View Full Version : TC Guideline?
just an idea:
is there any chance, that this forum and its people could define its own
"Tetris Concept Guideline" - The TCG ?
maybe - bringing together the best from both worlds (arika and TDS)....
or at least a guideline for casual gamers and a second guideline for extreme speed players...
another idea: what about defining some sort of gliding difficulty for the ruleset:
low (gravity) levels: SRS with infinite spin
medium levels: SRS, limited lockreset, more limited wallkicks and shorter lockdelay etc
20g and up: floor kick once etc
the problem , though would be initial piece orientation, as it barely could be switched during a single game session from flat side down to flat side up...
Needle
05-14-2007, 06:45 PM
While it sounds nice on paper, I doubt people can agree on a standard. There's a ton of mutually exclusive concepts, like the initial orientations you mentioned, or locking hard drop vs Zangi-moves, ARE vs no ARE, etc.
so... how about 2 guidelines then? one for casual, one for highspeed...
its just so amazingly confusing at the moment. and if you want to implement an online highscore list / leaderboard, one would need a set of rules most players are happy with. lockjaw is fine, heboris is fine, but when it comes to comparing the players skill, all those hundreds of options makes this hard or impossible....
tepples
05-14-2007, 09:47 PM
is there any chance, that this forum and its people could define its own
"Tetris Concept Guideline" - The TCG ?
That could happen only after caffeine moves the site to a new domain, as he has been talking about for several months but not actually done. Otherwise, we'd have Mr. Rogers breathing down our necks.
maybe - bringing together the best from both worlds (arika and TDS)....
or at least a guideline for casual gamers and a second guideline for extreme speed players...
The guideline for speed players is supposed to be that scoring shall take into account pieces per minute.
caffeine
05-14-2007, 10:00 PM
now wait a sec, you're the one who said a domain name ought not change.
tepples
05-14-2007, 10:13 PM
Ideally, a domain should not change:
Oh, and do think about your domain name. If your name is not soap, will you want to be referred to as "soap.com" even when you have switched your product line to something else. (With apologies to whoever owns soap.com at the moment).
But under the current UDRP, Mr. Rogers and his company can force the change at any time through a WIPO arbitrator, just like what happened to tetris.net and tetris.org. It might be better to get the change out of the way sooner rather than later.
Split coming...
caffeine
05-14-2007, 10:53 PM
these are open
tenbytwenty.com
rotateanddrop.com
fouratonce.com
should be short and easy to remember. out of those, my gf "got" rotateanddrop.com, fyi.
colour_thief
05-15-2007, 12:23 AM
I don't think we should change the domain unless we have to. See: tetrisattack.net
tepples
05-15-2007, 02:05 AM
I don't think we should change the domain unless we have to. See: tetrisattack.net
Do the TA.net people talk about fan games all the time like we on TC do?
caffeine
05-15-2007, 02:18 AM
to tell you the truth, i'd really just hate to lose our google rank. it's bad enough already. and it takes a year to even be considered.
here are some more domainnames... dont know if they qualify. at least no "tris" in the name...
tetricity
<snip>
...
</snip>
(have snipped away my list of domainnames... who knows... domaingrabbers are lurking everywhere.)
colour_thief
05-15-2007, 02:58 AM
I don't think we should change the domain unless we have to. See: tetrisattack.net
Do the TA.net people talk about fan games all the time like we on TC do?
Yes. It's even had romz available for many years.
jujube
05-15-2007, 04:03 AM
if the domain name must be changed i'm voting for "tetricity." very sneaky clever name herc.
lee n
05-15-2007, 05:15 AM
Why do we have to change the domain name again?
cdsboy
05-15-2007, 05:26 AM
Why do we have to change the domain name again?
Basically because TTC is notorious for killing any project with the name or use of tetris in it.
if the domain name must be changed i'm voting for "tetricity." very sneaky clever name herc.
bad thing.... the tetricity.com is already grabbed and parked.. (in august 2006, cant remember if i "created" the name before, but might be so, was thinking about domainnames last summer)
its such a holy shit. every good domainname is just grabbed and parked with these stupid "search offer pages"... they sit on the domainname forever. in april i was hoping that these fucking grabbers release the domain blockout.com - but they prolonged it. so we have an empty website what could be a nice dedicated fan site... and there is ABSOLUTELY no way to get it. (because kardon enterprises owns the trademark to blockout and they seem to be just uninterested in the domain. and i can barely ask them if they would fight for the domain for me to create a fan site....)
PetitPrince
05-15-2007, 01:42 PM
How about something like AgeOfBlock.com ? Or blockage.ch ? (.com, .net, .org are already taken)
Cubicz
05-15-2007, 01:50 PM
I really like .tv domains. INTERNET TELEVISION!?!?!
So if we have a cool name that is 'parked' by search sites, a .tv is an option. But then there becomes an issue of people forgetting the .tv part and going to .com and just finding a search page.
lee n
05-15-2007, 04:31 PM
tetr.is seems to be available http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif They can't bug us for calling the site "TETr".. it'd be the equivalent of TREKr for star trek fans.
caffeine
05-15-2007, 05:00 PM
it's going to be .com and it's not going to have tetr- or -ris if i do make a new domain name.
Rosti LFC
05-16-2007, 12:22 AM
Shouldn't we wait until we've at least had some form of notice from TTC before moving the domain?
tepples
05-16-2007, 02:19 AM
Shouldn't we wait until we've at least had some form of notice from TTC before moving the domain?
No, because being proactive 1. shows due diligence on caffeine's part and 2. allows PageRank on the new domain to begin accumulating.
DIGITAL
05-16-2007, 02:29 AM
Shouldn't we wait until we've at least had some form of notice from TTC before moving the domain?
No, because being proactive 1. shows due diligence on caffeine's part and 2. allows PageRank on the new domain to begin accumulating.
On the other hand, it would be an inconvenient hassle if D-Day never comes.
Rosti LFC
05-16-2007, 02:35 AM
Shouldn't we wait until we've at least had some form of notice from TTC before moving the domain?
No, because being proactive 1. shows due diligence on caffeine's part and 2. allows PageRank on the new domain to begin accumulating.
On the other hand, it would be an inconvenient hassle if D-Day never comes.
Precisely.
Tetrisconcept is hardly massive. It's not like we have hoards of users. It's also not like we're actually causing TTC any trouble.
Yes, we use the word Tetris, which is a trademark, but we're not causing loss of income. By making fangames, you're creating alternative games and possibly reducing the number of games TTC sells, and therefore it's worth them chasing you down and threatening to sue you. I can't really see them finding Tetrisconcept responsible for anything other than advertising and promoting the games. We don't claim to be an official site either.
colour_thief
05-16-2007, 02:47 AM
I think we'd be fools to change unless asked. Which will never happen unless TTC is insanely stupid. Do you know how much bad press you'd get attacking a profitless fan resource for such a beloved game? Kotaku would be all over that kind of story.
jujube
05-16-2007, 02:56 AM
Do you know how much bad press you'd get attacking a profitless fan resource for such a beloved game?
i have to agree. besides, how do you harass someone who bought tetris fliptop (http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=515)?
additionally, there is just no other word that can describe block falling games better than just
TETRIS !!
tetris ought to be a public domain name and not a trademark.
by the way: is there such thing like a "creative commons trademark" that protects a new trademark against commercial companies, but allows fair use for private projects? i was searching in the creative commons homepage, but got confused...
Taratang
05-16-2007, 03:19 PM
The current site is either under the rader of TTC or simply tolerated. Neither scenario is likely to change unless it starts profitting from the trademark, so I say leave it as it is.
tepples
05-16-2007, 08:55 PM
additionally, there is just no other word that can describe block falling games better than just
TETRIS !!
Falling block games are called "falling block games" or "ochimono games". I've tried to push "tetromino game" or "Soviet Mind Game" (the latter found on the packaging of Tengen's recalled product) as a generic alternative, in the same way that "sparkling wine" and "crémant" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparkling_wine) are generic terms for the kind of wine associated with Champagne, France (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champagne_%28wine_region%29).
by the way: is there such thing like a "creative commons trademark" that protects a new trademark against commercial companies, but allows fair use for private projects?
No. Trademark law at least in the United States requires a trademark owner to be careful about licensing, handling each licensee on a case-by-case basis, so that the mark isn't ruled generic. See naked licensing (http://www.google.com/search?q=naked%20licensing). However, there is a structure called a certification mark (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Certification_mark).
The current site is either under the rader of TTC or simply tolerated.
The latter, as kbr420 posts here.
Neither scenario is likely to change unless it starts profitting from the trademark
If someone starts distributing copies of LJ source and binaries for a fee (as is their right under the GNU General Public License), then LJ has become commercialized in the same way as, say, SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop. But then the LJ manual doesn't use the word "TETRIS" to refer to anything but products associated with Elorg or Mirrorsoft.
colour_thief
05-16-2007, 10:22 PM
"Soviet Mind Game"
This is the worst possible name. You know the Russians actually took offense to the original marketing campaign for Tetris right? As I recall, the worst offender was even recalled.
Rosti LFC
05-16-2007, 10:36 PM
If someone starts distributing copies of LJ source and binaries for a fee (as is their right under the GNU General Public License), then LJ has become commercialized in the same way as, say, SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop. But then the LJ manual doesn't use the word "TETRIS" to refer to anything but products associated with Elorg or Mirrorsoft.
I doubt they could start berating Tetrisconcept over Lockjaw. Its got a lot of discussion here, but it's not even hosted on the site. And if someone else was to be charging for it, then that's even less to do with TC.
tepples
05-16-2007, 11:23 PM
You know the Russians actually took offense to the original marketing campaign for Tetris right? As I recall, the worst offender was even recalled.
As far as I can tell from the History article on the wiki and its references, Tengen's product was recalled not because of "Soviet Mind Game" marketing but for a different reason: Andromeda/Mirrorsoft fell far behind on royalty payments to Elorg.
coming back to the original topic of this thread, a unified TC guideline:
i think there is a simple and very obvious solution to the initial piece orientation problem. its so simple..
remove any fixed initial piece orientations and instead present pieces with randomised initial orientation.
of course, this would add a bit of extra challenge to the game! but hey... instread of ever increasing speeds, why not increase difficulty and complexity of some gameplay aspects a bit?
colour_thief
05-17-2007, 02:05 AM
You know the Russians actually took offense to the original marketing campaign for Tetris right? As I recall, the worst offender was even recalled.
As far as I can tell from the History article on the wiki and its references, Tengen's product was recalled not because of "Soviet Mind Game" marketing but for a different reason: Andromeda/Mirrorsoft fell far behind on royalty payments to Elorg.
I'm not talking about the NES Tengen Tetris... There was a PC version who's cold war themed backgrounds offended them. Generally I don't think they liked that branding of the game. Also, Pazhitnov likes to describe it as a universal game. There's nothing particularly Soviet about it... These days Tetris is more Japanese than anything else.
kbr420
05-17-2007, 01:31 PM
hi guys,
TC IS IN TROUBLE!!!
LOL, j/k
I've mentioned TC to upper management many times, and not once have I heard of any legal action being taken. This place should be okay.
One word of advice - NEVER HOST ANY TETRIS GAMES THAT ARE NOT AUTHENTIC.
lee n
05-17-2007, 02:37 PM
One word of advice - NEVER HOST ANY TETRIS GAMES THAT ARE NOT AUTHENTIC.
What about hosting games that are authentic? omgpiracylol!
In all seriousness though, TC is a forum and a wiki.. hosting games seems out of the scope.
just an example on how fair and easy it COULD be concerning trademarks:
http://perl.oreilly.com/usage/ (http://perl.oreilly.com/usage/default.htm)
"We will license the camel image widely for open source products and non-commercial sites related to Perl, requiring only an acknowledgement of its trademark status and a link to www.perl.com (http://www.perl.com/default.htm).
so, it seem to be easily possible to allow a fan game to carry the name tetris and even some sort of well recognised tetris logo if it adds
"tetris(r), used with permission by www.tetris.com (http://www.tetris.com/default.htm)"
are there any reasons this is not possible with ttc? well if, we all know why..
Rosti LFC
05-17-2007, 11:38 PM
"tetris(r), used with permission by www.tetris.com (http://www.tetris.com/default.htm)"
are there any reasons this is not possible with ttc? well if, we all know why..
That implies we've had permission, which so far we haven't.
To get it, we'd have to ask for it, and there's no reason why they couldn't just say "No, we want you to shut the site down" instead.
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