Childhood classic: Was Tetris invented by the Russians?

Tetris was invented by the Russians. This man's name is Alexey Pazhitnov.

This famous game once caused an uproar in the legal community in the 1980s, which was the famous Tetris property rights dispute.

Theft and carve-up by European and American powers: This is where the copyright battle begins

In June 1985, Alexei Pajitnov, who was working at the Moscow Scientific Computer Center, played a Jigsaw was later inspired to create a Tetris game for the Electronica 60. It was later ported to PC by Vadim Gerasimov and spread among the Moscow computer community. Pajitnov became famous as a result.

The PC version of Tetris was ported to the Apple II and Commodore 64 by a group of local computer experts in Budapest, Hungary. These versions of the software attracted the attention of Robert Stein, the manager of a British game company called Andromeda ( Robert Stein, he purchased the rights to Tetris from Pajitnov and Hungarian computer experts, and before buying the rights, he sold them to Mirrorsoft in the UK (not Microsoft!) and the United States. Spectrum Holobyte. (Who...)

After negotiations between Stein and Pajitnov in November 1986, no results were achieved on the copyright acquisition issue. Stein even flew directly to Moscow to interview Pajitnov, but came away empty-handed. Since the Russians didn't know much about the video game industry that was already emerging in the West, Stein decided to steal the rights to Tetris, so he spread rumors that it was a Hungarian-developed game.

At the same time, the PC version of Tetris had been produced by Mirrorsoft in the UK and sold in Europe, which received great attention from people at the time. Not only because this game is fun, but also because it is "the first game from an Iron Curtain country." The game promotion posters at that time had strong Cold War colors, such as war scenes, Gagarin's space flight, etc. And Stein still doesn't have a formal legal copyright.

In June 1987, Stein finally obtained the copyright of Tetris on the IBM-PC and its compatible machines, including "any other computer system". However, he did not sign an agreement with the Soviet Union, which means that the copyright is incomplete. (Translator's note: The description of "any other computer system" in the original text was "any other computer system". This statement seemed very loose at the time, which paved the way for the subsequent dispute over property rights.)

The popularity of Tetris on the computer platform in January 1988 caused a situation where "paper is expensive in Luoyang" (disk is expensive in London?). When CBS Evening News interviewed Pajitnov, the father of Tetris, Stein's plan to steal the copyright was completely ruined. (Deserve it!) A new company ELORG (Electronorgtechinca, a software company in the Soviet Union) began to negotiate with Stein on game programming issues. Alexander Alexinko, the head of ELORG, knew that although Stein did not have the copyright, he would use the game development program in his hand as a bargaining chip to threaten to break off negotiations.

Nintendo also got involved: three groups of people attacked the "man in the sleeve"

In May 1988, after several months of quarreling, the exhausted Stein finally and ELORG signs a contract for PC Tetris rights. The contract at the time prohibited the development of arcade and handheld versions of the block game, and the PC version of Tetris became the best-selling game at the time.

In July 1988, Stein discussed with Aleshenko the development of an arcade version of Tetris.

Aleshenko had not yet received a penny in royalties from Stein, but at the same time Spectrum and Mirrorsoft had begun selling the rights to Tetris to video game companies. Spectrum sold the Japanese console and PC rights to Tetris to Bullet-Proof Software (the makers of the FC and GB versions of Tetris), while Mirrorsoft sold its Japanese and North American rights to Atari in the United States. Then the conflict between the two companies began. In November 1988, Tetris (the unfamiliar Tetris 1) released by BPS on FC was released in Japan, with sales of 2 million copies.

With the development of GB in November 1988, the manager of NOA (Nintendo of America) Minoru Arakawa (the son-in-law of Nintendo's Mr. Yamauchi) hoped to make Tetris into a game on GB. So he contacted Henk Rogers, the president of BPS. When Rogers contacted Stein again, he was rejected. So he went directly to Moscow to buy the rights. Sensing the limelight, Stein also took a flight to Moscow; at the same time, Kevin Maxwell, the son of Robert Maxwell, the head of Spectrum, was also heading to Moscow. In this way, the three groups of people arrived at the ice-covered red city almost at the same time.

On February 21, 1989, Rogers first met with ELORG representative Evgeni Belikov (the same name as the "man in the condom"). He impressed the Soviets such as Pajitnov and signed the rights to the block game for handheld mobile phones. He then showed the FC version of Tetris to the Russians, which shocked Belikov. Because he did not grant Rogers the copyright for the home console! Rogers told them that he purchased the copyright from TENGEN, but Belikov had never heard of the name of the company TENGEN. In order to ease the embarrassing situation, Rogers told Belikov all the facts that Stein had concealed, and promised to pay the Soviet Union more checks as the copyright fee for the FC version of Tetris that had been sold. At this time, Rogers discovered that he had the opportunity to buy the copyrights for all Tetris models (but he had not yet bought it at the time). Although Atari would look at him with disdain, don't forget that behind him and BPS, he also has Nintendo as a big backer. support.

Note: The original agreement signed by Robert Stein was only for the copyright of the computer version of Tetris, and the other copyrights were not his.

Later, Stein and ELORG re-signed the agreement. The modified content in the contract that Belikov forced him to re-sign was: "The definition of a computer: a machine that includes a central processing unit, a monitor, a disk drive, a keyboard and an operating system." But Stein did not look carefully at these definitions at the time. (This time it was his turn to mess up...) Later he realized that this was a trick played by Rogers to steal the copyright from him. But it was too late. The next day he was told that although the signed document could no longer be changed, he could still get the development rights to the arcade version of Tetris. Three days later, he signed a deal for the arcade version.

FC copyright is in trouble again:

Fully reflects the state’s intervention in the economy. Kevin Maxwell visited ELORG on February 22, 1989. Belikov took out the FC game card Rogers gave him and asked him about it. Maxwell saw Mirrorsoft's name on the cassette and remembered that his company had sold some of the copyrights to Atari. (Foolish people do dumb things...) When he wanted to continue talking about the copyright issues of Street Fighter and handheld consoles, he found that the only agreements he could sign were for other than computers, arcades, home consoles and handheld consoles.

(In fact, it means there is no agreement to sign, unless he invents a new entertainment system, such as Tetris blocks...) When he was confused, this guy had an idea and told Belikov that the cassette was pirated (sweat...) , and then you also need to sign an agreement for home use. The final result was: Kevin Maxwell took away only a blank piece of paper, and Robert Stein took away the Arcade Agreement. Since Maxwell claimed that all FC cards were pirated, ELORG retained the copyright of the home console and did not sell it to anyone. If Maxwell wanted to obtain the rights to the home console, he would have to outbid Nintendo. Henk Rogers purchased the rights to the console and informed Arakawa. BPS reached a deal with Nintendo to produce the GB version of Tetris: the deal was worth US$5 million to US$10 million.

GB version of Tetris

GB version of Tetris On March 15, 1989, Henk Rogers returned to Moscow and spent huge sums of money on behalf of Nintendo to acquire the copyright for the home console version of Tetris. . Although the price of the copyright fee has not been disclosed to the outside world, this figure will never be available to Mirrorsoft. Even Minoru Arakawa and NOA CEO Howard Lincoln personally went to the Soviet Union to help.

On March 22, 1989, the home console agreement between ELORG and Nintendo was finally reached. Nintendo insisted on adding a statement that after the agreement was signed, if there was a legal dispute with other parties, the Soviet Union must send someone to testify in a U.S. court. In fact, such legal disputes will be inevitable. It is said that ELORG only received a deposit of US$3-5 million. Belikov notified Mirrorsoft that Mirrorsoft, Andromeda, and Tengen did not own the rights to the consoles, and that the rights now belonged to Nintendo. That night, the leaders of Nintendo and BPS held a celebration party in a Moscow hotel.

(Everyone understands that the copyrights for home consoles and handheld consoles are now in the hands of Nintendo and BPS respectively. Neither Atari nor Tengen has the right to produce the FC version of Tetris.)

On March 31, 1989, Howard Lincoln happily (gloated?) sent an ultimatum (fax) to Atari, telling them to immediately stop the FC (NES) version of the Tetris game. This made both Atari and Maxwell very angry. They wrote back in the name of Tengen and said that on April 7th they already owned the copyright to the home console Tetris.

On April 13, 1989, Tengen wrote an application requesting the copyright of Tetris' "audio-visual works, source programs and game music". However, the application did not mention Alexei Pajitnov and Nintendo’s game copyright issues. (Ignoring Alexei Pajitnov was a big mistake!)

Meanwhile, Maxwell used his media power to try to regain Tetris' position. The Soviet and British governments even moved out to intervene in the Tetris copyright issue. (What a great honor!) As a result, it provoked a conflict between Su *** (!) and ELORG. Even Gorbachev assured Maxwell that "you don't have to worry about Japanese companies in the future." (Khan...this Maxwell is really not a good person...the great Soviet government is paying attention to Tetris...) Later in April, when Howard Lincoln returned to Moscow, he found that ELORG was already under the supervision of the Soviet government. He couldn't hold his head up under the pressure, and in the middle of the night, NOA called him and told him that Tengen had sued Nintendo. (The storm is about to come...)

The next day, he met with Belikov, Pajitnov and several other ELORG members to ensure that they could provide Nintendo with evidence of the lawsuit. (This time the terms in the contract came into effect.) NOA immediately countersued Tengen and began to collect evidence.

Is the FC a computer or a home console? Nintendo wins a big victory

On May 17, 1989, Tengen published a large Tertis advertisement in USA Today, although a court battle was imminent.

In June 1989, the case between Tengen and Nintendo finally went to trial. The theoretical battle mainly centered on one issue: whether the NES (FC) was a computer or a video game console. (No one is allowed to laugh, this is a very serious topic in court) Atari believes that NES is a computer system because it has expansion functions, and Japan's Famicom also has network functions. Nintendo's evidence is even more pertinent: the Soviets in ELORG had never intended to sell Tetris' home console copyright, and the concept of a so-called "computer" had already been mentioned in the agreement with Stein.

On June 15, 1989, a court hearing was held to discuss Nintendo and Tengen's mutual orders to cease production and sales of their respective Tetris software. Judge Fern Smith declared that neither Mirrorsoft nor Spectrum Holobyte owned the console rights, so the rights they provided to Tengen could not be enforced. Nintendo's request was eventually granted.

On June 21, 1989, all Tengen versions of Tetris were withdrawn from shelves, and production of the game cartridges was also forced to cease. Hundreds of thousands of copies of software remain in boxes and sealed in warehouses.

In July 1989, the Nintendo NES version of Tetris was released in the United States. U.S. sales are approximately 3 million. At the same time, the Game Boy bundled with the GB version of Tetris swept the United States, and a whirlwind of cubes blew across the land of America.

The melee about Tetris has come to an end at this time. The court dispute between Nintendo and Tengen lasted until 1993.

Epilogue: Crazy money and wasted work?! Fortunately, the players did not suffer.

Epilogue Atari Games still developed the arcade version of Tetris and sold about 20,000 machines. . Atari Games was recently acquired by Williams/WMS, and the fate of the NES version of Tetris stored in warehouses is unknown. Tengen could not dispose of them through other means, so the software was presumably destroyed. However, it is said that there are still about 100,000 copies of the Tengen version of Tetris flowing into the market.

The so-called "Tetris 2" we play today in the D-version cards of games such as 64-in-1 is actually the Tengen version of that year. To be fair, this version of Tetris is much more fun than the BPS version. First of all, the operation feel and button settings of this version are very good. AB is for forward and reverse rotation respectively, while the BPS version uses the cross key to turn down. It only supports one direction. Press A and it will fall down directly. Very unpleasant; secondly, the two-player battle it supports, the mode of competition and cooperation with the computer is also refreshing. Also, there is no mention of music.

Robert Stein, the initiator of this copyright issue, only made a total of $250,000 on Tetris. He could have made more money, but Atari and Mirrorsoft didn't pay him enough royalties. (The retribution you deserve...) Spectrum Holobyte needs to renegotiate with ELORG to ensure the copyright of the computer version of Tetris.

Robert Maxwell's media fortress gradually fell apart in the melee. The fact that the old Maxwell was the mastermind behind the business was also under investigation, but he suddenly fell ill and died. (So ??angry...) Mirrorsoft UK also sadly withdrew from the stage of history.

The real big winner is BPS president Henk Rogers, and Nintendo behind the scenes. How much money did Tetris make for Nintendo? The answer may never be clear.

Think about it, in the United States, GB is sold bundled with Tetris to increase GB shipments... And people who buy GB because of Tetris will also buy other GB cards... If you calculate it like this, the profit is simply It just snowballed. Currently, a total of 30 million copies of the GB version of Tetris (Z version) have been produced. (Later, GB's Tetris was reissued on SFC and appeared on the screen together with "Doctor Mario", becoming an immortal work.)

As for the Soviet Union, except the Soviet government, who Not much benefit from Tetris either. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the original ELORG personnel were scattered across the country and even around the world, and many people continued to develop games (such as Pajitnov).

Alexey Pajitnov barely made a penny from Tetris. ELORG originally planned to give him the rights to sell Tetris, but immediately canceled the deal. But Pajitnov is still pleased that he was able to produce such a world-famous excellent game. He received a 286 (a great computer in the Soviet Union at the time) as a reward from the Academy of Sciences. And I was assigned a house that was more spacious and brighter than my colleagues’ homes. In 1996, Henk Rogers paid him a reward (a man who repays his kindness), and Pajitnov formed Tetris Company LLC, finally being able to create his own games and collect royalties.

Note: Back then, Tetris was popular in every corner of the world. The entertainment tool invented by a man who was originally a big-pot meal became a treasure that benefits all mankind. Its value far exceeds What I envisioned when developing this software. Although Atari lost miserably in court, thanks to Asian pirate dealers, the Tengen version of Tetris has taken root and blossomed in the hearts of Chinese players, while Nintendo's orthodox Tetris is no longer played in China.