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This all started in 1995 when in our programming class at school we programmed a Turbo Pascal version of the boardgame "Pentomino", a puzzling game similar to Tangram,
but using playing pieces that consist of five (greek: penta) squares, connected via their edges. Our teacher provided us with some object-oriented functions to move, rotate and mirror the twelve possible pentominos, the rest was upon us.
So, after finishing the boardgame simulation, I worked on my own game and succeeded after a lot of work. I learned a lot in the process and enjoyed playing it, as did my friends. The added mirroring function transformed the game to something very different that stayed fascinating after many games. As the years went by, computers got faster and the Turbo Pascal game was running too fast. In 2006, I managed to use my old DOS copy of Turbo Pascal to change the timing and use the game for a few more years. Then, with modern Windows, the old DOS executable no longer worked. So I didn't play for years - until I thought "Hey, I wonder if there is a DOS emulator?" and googled it. Of course there is: DOSBox! For several months, I enjoyed playing Pentris in DOSBox, but I wanted a more accessible version, something that other people could experience easily. So after some more googling, I found the excellent HTML5 Tetris by Robert Eisele. Pentris and the other HTML5 variants you see above would not have been possible without his work, but there was still enough headache involved in modifying the game to what you see on this page. Thank you to all of my friends who have helped me test this. I hope you will enjoy playing Pentris, Hextris and Polytris! |