History of the genre

From a Soviet research computer in 1984 to a courtroom in California and a thirteen-year-old crashing an NES on stream — how block stacking became the most-ported game idea ever written.

21 articles

• Who Invented Tetris?Alexey Pajitnov wrote the original in 1984 at a Soviet research institute, on a computer that could not draw graphics.
• Where the Name "Tetris" Comes FromA Greek numeral prefix welded to the name of a racquet sport, because the author liked both.
• The First Version Ran on a Computer That Could Not DrawThe Elektronika 60 had no graphics mode, so the original pieces were built out of punctuation marks.
• How the Game Escaped the Soviet UnionIt spread by informal copying, reached Hungary, and was picked up by a Western agent before anyone had signed anything.
• ELORG and the Most Confusing Licence in GamesA Soviet state agency, a chain of Western sublicences, and a fight over what the word "computer" means.
• The Trip to Moscow That Decided the Handheld MarketHenk Rogers arrived at ELORG without an appointment, and left with the rights that made the Game Boy.
• Why Bundling It With the Game Boy Worked So WellA monochrome handheld needed a game that lost nothing on a bad screen. This was the best candidate ever written.
• The Lawsuit Over Who Could Publish ItTwo versions on the same console, one of them recalled, and a ruling that turned on what had actually been licensed.
• How the Author Finally Got PaidThe rights reverted in the mid-1990s, and Pajitnov co-founded the company that has licensed the game ever since.
• The Specification That Made Every Modern Version Feel the SameRotation, kicks, the seven-bag, hold and scoring were unified into one rulebook — and it changed how the game is played.
• The NES Version and Its Beautiful FlawsNo hold, no kicks, a randomiser that can starve you, and a scoring table that made it a competitive sport anyway.
• How a 1989 Cartridge Got a World ChampionshipA small side event grew into a competitive scene that repeatedly broke what the game was thought capable of.
• Hypertapping and Rolling: Two Ways to Beat a Speed LimitWhen the game outran the d-pad, players changed how they held the controller rather than accepting the ceiling.
• The Kill Screen: When the Game Runs Out of NumbersPush a 1989 program past what its authors tested and the arithmetic starts producing nonsense, then it crashes.
• The Arcade Versions and What They ChangedA coin-op cabinet has different incentives to a home console, and the design shifted to match.
• Why It Ended Up on Absolutely EverythingTiny state, no assets, and rules you can implement in an afternoon — the most portable game design ever written.
• The Game on Screen: Documentaries, Dramas and ShorthandA 2023 thriller dramatised the rights fight, and falling blocks became visual shorthand for "computer".
• What Alexey Pajitnov Did NextHe kept designing puzzles, moved to the United States, and spent decades never quite escaping the first one.
• The Soviet Computing World the Game Came FromNo software industry, no home market, no way to sell a program — and a culture of copying that let one escape.
• Clones, Variants and the Genre That Grew Around ItRules are not copyrightable, so a whole family of falling-block games grew up alongside the original.
• Why the 1984 Design Barely Needed ChangingForty years of iteration refined the edges and left the centre alone, because the centre was already right.