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The World's Largest Game Of Tetris

hax0r writes: "You might be asking yourself: What can I do with 5 months, 10000 christmas lights, a 14 story library, and a Linux box? Why not play Tetris? And they say there are no good games for Linux." There's some QT movies on the site, as well as pictures. The site was slow to respond for me, but if you're patient you should get through.Thanks to Blue Draco for the pix on a fast server.

32 of 117 comments (clear)

  1. Wow! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2


    Imagine a Beowulf cluster of library buildings!

    Personally, I can't wait till someone 0wns it and uses it say something naughty about the dean.

  2. Been there, done that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3

    This has already been done. Check out MIT's Hacks gallery.

    1. Re:Been there, done that by bughunter · · Score: 2
      MIT's hacks pages discuss a lot of technically "criminal" activity: trespassing, breaking and entering, etc. Unlike most other anti-authoritarian groups, however, MIT hackers have a well-developed sense of libertarian ethics that extends to their web presesnce. Also, they were the original home to the "MIT Lockpicking Handbook" that you'll find mirrored all over the net - a pretty darn good homebrew guide on defeating keyed tumbler locks. I think MIT has taken it down by now, and they especially don't like the attribution to MIT in the title, but that was already enough to get them included on filtering databases.

      I'm sure there's actual MITers out there that can do the facts more justice than I have, but they haven't spoken up yet...

      --
      I can see the fnords!
    2. Re:Been there, done that by Chelloveck · · Score: 2

      I just checked MIT's hacks page, and my company's proxy told me this:

      WebTrack Control List category criminal skills is restricted.

      I guess they're afraid I'll start playing Tetris on our 3-story building...

      Speaking of which, we manufacture barcode printers. I've been tempted to sneak in a Tetris game with a refresh rate of one frame per label. Maybe it's time for that!

      --
      Chelloveck
      I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
    3. Re:Been there, done that by sec · · Score: 2

      I suspect they were being facetious. One dimentional Tetris, while possible, wouldn't be much of a game. :)

    4. Re:Been there, done that by SuperKendall · · Score: 2

      If you keep reading, you see the following displays were done in addition to the VU meter (after the music stopped):

      `cylon'' scanning light patterns
      IHTFP in morse code
      One-dimensional Tetris

      I'm not sure what they mean by "One-Dimensional", but it was tetris!

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  3. Re:Allright by Pathwalker · · Score: 2

    Well, the software I used isn't open source.
    I'm using MegaPEG LE which came with my copy of Premiere.

    The web server is all open source (Roxen on FreeBSD) if that makes you feel better...

  4. Re:Allright by Pathwalker · · Score: 5

    If you want MPEG, I'm running the quicktime files through my converter now, and I'll have them up at http://house.ofdoom.com/~hungerf3/video/tetris/ in a few minutes.

  5. Re:Office Building Lights? by slim · · Score: 3
    I had big ideas when I was at University. We did a little stunt where we put posters up telling the residents of the three residential tower blocks to look out of their windows at a given time and "copy": I started flashing my desklamp on and off, and within 5 minutes, all three towers were shimmering with flashing lights. That proves is can be done (we had 20 floors in each tower).


    The problem with using the main lights of a building is that if they're striplights (which is likely) they tend to take a few seconds to flicker into life. I don't fancy playing Tetris with that much display latency...

    --

  6. Re:Alexander Pojitnov's Legacy by Accipiter · · Score: 2
    His name is actually spelled "Alexey Pajitnov"

    http://www.tetris.com/history.html

    -- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?

    --

    -- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
    (If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't. :P)

  7. A bigger Tetris - almost by XNormal · · Score: 2

    The 44 floor triangular tower of Azrieli Center in Tel Aviv had a huge millenium countdown animated display. There were rumors that the programmer wrote Tetris for that display but eventually didn't run it. IIRC, the display controller was running Linux.


    ----

    --
    Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
  8. Re:Allright by Jose · · Score: 2

    umm, try out xanim. I watched it fine in Linux.

    --
    The basic sleazeware produced in a drunken fury by a bunch of UCBerkeley grad students was still the core of BIND. --PV
  9. Re:Powered By Slow Mac by HerrNewton · · Score: 2

    actually the server seems quite peppy to me, and I'm in North Dakota, not exactly a hop off the backbone.

    ----

    --

    ----
    Am I the only one who thinks Microsoft is a misnomer? Perhaps Macrosoft would be a better fit?
  10. Man or AstroMan by boarder · · Score: 2
    It is actually a person playing the game. They have a console of sorts set up where passersby can play the game. They also have a stereo set up that pumps out the original music.

    If I lived anywhere within 200 miles, I'd be over there NOW.

    --
    IANAL, but I play one on /.
  11. Man, if only... by boarder · · Score: 3
    If I lived within 200 miles of this, I'd over there in a flash. I want nothing more right now than to play Tetris on a 14 story building.

    Seriously, though, the only flaw I saw in their system was the refresh rate. I know when I play, the pieces are moving so fast that their "screen" wouldn't be able to keep up (I'm not trying to brag).

    Are there any Tetris masters out there who have had a chance to play on this beast? I would like to know how well it keeps up with really fast play.

    For reference: I have scored 470,000 points on the Nintendo version and have broken computer versions by playing too fast. There was a version playing on the Internet that kept a global high score list and I was always at the top. I would love to hear some other people's high scores to have something against which I can compete.

    --
    IANAL, but I play one on /.
  12. Nintendo will sue them by weave · · Score: 3
    Don't they know there is a patent on Tetris?!

    # 5,265,888

  13. Office Building Lights? by QuantumG · · Score: 3


    Forget christmas lights! Ya know all them HUGE buildings they have in the city with ten offices per floor on the one side? Well that is begging for a good tetrisizing already! Maybe when ip6 goes hardcore and they give every office light an IP some leet crackers will do this :)

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
  14. Re:Allright by vectro · · Score: 2

    Actually, this was not encoded with the Sorenson codec, so you can play it using xanim. No need to go to windows.

  15. I personally think.. by citizenc · · Score: 3

    .. that this proves, once and for all, that size does, in fact, matter ;)

    ,-----.----...---..--..-....-
    ' CitizenC
    ' WebMaster, PlanetQ3F
    `-----.----...---..--..-....-

  16. Soon comes the FUD by DanaL · · Score: 5

    Tomorrow, you'll hear of someone running Ghost n Goblins on an NT box running *100,000* Christmas lights.

    Then, Sun will insist that Java is the best platform for this sort of thing and promptly release the Java Christmas Light Interface API :)

    Dana

  17. Who is playing Tetris?!?! by antdude · · Score: 2

    Is the computer playing tetris or a human?!

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  18. Re:Quicktime Movies by antdude · · Score: 2

    Dang it. I just started downloading. Thank you for the warning, Laven!

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  19. Re:Done before... hehe... by Chilles · · Score: 2

    Yeah,
    here's a link.
    http://etv.et.tudelft.nl/commissies/lustrum/move gif.html

  20. Re:hehe by MattXVI · · Score: 3

    Now, I'll laugh if Rob Malda does that to the Slashdot home page.

    --
    When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood.
    -Tom Jones
  21. Very Very Very Cool by edibleplastic · · Score: 5

    I actually was visitng Brown last night and happened to be walking by the Science Library when they started testing it. At first I thought it was just random lights on the building, but then I was able to make out the individual pieces falling and rotating. All of the familiar l's, straight lines, and t's were there, among the other ones and they were actually playing tetris! It was also really funny because they had a boombox playing the music from the original tetris, completing the experience!

    It looks like they have the basic system down, they just need to work on the refresh rates, because as of last night it was done floor by floor, so if you moved a piece right, it would sort of move to the right line by line. But all in all a very impressive set up!

  22. Allright by fluxrad · · Score: 5

    This marks a great day in history for the triumph of linux!! Now linux can do everything!!!

    Oh - you'll have to excuse me. i need to jump on my windows box to actually WATCH the movie!!

    Final notice: if your last name is Sorensen, or you have anything to do with QT - i'm coming to kick your ass!!!!!


    FluX

    --
    "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
  23. Hack idea... by IO+ERROR · · Score: 3
    How about binding a red, green, and blue light together, making each of them individually controllable, and then putting, say, 786,432 of these into a 1024x768 matrix? It could be the world's largest monitor.

    You could read slashdot from a mile away...
    ---

    --
    How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
  24. Re:Sorenson video codec by bolsh · · Score: 2
    Regardless of what someone just said about watching the QT files grand under Linux, the Sorenson video codec is still not supported. This is not because of anything to do with xanim, it's because Sorenson signed an exclusive agreement with Apple, so the only product that supports the codec is QT4.

    I e-mailed the main Sorenson support line (support@s-vision.com) a few days ago about this (after I couldn't watch the LotR trailer), and got a reply from Scott Wheeler (swheeler@s-vision.com) which said, among other stuff,
    Sorenson Vision has chosen to team up with Apple and their QuickTime product. Because of this, Sorenson Video is only available on supported QuickTime OS platforms.

    If you're interested in QuickTime for platforms other than Mac or Windows, please contact your platform vendor and let them know that you would like them to license QuickTime from Apple. Once QuickTime is available on a platform, Sorenson Video will be there as well.
    I sent another e-mail, asking for (a) a contact in Apple and (b) any indication that there might be a way they could support a free platform. So far, I've gotten no reply to that one.

    I think we should let people know how much proprietary video codecs restrict people, and encourage people to distribute in video formats that don't require us to buy new hardware and/or software to view them. As a start, we could mail Mr. Wheeler, nicely voicing our opinions, and asking him to pressure Apple to make a concession, and let Maark Podlipec include module support for the codec with xanim.

    Dave.

  25. I'm Honored by maniack · · Score: 2

    Thank you for this great honor. It's beyond my wildest dreams to ever be a karma whore-*sniff*-*sniff*. I'd like to thank my computer and it's trusty (although covered with-never mind) keyboard, the old ztetris game on my TI-86 (the only thing that kept me sane in school at times), and most of all the whole slashdot community (trolls, karma whores, ACs, and the others). Without them *sniff*-*sniff* this would never have been possible. I love you all.

    --

    "Control the media, control the mind."-Cabal

  26. mandatory quake post by maniack · · Score: 3

    So when can I start playing quake with christmas lights?

    --

    "Control the media, control the mind."-Cabal

  27. Re:hehe by gwernol · · Score: 2

    reminds me of in high school when we spelled out [creative] stuff on the scoreboards. oh well, i never got caught

    Which reminds me of one of my psychology lecturers at university. He was a bit odd. Quiet, withdrawn manner. Always seemed to behave strangely around female students. Never looked you in the eye when he talked to you.

    We had these huge lecture theatres with three-storey high roll-over blackboards. Now, normally there was stuff from other lectures left on the boards. One day, we noticed that every time this guy lectured, it said "Love me" at the top of the boards. This happened three of four lectures in a row, and only in the lectures with this guy. So a couple of us snuck in before the next lecture and hid at the back. Sure enough, this prof. came in 10 minutes before the start of the lecture, wrote "Love me" on the board, rolled it to the top and left the lecture hall. At the start of the class, he came in an taught the whole lecture without mentioning the message, just as he had every week.

    I don't think I ever completed his course. Too damn weird.

    --
    Sailing over the event horizon
  28. nice, but no record by refried+noodle · · Score: 5

    Tetris for buildings is all nice and well, but the record is still set in 1995 in the netherlands by the association for electrical engineering students. check http://etv.et.tudelft.nl/commissies/lustrum/movegi f.html (or the guiness book of records)