The Tetris Effect

“The art challenges the technology, and the technology inspires the art.” John Lasseter.

Video games are everywhere today. It has transitioned from arcades, into our phones, and now into our pockets. It is a time when developers are looking back at our short history in the industry (since the 70s and 80s) and have asked themselves what made those games so enjoyable. Hell, a lot of them, grew up with the arcade and first few console cycles - Atari, Comodore 64, NES, Sega Genesis are the most popular. But one game is surviving the test of time since it’s creation more than two decades ago; it has spear headed this new market of casual games that has reached out to more people than the core market of console and PC games. This game is Tetris and I call this: The Tetris Effect.

So why is Tetris such an influential game and why is it’s influence still being felt even today?

The History

Tetris has a such a great history. It was created in the spring of 1985 at the Moscow Academy of Science Center by Alexey Pajitnov on an Electronika 60. He was fascinated with puzzle games and decided to create a game based on pentominoes. Pentominoes are mathematical 5-polyomino shapes. After weeks of programming he decided to name his creation Tetris because it uses tetromino shapes that are based on 4 blocks each. Tetris, at it’s core, is a puzzle game about clearing tetrominoes by stacking them in specific ways. Tetris recieved it’s worldwide acclaim on the Nintendo Gameboy.

Tetris - Gameboy Version, 1989

Games have definitely changed since 1985 when Tetris was created. In an age where AAA games take millions and millions of dollars for it’s high fidelity graphics and it’s complex gameplay, the current boom of casual games is attributed to the basic philosophy of Tetris: a game doesn’t have to be complex in order to be successful or fun. Tetris and the rest of the casual game market still hold their own. There have been many iterations of Tetris over the years such as Tetris Plus, Tetris DX, and Tetris World but they all adhered to the same simple base mechanic: clear the blocks. Tetris is still touching our lives because its simple and addicting. 

Tetris in it’s 3 main iterations: the original on the top, the Gameboy in the middle, and for iPhone on the bottom.

Alexey Pajitnov. He's so happy.

The Recognition

On March 2007 at the Game Developers Choice Awards, Pajitnov is awarded the First Penguin Award for pioneering the casual game market and it’s evidence is palpable. The Tetris Company is formed in 1997 and it is headed by Henk Rogers and Alexey Pajitnov. This is vital because in 2002, Rogers establishes Blue Lava Wireless to develop Tetris for mobile devices in North America which is then purchased by Jamdat in 2005 and in turn, bought by EA in 2006. EA released Tetris for iPod in that year and it becomes Apple’s #1 downloaded game. The same trend seems to happen whenever Tetris is released on nearly all devices. An entire market was carved out of having Tetris on hand-helds. Games such as Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, and Plants Vs. Zombies, products of the casual game market, owe their success to the original casual game of 1985: Tetris. Tetris has been on the top charts of the iPhone App Store since 2008 when it was released on the iPhone. 

You can pick up the game for 10 minutes or play for hours. Tetris is a game that will live on forever and it will continue to shape the game industry. Alexey Pajitnov had no idea of the greatness that was to follow in 1985 when he first created the game on that Electronika 60. The boom that Nintendo received on the Gameboy was strongly attributed by it’s pack in game of Tetris. It’s influence on the current market of casual video games more than 25 years later, is nothing short of amazing. The simpleness of it’s design and function has cemented Tetris as possibly the biggest game changer of all time. Game Informer put Tetris 3rd on their list of “The Top 200 Games of All Time”, saying that “if a game could be considered ageless, it’s Tetris.”