Alexey Pajitnov must sleep terribly at night. While his products are much loved by their users, ultimately, he has ruined countless lives. In this regard, yes, Alexey Pajitnov is no better than a drug dealer. Pajitnov cooked up, like so much crystal methamphetamine, the much loved game of Tetris. While working as a computer programmer in the Former Soviet Union, Pajitnov created the game as a way to kill some time. Amazingly, the game spread out from behind the Iron Curtain, and eventually found its way to various companies, each of which would claim rights to developing/publishing the games. The story of Tetris is so amazingly convoluted that if I were to try and explain it any further, I would need to create new words, with completely new meanings, in such an abundance as to create a new language. However, if you do want to know more about Alexey Pajitnov and Tetris, consult your local library, or hunt down a copy of the BBC’s Tetris: From Russia with Love.

Due in part to the game’s addictive qualities, Tetris has been ported to just about everything with a screen and a microchip inside. Actually, scratch that: they’ve even made versions without either of those two prerequisites. So while you have very little excuse to have never played a game of Tetris, there are yet more version of this classic puzzler to be discovered. Today we’ll look at two versions of Tetris made with the express purpose of driving you insane.

Magic Eye Tetris (Platform: Web based, so a compatible browser like Firefox)

Magic Eye Tetris takes two well known, and up until this point entirely separate, cultural phenoms: the game of Tetris and the vision destroying Magic Eye pictures and merges the two together in an effort to melt your brain. I wish I could tell you more about this game, but for the life of me, I can’t see anything. I know how to focus on magic eyes too, but still, no dice. However, I’d imagine this game being the biggest eyesore ever created: a magic eye compelling enough to force you to stare for hours at end.

Bastet a.k.a Bastard Tetris. (Platform: Linux, Mac, Windows)

Do you often find yourself swearing at the order of pieces you receive in a normal game of Tetris? Swearing that the game is intentionally screwing you over? Well, Bastard Tetris is a version of the game that actually is trying to screw with you. As you play the game, the computer calculates the worst possible piece to give you. It even taunts you with a picture of the piece you’d like to receive with a note saying “Won’t give you this one!” The bastard.

The game is downright impossible. If you manage a score above 8 cleared lines you are more machine than human. Seriously, the world record is probably under 12 lines.

Complimenting the game’s bastard tactics, is the pain of installing the program:

On Debian-based Linux machines (this includes you, Ubuntu users!), you can simply use sudo apt-get install bastet. Then launch a terminal and type bastet to play. Gentoo users are already bastards enough to not require this game at all.

On computers running Mac OSX, you’ll have to dig much deeper into the command line than you’re used to, using Darwin Ports. Sadly, the game will be the biggest bastard for you to install.

Windows computers: check the original author’s site for a link to the windows download. Just install the .exe. You also have the option of downloading Abandoned Bricks which includes a “Bastard” mode

Please, try not to drive yourselves cross-eyed and insane by playing these games.

- Rob O’Reilly

Posted on Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 at 1:28 am in the category:Computer, Linux, Tetris. Comment RSS 2.0 feed. Comment it , or trackback this post.