Home page: Introduction to BriJ
BJ Bridge ( BriJ for short) is a
unique duplicate bridge bidding and playing game for Apple iPhones,
iPads and Android devices including Kindle Fire.
Watch introduction
Also
'How To' videos - YouTube
Look out for more
symbols
on these pages.
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BriJ is designed both for beginners and those who know a bit about
the game. There's copious help at every stage. If you decide to
turn on hinting, there is guidance and detailed explanation for
each bid and play of the cards, whether it's you or the computer
playing the cards.
Touching any bidding or playing card opens a window to explain why
the play was made. There is also an automatic "Did
you know" feature to offer basic guidance in the early stages
of getting to know the game
- There are two free versions. BriJ Lite follows a Benjaminised Acol style of bidding, conforming
in the main to the "Bridge for All" method recommended by the English
Bridge Union. Another version of BriJ,
designed for beginners to the Acol style of bidding is
Duplicate Bridge Beginner. This is based around
the English Bridge Union Foundation Level.
See BriJ Bidding
and Playing Conventions
- The PRO version of BriJ
has further options to choose a bidding method from any of
▶ Acol - Absoulte beginner; Foundation level for EBU students;
Level 2 for EBU students, Advanced ACOL (with many added
conventions).
▶ SAYC (Standard American Yellow Card) - Beginner; SAYC with
common conventions; Advanced SAYC (with many added conventions)
▶ Benj Acol - Basic or Advanced
Within
your chosen system, the PRO version also lets you select or
reject individual conventions and lets you adjust
point ranges assumed for opening bids, e.g. for 1NT or 2NT
- BriJ is optimised for the type of
device you are using, whether Android tablet or mobile phone.
Layouts change automatically
in the mobile mode to fit in with limited screen space.
This example shows BriJ running on
various android devices with varying operating systems:
iPhone 4, iPhone 5, iPhone 6, iPad 2, 10.1 inch Motorola Xoom 2 tablet, Nexus 7, 8.2 inch Motorola
Xoom 2ME tablet, Nexus 4 (4.7 inch) and Nexus 5 (4.95 inch),
galaxy S4 (5 inch), San Francisco II (3.5 inch) Nook (7 inch).
It also shows some of the varying layouts you can choose to play
the game.
At the time of writing, you can purchase a 7 inch tablet with
decent screen resolution and bluetooth for
under £50, so if you find BriJ useful,
this could be a good option
- If you have bluetooth you can connect up with other
players to practice bidding and playing as a partnership. If your partner
wins the contract you get the option to play in defence (against
your partner) or to play
the contract at the same time and independently of partner.
Connect with bluetooth and play anywhere, without Internet access!
- You can play in one or more seats at the same time, optionally
choosing to see hands one at a time. You can also rotate the table
to play an alternative hand, for example to mirror your seating
position at a club match
- BriJ is oriented towards Duplicate Bridge. It provides realism
by showing a proper bidding box. Tricks are also laid out as you
would expect in a normal game. Results of your playing efforts are
converted to Duplicate scores against two opponents and you can see your running average
as a percentage
- Experienced club players can download hands from their club
website (when using BridgeWebs). BriJ will then include double-dummy
results if shown on your club site, as well as individual pairs
results actually achieved. You can replay the hands against
BriJ opposition
to find out where you went wrong!
- You can also download Tournament deals and results and pitch
yourself against champion bridge players. BriJ
comes with a number of examples of tournament
heats pre-loaded
- BriJ bidding and BriJ playing engines use the same logic as real
human players. You have a reasonable chance of beating your computer opponents,
because BriJ does not cheat by peeking at the hidden cards to find
that impossible play! Like a real player, BriJ
will improve all the time. Look out for later releases!
- BriJ deals are totally random.
You can ask BriJ
to show predictions of what contracts are likely
in a particular deal and how many tricks ought to be made. Use this information before you start
bidding if you want to use it as a target for your own play. Or
see it only after you have played the contract
- In the PRO version, you can ask BriJ to select from random deals one that illustrates
a particular convention such as Puppet Stayman, for learning
/ practice purposes
- Any deal can be saved for playing at a later date and can be
passed to other BriJ players via email
- During bidding or play, you can cancel a card drawn in error,
or UNDO bidding or play to any earlier point if you want to try
an alternative strategy. There's a Claim
button to avoid playing out to the last trick
- There is plenty of tutorial material to help you get used to
the BriJ game and its many option
settings, both within the game and on this website (see
User Guide,
Bridge Beginners and
FAQ).
Please use the Support page to leave feedback on
things that you like/dislike, suggestions for future
BriJ releases and to provide details of any problems you find.
- You can also browse the BriJ Forum to get help from other BriJ
users or to offer your expertise to others