my browser (Firefox 32, don’t worry about it, I have configured it to death). When I click on “Play”, only the left buttons appear, nothing else happens.
I have JavaScript and cookies. Do I need any other “fancy” browser features?

[danbeck]

Thanks Wuzzy for the translation. I uploaded the traductions to Google Play.

The game works on Firefox, Chrome and Android/Webkit. It doesn't work with IE for the moment - but we are working on that. This is due to how IE handles click event.
The game uses localstorage and "onhashchange". Nothing fancy really. All graphics are made with sprites, even the shadows.

[eugeneloza]

Russian & Ukrainian translations.

[danbeck]

Wooo :-) Thanks a lot eugeneloza!

[eugeneloza]

You're welcome!