Tetris Forever review: Forty years of gaming perfection

There’s something to be said about being an ‘old dog’ in the hobby of gaming. At the ripe age of 42, I was alive and playing games when Tetris first took over the world on the Game Boy. This was the first portable version of Alexey Pajitnov’s masterpiece and how a global audience tapped into a truly timeless game, one that is still as perfect today as it was back in 1989, or even in 1985 when Tetris was first developed for the Electronika 60 home computer.

I still remember, though with great concentration, how it felt to play Tetris for the first time. It’s an instinctive game, one that needs no real introduction or teaching. Aside from knowing that you can clear lines by dropping blocks, therefore scoring points, you can just start playing. The concept was simple, as were the controls, and, like so many other titles from the early days of gaming - PAC-MAN, Pong, Donkey Kong - the simplicity was what captured the minds and hearts of players.

The Tetris brand has lasted almost 40 years and has cycled through various iterations including one based on matching up hats that nest inside themselves called Hatris. With this latest release, Tetris Forever, developer Digital Eclipse not only tells the delightful history of the franchise, including the ability to play some lost gems, but they also bring us another legendary original version of the game to rival even the stellar Tetris Effect from 2018.

Upon starting Tetris Forever, you’re welcomed by two quotes. One is from creator Alexey Pajitnov, simply saying, “Play Tetris, my friends.” The other comes from Henk Rogers, who negotiated the deal for Nintendo to obtain the rights to Tetris for the Game Boy. His words read, “Tetris is the one game that’s still going to be around when all the other games are gone.” It is perhaps a somber note, but it reads true due to the timeless nature of the game.

Digital Eclipse

Coming into this review, I knew that I’d have to slap a score on the end of the words here, which caused a great deal of conflict within me. How can you score a Tetris game when its basis hasn’t changed for 40 years? It’s the perfect game because it’s based on logic, you might not be very good at it, but that doesn’t stop it from being perfect.

So, instead of discussing the core of the game, which we’ve all played by now, I will rejoice in the production of this product. Because it’s a celebration of Tetris, one that through video clips, photos, and interviews with creators, builds out an interactive history of the game from inception all the way to 2024 and Tetris Time Warp, the new iteration from Digital Eclipse.

I thought the production would be stuffy and dry, telling the story of development via interviews with Pajitnov and how wrong I was. Each video and photo is a nugget of joy. Pajitnov’s humour comes through in his charming, broken English, his genius is understated and yet exudes through his mini-talks on the game.

Once you’ve learned a bit about the history of Tetris, like a kid in a museum, you get to go hands-on. We’re whisked back through the decades to play Tetris as it appeared when Pajitnov first coded it using symbols from the international keyboard on his Electronika 60 computer. Them, as the history unravels, we can jump into the game on MS-DOS, then the NES. We take a stop to play Hatris, an off-shoot from the Tetris brand, then we can check out Bombliss, which introduced a bomb mechanic for clearing chunks of the playing field, on SNES and Game Boy.

It’s a video game nerd’s personal museum tour built from wonderful candid interviews and archival photographs leading you through (almost) all of Tetris.

It’s a shame that some versions of the game are missing, like the aforementioned masterpiece Tetris Effect, however, the package doesn’t suffer because of it. And because it has an all-new version of Tetris to play in Tetris Time Warp.

Digital Eclipse

Here you’ll play the standard game in time attack or score attack, even bringing in friends via multiplayer, and the playing field is much as you’d imagine it. With lush high-definition blocks and colours everything feels like the usual game given a polish. And then the time warp blocks fall into the playing field.

These blocks represent the different eras of Tetris and cycle through designs and colours - the gold one is super special. Once the block is placed it locks in the Tetris era, so when you clear that line, you’re whisked off to a minigame from that time period. For example, drop in a dark green shape highlighted by almost neon green lines and you’ll play the original version to earn bonus points; lock in a Bombliss shape to go off and earn points playing a burst of Bombliss.

Once you come back to the modern era after less than a minute of frenetic block-placing, your points are added to the total for big scoring opportunities. It’s not only a clever motif but one that sparks instant joy. Whether I played at home on my TV or in handheld (on Switch) in a coffee shop, I was grinning like a loon every time the era switched and I had to think on the fly.

This all felt like being a kid again and playing Tetris for the first time on my Uncle’s Game Boy. Digital Eclipse has tapped into what makes the format great, which is to embrace the key principles of the game - clear lines and think fast. Much like practically every other version of Tetris that has come before, Tetris Time Warp is endlessly replayable and if that weren’t enough, they’ve included a marathon version of both their own modern Tetris design and a mock-up of the 1989 game version to be played for mega high scores.

If I have to be super critical, I would say that your time with the game could be limited if you can’t see yourself playing over and over. You can see everything the game has to offer in a couple of hours, making the price tag feel a bit steep in this cost-of-living crisis. Plus the lack of a unified control scheme - they change based on the version of Tetris you’re playing - is frustrating.

Digital Eclipse

Tetris Forever isn’t just for historians and archivists who want to know more about the franchise. It’s a treasure trove of joy that rolls back the years and shows that with a simple formula, games can last forever. If you enjoy the classic game, this is the definitive way to play it. Sure, there might not be a lot in rewatching the historical segments over and over, but they’re simply extra flavouring in a banquet of gaming that is already delectable in every form.

Pros: Perfect gameplay in a variety of flavours, wonderful historical documentation, and a new mode that dazzles, tremendous and iconic soundtrack

Cons: Not a complete history due to licensing

For fans of: Tetris, logic puzzles, Picross

8/10: Excellent

Tetris Forever is available now for Nintendo Switch (version tested), PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. A review code was provided by the publisher. Read a guide to our review scores here.