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How to lose at Tetris

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2016

Heidi Burgiel
Heidi Burgiel*
Affiliation:
Department of Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science, m/c 249, University of Illinois at Chicago, 851 South Morgan St., Chicago, IL 60607-7045 The Geometry Center, 1300 South Second Street, Minneapolis, MN 55454, USA
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Extract

Tetris is a computer game which has obsessed many computer users and attracted much attention, despite the simplicity of its rules. This paper addresses the question: ‘can you “win” the game Tetris?’

Designed by Soviet mathematician Alexey Pazhitnov in the late eighties and imported to the United States by Spectrum Holobyte, Tetris won a record number of software awards in 1989. Versions of Tetris are sold for most personal computers. There are Tetris arcade games, Tetris Nintendo cartridges, and hand-held Tetris games; Tetris has been played on machines ranging from mainframes to calculators. The game's success has prompted the invention of several similar games, including Hextris, Welltris, and Wordtris.

Type
Articles
Information
The Mathematical Gazette , Volume 81 , Issue 491 , July 1997 , pp. 194 - 200
Copyright
Copyright © The Mathematical Association 1997

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References

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