So I decided to get Tetris Effect. I heard about it quite a while ago, recently I was able to play it in VR which was almost a religious experience. I knew I had to get it after that. I was looking for a Tetris game on Steam and was surprised that I didn't find a single offical one there and only after going to the offical Tetris site did I see that you can only get it exclusively from the Epic Games service. Fortunately I have an account so I picked it up and started playing...

The game translates pretty well to a computer screen, although it does take some getting used to the effects as they can get a bit distracting. The game has a similar vibe to Child of Eden, and especially Lumenes. The game was concieved by Tetsuya Mizuguchi, who was repsonsible for both CoE and Lumines, so that isn't all to surprising. Some of the levels, with their distinct tile design and specific sound effects, gave me these intense nostalgia waves from certain levels in Lumines II. They took some of the best parts from Mizuguchi's games and integrated them into Tetris and also added an entirely new mechanic to the game calle "The Zone", where once you get enough meter by clearing lines you can stop time and clear more than 4 lines at a time, going as far as clearing 16 lines in a row called a "Decahexatris". I think it works as a mechanic, perhaps not as elegent an addition as formalizing the T-Spin or beeing able to hold a piece, but it is a very satisfying.

What I found really interesting was how they incorporated a lot of religious and mystical imagery into the visual look of the game. When you first start the game you see a T-block with a thin stream of smoke coming from it like a incense stick, immeadiately suggesting a calming Asian/Buddhist/meditative tone. Some of the levels are called things like "Prayer Circle" and "Ritual" and those levels have religious or mystical visual elements. There are levels that have rich geometric patterns and odd shapes that suggest faces in a DMT trip like style. There is also a collabrative mode where you engage in weekly "Rituals" where a certain amount of people have to complete a task for the goal to be complete. The name of the game itself, Tetris Effect, is a reference to the psychological phenomenon where people will begin seeing Tetris block shapes in their dreams and imagination, even going as far as hallucinating blocks falling in patterns on walls or floors. I think that the game design wants to evoke the sense that playing Tetris is a meditative thing that can have an almost religious effect on the mind, clearing it of thoughts and distractions. I have to say that I myself have noticed, or at least felt that I have noticed, this kind of effect and even intentionally have played Tetris with this in mind.

A while back I saw a documentary about competitive Tetris players called "The Ecstacy of Order" where people from all walks of life had been playing the original NES version of Tetris for years on end, never knowing that others around the world had, like them, been playing the game obsessively. I remembering reading that some people have even gone as far as calling Tetris the first virtual pharmaceutical. Tetris Effect taked that idea and distills it into what I can only call the closed a game can get to being a virtual meditative experience.

On another note, it feels like I'm dreaming a little more, or at least remembering a lot more. I guess it's the change in temperature or light or something. I don't care how it's happening, it's just nice to experience dreaming again, for a little while there it seemed like it was over for me remembering any significant dreams. Given how ga-ga I was over the whole topic for many years, it seemed like such an undramatic end for it to have all just fizzled out.

In a creepy dark house, full of clutter. I find a machine with a crank that allows you to see spirits. I crank it with another person but none of the device's gas lights turn on. I shudder with a case of the creeps, see shadows around me move, hidden faces emerging. #dream -m4ra (@m4radreams) Nov 8, 2019