So Darn Close

[Doc]

1991. No, that is not a year. That is the number I am both praising and cursing.

Today, I really had my game face on. I cleared one thousand nine hundred and ninety one lines today in Tetris, my personal best. Beat my last score by one measly little line... But it's just not good enough... grrr. I have played this game since... Well some time in the 80s. It's been many years. I have always hoped to clear 2k lines, earning an unofficial Master's Title. Sadly, I don't know of any more official TetraCons, so I don't think titles matter any more. Of course, I would still love a Grandmaster's Crown, but, that will never happen. I no longer have the motor control to even dream of clearing 3k. There are folks who play Tetris by score, something that has never caught on with me. All that matter is the lines cleared, no fancy doodads, bells, or whistles. No falling pianos to crush tiles into place, no bombs, no bubble pop pops. Just good old fashioned line clearing goodness.

I don't know how many people play this game, or how many people here play hardcore Tetris. After about 500 lines, it becomes quite fast. Panic must be banished and your nerves made steely. Instinct must be finely tuned. Gambles must be made, gambits that will either carry you through or crush you in humiliating defeat. After 1000 lines, it gets scary. You live or die by pure reflex, instinct, and lucky gambits. I love that nervous sweaty queasy feeling... When you finally blow it, your hands shaking, your eyelids twitching, all those little nervous tics on your face and neck... What a feeling.

I play several clones, one of which does not get as fast, for practice, and can often clear over 100k lines in a good practice session... But in the real game... I just can't clear the 2000 mark. After all these years, all these attempts, having it in reach, I just can't do it and I feel like such a failure. It's bitter... As I get older, I am slowly losing my lightning fast reflexes. I don't think I am going to make it.

So close... it hurts.

[Pete]

Hi,

But in the real game

And which is that? I remember the first tetris I saw was a bar game. That was before any of the "clones" hit the PC (and, I presume, Mac). There was a DOS version that was very simple, and wicked fast after a while -- literally too fast to play, since the key rate was slower than the fall rate (unless you tweaked the BIOS settings). I've seen a bunch of versions, some of which came with game packs, some freeware or shareware. All had different speeds.

So, just which is "the real game"? And where can one get it?

--Pete

[Doc]

Well, as far as I can tell, the most official Tetris out there is the one that I have, but it's not in English. It's in Russian and I have no idea what it says. It has a governer on it to keep speed stable no matter how fast your machine. It came out for the Apple in about, hmm... 1988 or 1989 maybe? This version needs an EMU to run on the Mac, there have been direct ports, but all of them effected the speed. There were so many clones made during this time, like the one ported to the IBM PC by, er, was it Mirrorsoft? Anyhow, that version was not official and stunk. Everybody fought over it, Tengen, Nintendo, Atari, but, as far as I can tell, the real versions came from Russia and Budapest under the Sovjet label.

If you can, find a good Nintendo EMU and look around for the Tengen Tetris ROM. Make sure it(The EMU) has processor cycling and speed control. Also look around the net for a Russian Patenov (SP) EMU, it was a small Atari like console made in Russia that played only one game. Tetris.

You know, this is a really good question, "What's Official?" Back in the days of TetraCons, I always saw it on the Apple II, er, possibly the Apple IIgs. The version that I have now. There was another version I think, possibly for the C64 or something, put out by Black Flag / White Flag software.

I have not bothered looking yet, but try looking online for the Church of Tetris or Tetrap. If the old oganizations are still around, various copies of "cannon" games can most likely be found there. Although I don't think it matters any more as nobody seems to care. Tetris has been cloned to death and finding a good original is hard. Look for anything in Russian, as from what I understand, most of them are purists and don't like deviations.

For practice and fun, I like Netris.

I am going to dig into this and see what's out there.