TETRIS: 1984 is the date of conception (1989) ♥

Given the ongoing discussion about whether or not TETRIS turns 40 years old in 2024 or 2025, I keep my eye out for early mentions of the game. As a bonus, this is an item that at the time of me posting it to social media a couple of days ago had not been covered in English anywhere else on the internet. As far as I’m aware this is the earliest printed reference mentioning the conception date of Tetris.

It’s a short interview with Alexey Pajitnov in Japanese PC magazine, Oh! X, conducted mid-1989 around the time of the release of the seminal Game Boy version of TETRIS, the first year the game was available outside of the USSR. It contains this beautiful question and answer:

Japanese text:

Q: TETRIS誕生のきっかけを教えてください。

——いまから5年前の1984年に、IQテスト用プログラムを作ろうとしたのが最初です。そのとき、ペントミノというゲームをベースに5～8個からなるブロックを落下させ、それを回転させて組み合わせるということを考えて作ったのがこのゲームなのです。

English translation:

Q: Please tell us about how TETRIS came to be created.

A: It started 5 years ago in 1984, when I was trying to create a program for IQ testing. At that time, I created this game based on a game called Pentomino, where I came up with the idea of having blocks made up of 5–8 pieces fall down and rotate them to combine them together.

Note: pentomino are comprised of 5 pieces whilst tetromino are comprised of 4 pieces, so the version referred to is certainly an early prototype. I’m not aware of a surviving version of whatever TETRIS was first known as that has blocks of 5–8 pieces.

Bibliography

• Publication: Oh! X, Vol. 8, No. 8 (August 1989)
• ISSN: 0910-7614
• Section: TETRISの原作者パジトノフ氏来日 (TETRIS creator Pajitnov visits Japan)
• Pages: 89–90
• Source scan