I wish just once someone would call me "sir", without adding "you're making a scene".

Tetris is a puzzle game invented by Alexey Pazhitnov (last name sometimes transliterated Pajitnov) in 1985, while he was working for the Academy of Sciences in Moscow, Russia during the days of the Soviet Union. Pajitnov has cited pentominoes as a source of inspiration for the game. Its name is derived from the Russain word "tetra" meaning four, as all of the blocks are made up of four segments. In an interview with G4 on the subject of tetris' creation, Pajitnov has also stated that the only other game he really liked at the time was tennis. And thus, by combining "tetra" and "tennis", he created the word "tetris".

The game (or one of its many variants) is available for nearly every video game console and computer operating system, as well as on devices such as graphing calculators, mobile phones, and PDAs. Tetris has even appeared as part of an art exhibition on the side of Brown University's 14-story Sciences Library [1]. The game first gained mainstream exposure and popularity beginning in 1989 when Nintendo released it for Game Boy. Tetris consistently appears on lists of the greatest video games of all time; it is believed to be the best selling game ever, due to its wide availability on almost every modern computer and game system made.

Seven randomly rendered tetrominoes or tetrads - shapes composed of four blocks each - fall down the playing field. The object of the game is to manipulate these tetrominoes with the aim of creating a horizontal line of blocks without gaps. When such a line is created, it disappears, and the blocks above (if any) fall. As the game progresses, the tetrominoes fall faster, and the game ends when the stack of Tetrominoes reaches the top of the playing field.

The seven rendered tetrominoes in Tetris are referred to as I, T, O, L, J, S, and Z. All are capable of single and double clears. I, L, and J are able to clear triples. Only the I tetromino has the capacity to clear four lines simultaneously, and this clear is referred to as a "tetris." (This may vary depending on the rotation and compensation rules of each specific Tetris implementation; For instance, in the "Tetris Worlds" rules used in many recent implementations, certain rare situations allow T, S and Z to 'snap' into tight spots, clearing triples.)

I hate the fucking squigly piece... I remember it being russian... that music was kick ass... i need to learn it...