Let's Play Mahjong!

"Let's play MAHJONG! These three contestants have magnificent prizes and have to win over $20,000. And now let's meet the host of Let's Play Mahjong, PAT SAJAK!"

Let's Play Mahjong is a 1979 unsold pilot hosted by weatherman and future Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak, announced by Kenny Williams, directed by Jerome Shaw, produced by Robert Noah for Merrill Heatter-Bob Quigley Productions, and it was taped for NBC on September 21, 1979 in Burbank.

Gameplay
Three players have a chance to play Mahjong and to win over $20,000.

Main Game
The main game is Mahjong. Three contestants, in anti-clockwise direction take a turn to draw a tile from the wall and then discarding a tile by throwing it into the centre and, if desired, announcing out loud what the piece is. A winning hand consists of 14 tiles. Since three contestants always have 13 tiles in their hand they must win by either taking a piece from the wall that completes their 14 tile hand (winning from the wall) or claiming a discard from another player which completes a 14 tiles hand (winning by discard). The winning hand is made of four melds (a specific pattern of three pieces) and the eyes (a pair of identical pieces). Contestants continues this way until one player has a legal winning hand and calls out Mahjong while revealing their hand.

Bonus Game
The bonus game is Fast Wall. It plays like Mahjong, except it speeds up for about 60 seconds before time rans out.

Trivia

 * Chuck Henry was mentioned on host on ticket, but it was fired between the ticket printing and pilot. However, Henry's hosting job went to weatherman and future Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak.
 * This is one of the two pilots Sajak hosted before he hosted Wheel of Fortune, the other was the 1980 Goodson-Todman pilot Puzzlers.
 * The theme music of the pilot is the same one used on To Say the Least.
 * The pilot was made when Robert Noah, Merrill Heatter, and Bob Quigley took the idea to importing the Chinese Mahjong game for $60,000 and bring it to make a TV version of the Mahjong game.
 * The sounds from the pilot were recycled from the original 1974-76 version of High Rollers.