You think you’re good at Tetris? I used to think so. But bow down, mere mortals:
http://sio.midco.net/icefreez7/tetris_japan_finals.mpeg
He’s playing at such a high level, blocks aren’t so much falling as they are appearing at the bottom of the screen. The video lasts about five minutes and he’s STILL going strong. Also, this appears to be official tournament video, so I’d bet it’s kosher.
I’d take the video with a shaker of salt. I think it’s been messed with. IMHO.
Recovering Tetris freak speaking.
I’m with Qadgop on this. From what I’ve heard, the infamous mario video was extremely fake and I imagine this is the same. If they did use an emulator the way the mario guy did, they did a good job of making it look real, with the background and split-screen and everything. In fact, the more I watch this, the more I’m sure it must be fake. I just don’t think they’ll go that fast.
There are several places in the video in which a piece is rotated right before it stops, sometimes two rotations. At the speed the video is going, there would be no way to physically push the buttons that quickly. Obviously fake, if you ask me.
It was fun to watch but I was getting skeptical of this footage as well. In the early levels its a pain in the ass to get those pieces to the bottom of the screen and they were locking instantly. Not to mention, the pieces were falling faster than the preview screen could keep up so I’m not sure how you could place the piece the instant it appears, especially on a full-sized screen. Also, as the tetris got higher and higher, don’t you think the player would “slow down” for a second, the clip ended w/o any resolution although I suspect it was the end of the game for him.
Commander Data plays video games?
It’s either cheated or extreme luck, and in either case, I’m not impressed. He gets too many tetres, and he’s not even building them intelligently. Towards the beginning, did you notice how he left a hole two squares wide, so that he needs not one line but two to get the Tetris? And he’s still getting enough of them. Then, later on, there are just too many places when the line shows up immediately after the Tetris is prepared for it.
Also, it looks like he’s deliberately dropping blocks fast… I would just think that the level he’s at is that fast, but there are a few times where something slows down a tad while he’s deliberating. But in the versions I’ve played, once you fast-drop a block, you can’t move or rotate it any more, and he does. I’m not sure if that’s just a different version, or more trickery.
I’m less skeptical. I watched his left hand for a while, and it seems to correlate pretty well with the direction the pieces slide, although I admit you can’t tell 100%.
I think you miscounted. I count 22 out of the first 200 blocks. That’s about 1 in 9.
It’s definitely just a different version. The only ones I’ve seen that don’t let you slide or rotate at the last second are freeware PC versions. All the “professional” ones like the classic for Gameboy do let you do this.
I agree it correlates, but the hands look like they are moving fast, but like they are in a fast-motion film, kind of like the Beatles running around in “Help!”
The video kept pausing on me. Repeatedly there would be a position with holes left that the next piece wouldn’t fill. As soon as it played again the lines with holes would disappear. I’ll go for fake.
don’t ask, I don’t see anything like that. Around what block number does something look amiss?
The background changes every level (100 blocks), and you can easily see the background change on the right-hand side as well. They’re in synch, all right.
It’s possible the entire thing was sped up. It doesn’t look like it to me, but I admit that a fast game player looks a lot like a slow game player sped up. The only way I can think to find out, though, is checking out the speed of the background animations against a real-life version of the arcade game, which is apparently Tetris the Absolute: Grand Master 2 Plus, by Arika.
After watching my sister play, I could almost believe it.
On checking it, there is something amiss with my player I guess because when it happens the display is actually several levels later.
Or Brent Spiner as Commander Data at a computer console in ST:TNG. 
Doesn’t Tetris “max out” after level 15 or so, where subsequent levels don’t get any faster? I’ve gone to level 22 before I finally lost, due to exhaustion more than anything else…
Doesn’t Tetris “max out” after level 15 or so, where subsequent levels don’t get any faster? I’ve gone to level 22 before I finally lost, due to exhaustion more than anything else…