Tetris Spokesman Calls Angry Birds a Fad

[omicron1]

So... Starcraft hasn't been around long enough to become a sport yet?


I think this person is just making peeved noise. Especially in the fly-by-night world of videogames, where you can tell if a game is good mainly by whether or not anyone's playing it a year or so later. Angry Birds may well be a fad, but it is also going to be remembered, like it or not, if only because of how successful it was.

 

[Dogstile]

Who the hell actually plays Tetris anymore?

Possibly the nine million or so monthly users on facebook games, people with my phone, me?

Just sayin'

 

[brainslurper]

if there's one thing the cast of Angry Birds is good at, it's knocking down blocks.

I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU

OT: I think he is partially right, the only way angry birds is going to stay relevant as long as tetris has is going to be by releasing it over and over long after anything is genuinely being added other then graphical improvements. See also:

Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda

 

[DarkRyter]

I never understood what's the big deal with Angry Birds.

Fling a thing, knock stuff down. I've played like 15 flash games that do the exact same thing.

 

[scorptatious]

He calls it a fad, I call it an overrated piece of crap that's a knockoff of far superior flash games.

I hear this criticism about Angry Birds a lot and to me, it doesn't hold a lot of weight. That's like saying Halo is a knockoff of Half Life. Or Sonic is a knock off of Mario.

The thing I hate about it is how it exploited an original idea, that as above stated was done far better, created a viral marketing campaign that pandered to the demographic of 12 year old girls who couldn't tell you a single game from Bioware's library, but think the birds are SOO CUTEEEEEEEEEE ~*U*~ omg.


Maybe that's just me being cynical in my cynic cave of cynicalness, cynically clutching my copy of Warcraft III and Quake against my warm, cynical chest, kicking back the hordes of young gamers who are too blinded by flashy explosions to acknowledge the rampant design flaws in Modern Warfare 3 with my cynical foot.

Then I have to stare down at my childhood, slipping away between my keyboard-toned forearms, tears fill my eyes as everything I ever loved fades into irrelevance...


What I'm trying to say is it's just not my type of game.

Oh that's fine. I'm not saying you have to like the game. I'm just giving out my opinion.

And I wish you a Merry Christmas. It sounds like you need one.

 

[Robert Ewing]

And tetris isn't a fad? A fad that has been dragged out far too long in a desperate bid to say that the classics were the best gaming will ever get?

 

[Aprilgold]

It is really sad when someone who distributes a videogame I grew up with sounds like some cranky old fart about a new game.
I've never played Angry Birds but I have nothing against a game that actually helps people understand a bit of physics. (And that pigs rule the world)

Well, go play Crush the Castle and you are basically playing Angry Birds for free. Angry Birds, like so many other, ripped off flash games because of their simple nature. Making them ideal to sell in the app store. Angry Birds got god damn huge because of impulse sales and word of mouth. However, Crush the Castle got shot aside from what was its concept and its gameplay style. Angry Birds is a fucking fad because people are ignorant of flash games, which are mainly good.

 

[imnot]

Who the hell actually plays Tetris anymore?

me... I love it, I had a Tetris compotition with my IT teacher, I won by 32000 points...

I'll go cry my self to sleep now.

EDIT: In fact now I think of it Tetris wont last forever, we all know what happened to the Soviet Union!

 

[him over there]

And tetris isn't a fad? A fad that has been dragged out far too long in a desperate bid to say that the classics were the best gaming will ever get?

This doesn't really make sense. tetris isn't a fad. The fact that people still play it after twenty years proves it isn't a fad because a fad is something fleeting that barely holds interest and lives only through a few die hard fans. Tetris is still played by ten million people, many of whom did not grow up with the original so it's not just people dragging it out to say classics are best. Would it have given birth to it's own genre while still being a contender itself if it was a a fad? No. Angry birds is just the billionth iteration of a crappy flash game on the internet that got a freebie because it was first on iOS and had a marketable image.

 

[similar.squirrel]

His words carry some weight, given how long Tetris has been around. On the other hand, his name is 'Henk'.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

I have to agree for reasons stated in this thread.

Who the hell actually plays Tetris anymore?

All these undercover Tetris players, comin' out to represent. You think you man enough to fight all of us? I got mah backup, ya dig? /fake gangster voice

 

[Caverat]

Eh, don't know why the tetris guy is acting high and mighty, all it has over angry birds as far as I am concerned is nostalgia gloss, and being more difficult. He's probably right though, more people will still remember tetris than angry birds, same way more people will remember Mario bros than Super meatboy. Nostalgia, works every time, even when a game isn't any better.

 

[andy25100]

If it came to me having to choose between Tetris & Angry Birds, Tetris would win in a heartbeat.

 

[Folji]

I never understood what's the big deal with Angry Birds.

Fling a thing, knock stuff down. I've played like 15 flash games that do the exact same thing.

Same here. I've seen and played several "fling X, knock down Y" games long before Angry Birds was even released. Guess the real fad nowadays is taking single things out of small piles of similar things and call that one thing an outstanding innovation. Like Minecraft.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

Remember this?

I think that warrants merchandise doesn't it?

Plushies may be out of the window, but how about a full on jewelery line? Cufflinks, necklaces, bracelets, earings... It all works!

You could also make Mugs, Mouse mats, tshirts, pretty much everything! Not only that, but you could bring out a subtle, yet stylish range! Its not hard to stamp/stitch some arranged squares on things... How about a tie-clip.cufflink.handkercheif set that has small, but polite, tetris peices engraved/stiched into it?

 

[Epona]

Personally, I just believe Tetris lives on just because it came out at a time where there weren't many substitutes for its type of gameplay, its music was really addicting, and it just so happened to have enough challenge to let casuals have something to do while letting hardcore people become Tetris gods.

I do agree that Angry Birds is probably a fad, but for different reasons entirely. imo, Tetris just had the right timing; Angry Birds lives on in an era of short attention spans where everyone can produce a game just as addicting as it in about half the time. It can't stand up to Tetris because of the competition it faces.

Tetris was on a level as high or higher than top NES titles in the late 80's. Angry Birds can't touch a AAA game today. There is even a Tetris game out on the Wii and DS and they aren't selling for 99 cents.

If your theory were true, people would have stopped playing Tetris long ago.

 

[Epona]

And tetris isn't a fad? A fad that has been dragged out far too long in a desperate bid to say that the classics were the best gaming will ever get?

25 years =/= a fad.

Dear Escapist: No other forum makes me continually prove that I am human and not a spammer.

 

[Nergy]

There is a distinct difference between the people who play Tetris and those who play Angry Birds. Angry Birds wouldn't have sold half as much if it was $5. A game which is as fun as a lot of lower end flash games on Newgrounds is NOT worth $5. But at a $1 to the people who own iphones, it's the shiz.

Tetris is a simple yet brilliant idea based on an ORIGINAL concept that was the first game to completely transcend generational boundaries and still does. While Angry Birds is a flash game that is a shameless rip-off of Crash the Castle, that people play when they're too bored to do anything constructive or brain-taxing.

This is coming from someone who doesn't play Tetris in any form, it's not my cup of tea. But this doesn't mean i can't see how brilliant the design of it is.

 

[Arppis]

Tetris is propably my favourite game of all time.

 

[Strazdas]

well i dont like either of them really. then again im not a casual gamer at all.

But i wouldnt go as brave as calling it a fad. after all, peopel called rock'n'roll a fad. and rap and techno, and skateboards and snowboards and computers and digital trade and back in the days even cars. some "Fads" dont fade.

P.S. capcha: fiotion value (almost fiction value)