Possibly a stupid question: is it possible not to win this? Is it just for the purposes of relaxing, or is there a strategy? I played one hand, and it needed to shuffle towards the end because there were no legal moves, and then I won. Can every hand be won without a shuffle?
Just like many solitaire games, you can definitely lose in Mahjong Solitaire. Since there are four tiles (two pairs) of each tile set, you can play in such a way that you’re deadlocked because of a previous choice. Imagine, for example, there are two matching tiles with one stacked on top of the other. If you already removed the other two matches for that same tile set, then you’re stuck, since the only way to remove…
When the tiles are shuffled, the situation you describe gets undone, no? So I'm guessing that means you've basically lost, but in this implementation it doesn't make that clear (at least to me), so I just carried on and figured I won.