Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. You wouldn't understand unless you've seen the looping in WORLD 4-4 and 7-4 of the original Super Mario Bros. 1990. Third grade class trip to COSI. Two kids had their original "brick" sized Game Boy systems. I asked to play Super Mario Land because it was familiar to me, having owned an NES for about half a year. I played a few games, but the amount of map segment reuse in that game was so flagrant it made me think I was playing something like World 4-4. And then somebody else started playing that Game Pak, which left me with Tetris. I think I got 4 lines in each of the first couple games. Then I rented NES Tetris (Nintendo's version; Tengen's had already been pulled), and I was hooked. Decades later, I still suck. I can barely break 40 lines in 60 seconds on Lockjaw. 2. I don't play a lot of Tetris anymore, what with having been employed for a year. I occasionally play Lockjaw and KGM, and I played quite a few games once to make a video that hasn't got flagged yet. 3. For about six months (January to June 2007) it was Animal Crossing for GameCube and DS. I "beat" both (paid off mortgage and got my character's house looking the way I wanted it). Before that it was Katamari. Now it's Brawl. I have Mario Kart Wii, but I haven't opened it because I still haven't "beaten" Brawl yet; besides, there appears to be some sort of licensing issue with Mario Kart. 4. You could try Tetripz by Mute Fantasies, if you can get it going, just to see how bad a game's controls can be. It had some innovative ideas, which I copied (sans control issues) for TOD.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. 1. I started playing tetris seriously (well, semi-seriously) right after I found this website, and found Heboris U.E. And no, I would not consider myself great, just average. 2. Texmaster, TAP, Heboris. I don't play too often. 3. GHIII, any shmup, FFR. 4. Panel De Pon, Puyo Puyo 15th Anniversary, Columns.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Thank you everyone! I appreciate it that you took some time to reply to my questions! Also thanks for the link to the old introduction thread PetitPrince. And I have to say that's a nice way of keeping track of your progress Amnesia. Quite surprisingly most of you got to know Tetris from an early age. And it seems most have been drawn back to their love for the game after the release of TDS. It's not that I never heard of Tetris until now. It's just that I didn't feel interested until recently. I guess puzzle and block game just were not my thing until now. I was a big fan of shooter games (Quake, Duke Nukem 3D, Half-Life etc.) and racing games (early Need for Speed games, GT games, GTR). I also played some football games with my friends before major football tournaments in the past and a lot of WarCraft III. Then there was a period where I got interested in different role-playing games especially since I moved from mainly playing on PC to playing almost only on consoles. I didn't buy any handhelds until recently. My brother did have a Sega Game Gear and GameBoy though. Worth mentioning is that I am terrible at platform games. Completing New Super Mario Bros. was quite a challenge while it is regarded as being too simple. But the last two months have almost only been about Tetris games. It's just very recently that I looked for other block games and found TA and Puyo Puyo. You can say that I went from being a semi-hardcore gamer to a casual gamer.
Re: Can you tell me more about... I love racing games, especially the Gran Turismo series. I like how you identified only early NFS games. EA has sort of destroyed the series, with the last great one for me being NFS Hot Pursuit 2. NFS Underground was a complete abomination, especially for the removal of the police cars, which were what made the series great for me. Aside from TrackMania, which I mentioned in my previous post, I also think that the Burnout series (again the early ones) are excellent.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? I originally played Tetris on the gameboy but I never actually owned it. I maybe played it maybe 20times. I didnt really enojy it at the time. I'd seen the famous TGM finals death mode vid a few years ago and was VERY impressed by it but never followed it up. Sometime in late Dec2006 a friend and I were flicking through some Snes Roms on my xbox out of bordem for something to play and we decided to play 2player on Tetris off Tetris/Dr Mario, I really enjoyed it! He slautered me but it was alot of fun. The next week I visited You Tube to try and get some tips to beat my friend at Tetris (i was really terrible). I was really inspired from watching videos of great Tetris players on You Tube. I was so impressed by the skill/speed/precision/thought involved in playing Tetris well, I NEEDED to get good at this game! I soon stumbled upon TC and discovered the TGM series of Tetris games and from then on I was hooked on it trying to get my first Gm. I would consider myself above average, I guess. I am still a little sloppy and I make some really silly moves but i feel I am improving, slowly. 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? I have only been playing TGM1 really. I have just started getting into texmaster death mode in past few months mainly trying to survive Lv300 speed and trying to learn some of the more ambitious overhang and repaire moves. (bvw1079 is GREAT at this ) I used to find myself thinking too much about how to fill in a tricky overhang, but I am slowly starting to identify what options I have and whats needed without thinking about it a long as I used too. I am still not happy with my skill level yet though. I plan on moving onto TAP soon. I play about 30mins a day. 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? Until Tetris I'd given up playing games for about 2 years. Up until then though I was playing Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo competatively and 2D Vertical Shoot em up's. I hold the record for the only "2ALL" both loops cleared on Strikers 1945II PCB outside of Japan, as far as i know from western internet scoretables. 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. Im not too sure about this one, Tetris in the only puzzles game i have given any real time too.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? I don't now why, but I can tell you how: I think it was about 7 years ago I got a GameBoy Color for my birthday, and I can remember that my brothers had a broken GameBoy, but with a working oldschool, original cartridge of the beautiful game Tetris. So I played it a lot and I kept trying to beat my records (somewhere between 350K-400K, unfortunately the game doesn't save it ). But then a few years ago, I just wanted a new handheld; a DS Lite. The first game I bought was Tetris DS, because of the fact I could play my favourite game online against others all over the world. But because there had been many changes in gameplay between the original Tetris for GameBoy and TDS, I learned new things like T-spins by the wiki on this site. I don't consider myself as a good Tetris player, but I do consider myself as a good, more than average, TDS player. 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? I have Tetris for GameBoy (don't play this game a lot anymore) and I have TDS; So if I have a long period with nothing to do, I can easily play TDS 8 hours a day...but when I have a long period when I have to go prison (aka school) I unfortunately play 0 hours. 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? I have a Xbox (not 360) and I play(ed) a lot: Halo(1 and 2), Project Gotham Racing(1 and 2), Splinter Cell(1, 2 and3) and GTA(III, Vice City and San Andreas). And I also played Minesweeper on the PC...I just cannot get under 2 minutes ...current expert record of mine = 122 sec. 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. Why playing others, if you already play the best puzzle game
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? I first played Tetris on the fat grey GameBoy I received for Christmas when I was three years old. Today I'm 18, so it looks like I've been playing for around 15 years. 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? I mostly play TGM1 and TAP. I haven't been playing consistently at all lately, but I try to play 30-60 minutes a day. Sometimes I'll play for longer if I need to pass a larger chunk of time that day. For example, I used to play for 2 hours every other day when I had an open period in my school schedule with another class right after it. 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? beatmania IIDX, Pop'n Music, a wide array of shmups, occasionally some fighters EDIT: I forgot about some cool stuff like Pac-Man Championship Edition, but I'm sure I'll never remember _everything_. So, I'll just append "...and many more!" 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. Panel de Pon, Puzzle Fighter, Dr. Mario, Wetrix... All I can think of at the moment.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. I've always been playing tetris off an on since I started out playing it on a friend's gameboy when I was about 5 or so. I had always gone through periods of where I was really interested in tetris but because I was a lot better than my friends and the marathon modes weren't all that great I'd eventually lose interest. It wasn't until I saw the Tetris Japan Finals vid that I really became interested in tetris a serious game. Unfortunately, the vid I saw of it was cropped and didn't show the arcade part so my search for the game wasn't very successful, but I did come across tetris DS eventually and I found TC when I searched for t-spins on google. 2. I play tetris DS, lockjaw and a little heboris and texmaster. I don't have too much time because of school so maybe 30mins to an hour a day on the weekdays if I'm lucky. A little more on the weekends. 3. I used to be into smash bros melee, got brawl but don't play that too much now. I also play a variety of other fighters occasionally and other puzzle games, but not very much these days. 4. bust a move (favorite non-tetris puzzle game), super puzzle fighter, planet puzzle league (also pokemon puzzle league), and puyo pop are all great. Other great puzzle games but aren't traditional falling block/tetris type games are echochrome, crush, Intelligence Quotient 2, intelligent qube, picross, and neves. Man looking at that list there are a lot of great puzzle games, if only there was enough time for them all.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? I first started playing Tetris in sophomore year of highschool because some friends invited me to play TetriNET. I was having so much fun and got hooked by the multiplayer. I've been playing tetris ever since, so it's been a good amount of years. After watching the japanese players videos, I don't consider myself a great player. However, I want to be one so I keep playing and try to improve. 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? I used to play TetriNET2 daily before its server shut down, and ever since I've been playing some Tetris DS and Heboris. When Tetris Friends came out, I started focusing on it and don't really play any other Tetris versions anymore. I average maybe 2 hours of tetris a day, more if i'm really bored. 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? I used to play Guildwars from time to time, and Counter-Strike Source. With school and a girlfriend I don't have much time for games anymore. 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. I've heard good things of Super Puzzle Fighter and Lumines, I don't play them but you might like them.
Re: Can you tell me more about... 1. I started playing tetris roughly 18 years ago (I was 10) when my mother bought me a lovely big white Gameboy. The 80 quid it cost was more than enough for her (pretty expensive back then too really) so I was "stuck" with the game that came in the box. That meant roughly 4 months with a new console and only Tetris. The next game I bought was Kirby's Dream Land which was so ridiculously easy (but hyper cute) that I was back on Tetris in a couple of days. I consider myself to be very good at the official games (currently 1 in UK at Tetris Zone and 16 in the world) but not quite master (it's coming) and utter trash at the TGM type games. I've had a play but will have a bash properly once I have finished my officially mission 2. Just answered that in one really. I play Tetris Zone and Tetris Splash the most, about 2 hours on a working day and about 4 on a day off. 90% Zone 10% Splash. I also play DS on journeys and Friends when I fancy hitting my head against a brick wall. A little TGM on Mame and Lockjaw on a GBA emulator. I suspect I'll play a bit more TGM when I get my Dreamcast back and I can play with those awesome joysticks. 3. Devil May Cry 4, Ninja Gaiden, Street Fighter 2,3 etc, Katamari, Call of Duty 4, Halo 3 and I'm sharpening up for some high scores on Pac-Man C.E. 4. Lumines Rules. Puzzle Fighter is fun.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Sorry for the delay, I've busy the last few days. "Retired"... I think you read a certain misleading thread title without reading the thread itself. I was retiring an avatar. About TA, I'm merely an ok player, but I suppose I can give some general advice. Probably the easiest way to get into the game is playing VS against the CPU. I'd also recommend not neglecting the puzzle mode, and be sure to study all the common skill chains. This page is old and crusty, but still contains valuable information. Time Trial and Endless is relatively unforgiving. I'd only play those after a healthy dose of the other modes. 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? I first played on other people's gameboys and PCs. I liked the game a lot, and eventually bought it on NES. Then I stopped playing it like everyone else, and even sold my NES and games at a garage sale. I started up again with TGM1 after seeing the famous "tetris japan finals" video. I guess that would be in 2002 or 2003. But I really didn't play that regularly at first. There was no good centralised tetris community back then. 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? Almost exclusively TAP and Ti, on my arcade machine. I don't really play every day... Perhaps Id's average to about an hour per day on weekdays and 4 hours per day on weekends, in an active week. I'll take breaks though. 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ) keep you busy? Nothing else that I play as regularly. I've revently played through Mario Galaxy and Geometry Wars Galaxies. Previous games I've really enjoyed include Super Monkey Ball (the first game), F-Zero GX, and God Hand. 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. Tetris Attack obviously. I easily consider TGM and TA as the 2 best puzzle concepts, by far. I also like Wario's Woods (SNES), especially playing against a human opponent. Aside from that there's a lot of puzzle games I enjoy, but don't find as deep or captivating, like Puzz Loop 2, Polarium, and Star Sweep. I'm not a fan of Puyo-ish games.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Heh, same. I wish I had remained dedicated. I didn't start playing consistently until 2006.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Code: 1. How and why did you start playing Tetris? Can you also please specify how long you have been playing Tetris and if you consider yourself a great player? ^^ 2. What Tetris games do you play and how much do you play daily on average? 3. What other games besides Tetris (if any ^^) keep you busy? 4. Any other block/puzzle game you recommend I should look into? Tetris variants are also welcome. 1; the first time i played tetris was when i was like 9 years old.. i had a 9999 in one games i used to love it! it lasted me like a year until i left it by accident on a bus.. i didnt played tetris again until i tetris ds.. 12 years after... im a medium player... 2; i play tetris ds and the game boy version... i love their multiplayers... i had tetris on my cellphone... but the my stupid phone broke and i had to get a new one... yup... lost me tetris!... i now play tetris like 20 mins every month on the ds... something like that... i might pick it up again... classics never die! 3; ive been playing mario kart wii... im getting tired of it... 4; i played tetrisphere (or something like that for the N64) for like a week and it was pretty cool!
Re: Can you tell me more about... Those 9999 games in 1 things should be sued for false advertising. There's like 9 games. colour_thief, Geometry Wars on the Wii or DS?
Re: Can you tell me more about... Wii, using classic controller. I got all gold medals, except for a couple co-op levels.
Re: Can you tell me more about... That's the same time for me as well, and the same regrets. But what can you do when you believe it is impossible to play like that Japanese? Without CT I wouldn't have seen the truth.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Again thanks for your replies everyone! I've looked for some info about the Japan finals that a lot of you mentioned and all I have found is one video of the Tetris Japan Finals of 2001. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF6o9Vgo4qc Is this what got you interested in TGM? EDIT: I just remembered were I saw this movie before. It was mentioned in the TGM gameplay essay written by PetitPrince. Also it seems that a lot of members found this site when looking for more information on T-Spins. Porsche Unleashed or Porsche 2000 is my favorite NFS game closely followed by the 2 Hot Pursuit games. And yeah EA... What do I need to say more. I haven't heard of TrackMania before and I only played the Burnout Paradise demo for a while. I was not at home when I checked the website. Your nickname caught my attention and I wanted to make sure it was really you. When I saw the GM avatar there was no doubt in my mind that it was really you. And at about that time I left in order not to get in trouble. Thanks for the link and your advice. Those gifs look really helpful. Until now I relied on 2 FAQs I found at GameFAQs which are pretty complex for a beginner. I had to laugh when you mentioned not to neglect the puzzles. This is the only mode in the game I barely touched. It took me a while too before I started playing the puzzle games in TDS. I'll give them a try asap. I tried playing with the buttons for a while, but one needs superhuman reflex to get a good score that way. :s Thank you and everyone else for you recommendations. I will look into it when I have more time. At the moment Tetris and TA will be (challenging) enough. At first I was also shocked, but there was no way to doubt it with all the videos currently online. My brother played the DS version a while ago. I've only played the Retro Evolved mode for about 2 hours. My high score was about 230.000, but my brother seems to achieve a few millions quite easlily.
Re: Can you tell me more about... Yeah, I have the DS version too. It might sound stupid and obvious, but the trick to Geometry wars is simply to not die, because your score increases almost exponentially as long as you stay alive.
Re: Can you tell me more about... That's the one yes! It was originally a video available from Arika's website. It's filename was changed the "tetris japan finals" by some random person and that changed file is what spread around for whatever reason. As far as I know it's just a gameplay video... Not any "finals" of any kind.
