In that case I'd still argue that "top out" is the preferential term, as "block out" and "lock out" only differ by one letter. But yeah, it's all guideline nonsense. They call a well/playfield a "matrix" and tetrominoes "tetriminos" just for the sake of having terms they can trademark.
I'm not sure if the following are trademarked, but they are silly nonetheless: - The top of the playing field is called the Skyline. - The 20 hidden rows in guideline games is called the Buffer Zone. (makes sense but it's still silly) - T-Spin overhangs are called T-Slots.
I know it's silly, but only a spawn that would overlap is affected by IRS. That's the only method of death in TGM, but NOT in Guideline, hence use of Guideline terms.
And actually, Top Out in Guideline means a block rising outside of the 20 line buffer zone due to garbage lines.
I think this thread is getting kind of off-topic but wanted to address a couple of points for historical record. First, you're right Zaphod, I mixed up the mechanics name, "pikii" was the freezing fog and "legend stone" was the unseen mechanic intended to start at level 2600. Also, thank you very much to our anonymous guest for locating another earlier example. Second, although I unfortunately cannot locate the correspondence to confirm it (Facebook blew up their legacy Messages somehow when they first introduced IMs), the reason IRS/IHS were originally removed from Facebook Tetris Friends was that they were reportedly "not Guideline compliant" and follow-up focus testing showed that casual players did not notice their removal. IRS/IHS were later re-introduced in the standalone Tetris Friends website as a paid upgrade with the implementation seen today (must press key explicitly during line clear animation). Third, IRS/IHS in Tetris Effect can be used to avoid certain death situations. Although the spawn position with IRS might be a bit off-centered (I think Kirby702 said that it always aligns to the bottom-left corner of the bounding box), it is consistently placed and will avoid ending Zone or ending the game if the piece would have overlapped when allowed to spawn in its default orientation. This was used to achieve the first Zone 21, as well as the first Zone 22.
I never disputed that Tetris Effect did have IRS and IHS for real. Mihara agrees. I'm just not sure how to test the effect in the standalone tetris friends, because it's really hard to set them up. but if so, they do violate his patent. Anyway, pretty sure TTC should have gave arika soem money for actually CALLING it Iniital Rotation System in Tetris Friends, though it probably didn't violate the patent. also, could someone who understands japanese look over the TLS patent and make sure whether it's lock delay (which would be invalidated by Sega's prior art) or the ghost piece?
TLS is the ghost piece. TGM has TLS mode which prevents the ghost piece from disappearing in later levels.
Any attempt at patenting TLS would be invalidated by Hexion (Konami's arcade version of Hextris, released in 1992), which is presumably why there doesn't appear to have been an application to begin with. EDIT: This tweet from Mihara and its continuation look important. Is someone able to translate it?
tl;dr they were meant to updates the #TGM_Series guidelines around the 1st of December yet that plan went a bit wrong and they had to postpone it.
So, things are still the same about this? There will be a witch hunt on January 1st, I guess... Also, how could they know if a gameplay is legit or not? The video quality? At least Youtube asks everybody to set up a television studio in their houses and film themselves while playing.
FWIW having vaguely heard about this purge on various sources, and having numerous videos that don't comply with the tgm series guidelines at all, I've yet to have my YouTube account be impacted whatsoever. Don't want to tempt fate and aware that 3rd Jan is hardly that long after the supposed date of the video apocalypse but is it possible it was all just grandstanding from Mihara?
Well for example if the photo of the TI screen has a laptop camera above it, it's obviously not legit. (not naming any names, but i definitely saw such a photo that cannot possibly have been from the actual arcade board)
Also, if there's a bandicam watermark, it's obviously hacked PC (recorded with PC screen capture software). also, if it starts with player loading instead of no data, and starts with classic rotation and master mode, it's obviously hacked PC TGM3. (legit TGM3 starts at no data, world rotation, and Easy mode. and if it's any higher resolution than 640x480, it's hacked PC.
Any updates on this? Was there a change to the guidelines? It's been about a year and a lot of us deleted all of our pb videos from the internet even if they were recorded on legit pcb and had the #tgm_series thing, to be safe. Is it "safe" to upload again assuming we follow the guidelines?
Chasing TGM players all over the world for playing on mame and clone is one of the most absurd thing I ever known in my life. WE are the people who have made TGM an international legend.
I said this on IRC the other day, but I really feel that Mihara contributes nothing but vitriol to the TGM scene these days. Any lingering respect from his past achievements is gradually being eroded by his toxic personality.
