Tetris (Electronika 60)
| Tetris | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer(s) | Alexey Pajitnov |
| Platform(s) | Electronika 60 |
| Release |
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| Gameplay info | |
| Next pieces | 1 |
| Playfield size | 10 × 20 |
| Hold piece | No |
| Hard drop | Yes |
| Rotation system | Original Rotation System |
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Tetris (Russian: Тетрис) was created by Alexey Pajitnov using the Pascal programming language on an Electronika 60, an unauthorized Soviet clone of the Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-11 computer. The game originally featured monochrome graphics. In its first version, the blocks in the tetrominos were represented by pairs of delete/rubout characters (character code 177). On Soviet clone machines like the Electronika 60, this character code rendered as a rectangle, but on an actual PDP-11, the same code displayed as empty space.
A later revision replaced the delete/rubout characters with square brackets to represent the blocks.
In 2003, to promote the movie Tetris (2023), a web version was released called Tetris E60.
Included with Tetris Forever is a rebuilt version of the game.
Gameplay
Pressing "1" on the keyboard toggles a preview of the next piece.
Scoring
- Points are awarded for each tetromino successfully dropped into place.
- At level 0, the potential point score for each tetromino starts at 19, and decreases by 1 every time the tetromino descends a row due to gravity. As can be seen, an I tetromino falling freely from the top of the playfield to the bottom will descend 19 rows and score 0; it is never possible to score less than 0.
- Playing at higher levels awards an additional 3 x (Level + 1) points per tetromino.
- Playing with the preview disabled awards an additional 5 points per tetromino.
- 3 digits are provided for score display; when 999 is exceeded, the counter rolls back to 0 and a tally of symbols appear in order to keep track of thousands.
Bugs
It is sometimes possible to manipulate a tetromino after performing a hard drop, even though it is supposed to be locking. Doing so will leave a trail of blocks behind, which, although visible to the player, are not recognized by the game as actually being there. This can lead to a variety of unusual scenarios, for example, visibly complete rows will not clear, and tetrominos can be dropped through the stack.
Trivia
- In the BBC documentary Tetris: From Russia with Love, a DVK-3 computer is shown displaying a TETRIS logo screen. However, it is unclear which version of the game included this feature or whether the display was merely a mockup.
- In Tetris The Grand Master 3 Terror-Instinct's Shirase mode, pieces turn into brackets at level 1000 to 1300.
- In Tetris Worlds (PC only), reaching rank 15 for all the Story mode games will unlock Hadar, a basic clone of this version.
- In 2023, Tetris E60, an official web game was released to promote the movie Tetris, emulating the look of the original.
- Tetris Effect has a theme that references this version.
- Tetris Forever features a recreation of the game. It offers two versions that it refers to as a "1984" edition (featuring a title/logo in Russian), and a "1985" edition (featuring the title "TETRIS" in large block letters composed of various other characters).