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VGS Weekly Contest - Tetris


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1 hour ago, Jeevan said:

looks like I might have invited the wrong guy to the party @NESfiend @mbd39 

Good job @Sumez!

I am usually a proponent of not poking the sleeping bears week to week in the contest. I assumed tetris would bring out a few badass nonregular participants though. And Im not gitting gud at all. My pipedream that this may be the week I buckle down and become a tetris master is already pretty well out the window. I suck pretty hard

A big part of the problem is I played this using A only growing up. I didnt even realize B was a thing until watching that tetris movie. The switch to a and b is just so contrary to instinct after 20 years. Im not getting that down and getting top 8 good in a week. 

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1 minute ago, NESfiend said:

I am usually a proponent of not poking the sleeping bears week to week in the contest. I assumed tetris would bring out a few badass nonregular participants though. And Im not gitting gud at all. My pipedream that this may be the week I buckle down and become a tetris master is already pretty well out the window. I suck pretty hard

A big part of the problem is I played this using A only growing up. I didnt even realize B was a thing until watching that tetris movie. The switch to a and b is just so contrary to instinct after 20 years. Im not getting that down and getting top 8 good in a week. 

I'm a one way flipper too. I always use B.

 

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3 minutes ago, NESfiend said:

You scored 499k one flipping? That makes it tempting to try again if correct....

Yes. I've been one way flipping for so long that it's part of my muscle memory and it would be hard to change it now.

 

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3 hours ago, NESfiend said:

I am usually a proponent of not poking the sleeping bears week to week in the contest. I assumed tetris would bring out a few badass nonregular participants though. And Im not gitting gud at all. My pipedream that this may be the week I buckle down and become a tetris master is already pretty well out the window. I suck pretty hard

A big part of the problem is I played this using A only growing up. I didnt even realize B was a thing until watching that tetris movie. The switch to a and b is just so contrary to instinct after 20 years. Im not getting that down and getting top 8 good in a week. 

 

3 hours ago, mbd39 said:

I'm a one way flipper too. I always use B.

 

I'm also a one-way flipper. I think this needs to change stat. Also, 1989 called and it said "Hey man, I'm 31. I do what I want!". 

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I can't imagine only rotating one way in Tetris. The thought sounds so counter-intuitive to me. 🙂 Getting a good score like that is super impressive!

But if you prefer playing that way, I'd definitely recommend the original Sega arcade Tetris, it's probably the first really good version of Tetris, despite only having one rotation direction (but three rotation buttons, for quick 270s!). It has some unique mechanics that make it playable at really high speeds, it's a lot of fun.

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13 hours ago, mbd39 said:

It's okay. I'm not that concerned with winning, I just want to do my best. I got some scores over 400k today, best being 477k. Haven't been able to hit 500k yet.

 

I finally hit 400k so I'm good. My personal best was around 450k, but I doubt that I'm going to beat that.

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3 hours ago, Ausden said:

As a gamer who only ever played Tetris casually and never got to level 15, this mess is screwing up my eyes. I am just unable to keep up with the pace. I’m old but I didn’t think I was THAT old!

Here's a tip. Try playing level 18 or 19 for a while and then go back to 15. It will feel much slower.

 

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I think if 15 already feels "too fast" that won't change things too much. But I do recommend playing "above" your comfortable speed level for practice, since improving in Tetris in general is about never getting complacent.

Thing is, 15 isn't fast at all. NES Tetris in general never gets that fast until level 19, but the limitation of the controls, such as pieces locking immediately and the slow sideways repeat makes the game challenging already at level 16 speeds, but also on level 15 if your stack gets more than halfway up (compare modern Tetris variations where the game doesn't get any harder based on the stack height).

Even level 9 is fast if you need to think about every placement, so the game is about figuring out basic strategies and training your brain to make the decision for you, before the next piece even comes out. The piece preview is incredibly important, so use it.

Tetris is a game you can play for ages without improving much, but starting at a base level, improvements will come very quickly. I think if you have the time to play the game just for an hour or so every day of this week, everyone here with even no experience playing Tetris could very easily get a 200K+ score. All it takes is being willing to learn some basic strategies, which there are plenty of resources for.

Starting at level 15, there's 100 lines to go before the game gets faster, so to reach 200k, all you need is around 10 tetrises, that means you can easily waste 60 lines and still get a fair score. So try to just stack up 4 rows high, waiting for the I piece (ideally, keep a column open on the far right side, no time to explain why), and then keep skimming the stack, keeping it low until that one piece comes. 🙂 

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1 minute ago, Bearcat-Doug said:

What level do usually start on when playing for fun?

I like 15 and 18, actually. My usual level 9 starts got boring, although I was practicing them for the contest because I didn't know what Bea had in mind.

 

 

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Just now, mbd39 said:

I like 15 and 18, actually. My usual level 9 starts got boring, although I was practicing them for the contest because I didn't know what Bea had in mind.

 

I usually start at level 9. It's easier for me to slowly build up the speed as opposed to starting on a high level.

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Yeah, almost every single game of NES Tetris will screw you over for I pieces at least at some point, so always be ready for that to happen. Anything above the 4 row high open column on the right should be kept wider if possible, like a "funnel". Two columns open leaves a great space to skim off almost any piece that doesn't fit anywhere else.

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And anything that does fit on the leftmost side of the stack should probably go there while you're able to get them there, because as the stack gets higher it might be hard to get stuff over there.

Another good rule of thumb to keep in mind while playing a game with a ruthless randomizer like this one is, "what would happen is an O piece (the square block) shows up now?". If you don't have a space for that, that's one of the worst things that can ruin a game.

Edited by Sumez
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