There's been talk of a Tetris film for years, but from the looks of it, the critical failure of movies like Pixels and Battleship may have slowed Hollywood's enthusiasm for adapting toys and games that have no established narratives of their own. In this case, that's actually a shame, because the story of the development and localization of Tetris is quite fascinating. With Tetris: The Games People Play, writer and artist Box Brown recently took that story to comics, and it's one of the best novels (graphic or otherwise) that I've read in years. If you're headed back to school this month, you should ask your teachers if they might add it to their curriculum. It would work in art, history, sociology, computer science, or even psychology courses, depending on how cleverly the instructor handles the challenge.
Part of what makes the book work is how it connects so many unrelated parts together to form a greater whole. Yes, that's also what happens in a game of Tetris, but no, Box Brown isn't hammy enough to actual spell that out in the comic itself. Instead, he subtly puts each seemingly random piece of the Tetris saga next to its appropriate partner as it naturally presents itself to the equation.
Chronologically, it all starts with the creation Senet, an ancient Egyptian game of strategy. We then move forward to the formation of Nintendo, the competitive card playing company, founded by artist Fusajiro Yamauchi in 1889. From there, Shigero Miyamoto, the Sega Master System, Ronald Reagan, Blasteroids, Gunpei Yoko, Kurt Lewin, the Atari 7800, Mikhail Gorbachev, Judge Fern M. Smith, and of course, Tetris creator Alexey Pajitnov, all end up coming together in a chain of events that's as unlikely as they come. All of them turning in just the right sequence eventually led to the release of Tetris for the original Game Boy, an event that changed the world of art and technology forever.
via destructoid http://ift.tt/2vJ4UKy