6 ms·

This reminded me of this really fun story of a reporter who accidentally discovered that his wife is the best Game Boy Tetris player in the world (by a lot): ht

by cmckn 5y ago

This reminded me of this really fun story of a reporter who accidentally discovered that his wife is the best Game Boy Tetris player in the world (by a lot): https://archive.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2007/08/19/bizarro_world/ https://archive.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2007...

vanderZwan 5y ago
> She has her game face on; I didn't even know she had a game face. Hahaha, amazing! Thank you so much for sharing that. Also a wonderfully wholesome story to balance out the one about cheating. Tangent: is it just me or does anyone else feel like this article is much better written than many long-form articles we see today? I'm obviously biased because of the subject, but still.
glandium 5y ago
Amazing story. This makes me wonder how many people unknowingly hold world records-breaking personal best. Edit: holy f%ck, the record is 4988 lines, now. https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/most-lines-cleared-in-tetris-dx https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/most-line...
- checkyoursudo 5y ago
  Probably everyone, in some obscure thing or other. ;)
- honkdaddy 5y ago
  That's pretty funny! The record is from a month after this article was published, and it's held by the previous champ who Lori briefly dethroned, Harry Hong [1]. Watching the gameplay is a trip - it's like watching an i9 crunch numbers when you're used to a Pentium II. [1] https://www.youtube.com/user/SuPaSaYaJiN/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/SuPaSaYaJiN/videos
  - vanderZwan 5y ago
    That's NES though, he doesn't seem to have his GBC records uploaded. I actually can't find any recordings of GBC records. But yeah, watching tetris pros is amazing. The "classic" is of course 2018's Jonas Neubauer vs. Joseph Saelee NES Tetris world championship match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_UPHsGR6fM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_UPHsGR6fM If you've never seen it before, you'd probably don't think you'd enjoy watching twenty minutes of two guys playing tetris. You'd be wrong.
    - glandium 5y ago
      Have you seen people play Tetris the Grand Master 3 past level 999?
      - vanderZwan 5y ago
        Oh yeah! Totally different type of Tetris though, kinda like... I dunno... rugby and Australian rules football?
    - manifoldgeo 5y ago
      Thank you so much for this; it was even better than I expected! I had no idea Tetris had such a big and thriving community. TIL!
- ummwhat 5y ago
  As far as I know, I currently hold the world record score at knife fairy. The game of knife fairy is very simple. You must sneak into your roommates room late at night and slip a knife under their pillow. My current score is 1, so it should be easy to beat. Good luck!
lqet 5y ago
Twin Galaxies did an interview with here [0], sadly that version is without line breaks. [0] https://www.twingalaxies.com/content.php/2614-Lori-Baker-Gameboy-Tetris-DX-Champion https://www.twingalaxies.com/content.php/2614-Lori-Baker-Gam...
- mkl 5y ago
  Run this in the browser console to insert line breaks: e = $('.article.postcontainer > font[size="2"]')[0]; e.innerHTML = e.innerHTML.replace(/(LB:|TG:)/g, '<br><br>$1');
- vanderZwan 5y ago
  > One of the things that interesting to me about coming to a place like Funspot is seeing things like what happened today with your score, where people start to congregate, including me, watching someone absolutely take control of a game like you did. People love seeing people be competent. I miss this in modern TV series, btw. It's one of those things that makes the older Star Trek series so compelling. Or for a relatively recent example: The Martian. I wonder why it's so rare to see stories like that in fiction though? (thanks to the other commenter for pointing out how to fix the article)
waterpowder 5y ago
That was a good read, thanks for sharing!
Arcorann 5y ago
Posted three days ago, funnily enough: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30820685 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30820685 I've never had much faith in 2000s-era Twin Galaxies scorekeeping, ever since I saw their recorded scores for Pokemon Pinball in the first Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition and realised that they were lower than my own (not especially good) scores. In this particular case, it turns out that if you count unofficial records, Japanese player Koryan (who incidentally is still active) recorded over 5000 lines in 2001 [1]; compare the TG verified record of 4988 set by Harry Hong one month after this article in 2007 and the current TG record of 5164 set by Tao Kitamoto in 2016 [2]. It's likely that Harry Hong could have beaten his previous record at any time if someone had contested it earlier. [1] http://www.din.or.jp/~koryan/tetris/sco.htm http://www.din.or.jp/~koryan/tetris/sco.htm [2] https://www.twingalaxies.com/showthread.php/154227 https://www.twingalaxies.com/showthread.php/154227
- bena 5y ago
  People have found out that if you get specific enough or if you choose something people don't really care about, you can get a Guinness World Record. For example: there's a guy who had a record invalidated for "fastest time to build the Lego UCS Millenium Falcon (75192)" because he forgot a piece. That's not the point. The point is that he clocked a time of right around 16 hours. Which I found weird. Because that's about what I clocked as well. Now, I wasn't super rigorous. When I started, I started a timer, when I finished for the day, I stopped the timer. At the end, I added all the times together. And I wasn't trying to build fast. I was just vaguely interested in how long it would take me to assemble a 7500 piece set. There's a guy on Penn Jillette's podcast, Michael Goudeau. He's a clown. Like, professionally. He has the Guinness World Record for most bites taken out of an apple in a minute while juggling. Dude Perfect holds the Guinness World Record for most ping pong balls stuck on a person's head using shaving cream. Remember, Guinness doesn't approach people, people approach Guinness. Then there's a whole process about getting the record verified. If it seems like a lot of work for a piece of paper and to be an answer to a trivia question, you'd be right.
  - wmwmwm 5y ago
    I met someone years ago who was an adjudicator for Guinness. I remember two stories in particular. One was a trip to Venezuela to judge a biggest bowl of soup (chicken IIRC), the other to Italy for a biggest doner kebab! (yes Italy not Greece). She said her biggest concern was that the doner kebab would fall off an underspecced trolley and kill someone, though I imagine that would probably have achieved a record of its own!
beeforpork 5y ago
Fascinating! When I read the WR for Tetris was 327 lines, I realised that I was in that league, too, at the time. I never knew I was that good! I never thought about competition or even world records at that time! I remember it became boring after a few hundred lines, and I am sure I never made 800, let alone the 4988 someone else posted. Weird...
dudeinjapan 5y ago
Reminds me a story from my 6th grade teacher who lived with the Maasai tribe in Kenya. One day she brought one of the tribesmen named Moses to Nairobi and they happened to pass by a stadium field where some men were practicing the javelin throw. Moses said "let me take a turn" and his throw landed far beyond where all the other javelins were clustered. Turns out it was the Kenyan national team... apparently they recruited him! I just Googled this and lo-and-behold: https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA898C58S9MG8CMJB071BCIKO98-KENYA-MASAI-JEVELIN-THROWER-ASPIRES-TO-INTERNATIONAL-COMPETITION/query/Masais https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA898C58S9MG8CMJB071BCI...
ar_lan 5y ago
I'm 99% sure I'm the best NBA Live 2004 (PS2) player in the world (by a lot), if it means anything :)
- HideousKojima 5y ago
  If I bothered to actually submit my times, I'd be ranked #9 for any% and #5 for 100% for the 2014 reboot of Strider. Not because I'm any good, but because hardly anyone has submitted records.
kingcharles 5y ago
This was such a cute story, thank you.
lqet 5y ago
She had a score of 841, which was broken just 3 months after her record by Neil Gewirtz with 2,349 lines. The record is 5,164 points now. https://www.twingalaxies.com/game/tetris-dx/game-boy-game-boy-color/marathon-mode-lines/ https://www.twingalaxies.com/game/tetris-dx/game-boy-game-bo...
gverrilla 5y ago
Such a good read, thank you. There doesn't seem to be much content like this around: interesting, honest, non-directly-commercial, no fake news, no SEO bullshit. Really thanks was good 5 minutes.

by cmckn 5y ago

vanderZwan 5y ago

> She has her game face on; I didn't even know she had a game face. Hahaha, amazing! Thank you so much for sharing that. Also a wonderfully wholesome story to balance out the one about cheating. Tangent: is it just me or does anyone else feel like this article is much better written than many long-form articles we see today? I'm obviously biased because of the subject, but still.

glandium 5y ago

Amazing story. This makes me wonder how many people unknowingly hold world records-breaking personal best. Edit: holy f%ck, the record is 4988 lines, now. https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/most-lines-cleared-in-tetris-dx https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/most-line...

checkyoursudo 5y ago
Probably everyone, in some obscure thing or other. ;)
honkdaddy 5y ago
That's pretty funny! The record is from a month after this article was published, and it's held by the previous champ who Lori briefly dethroned, Harry Hong [1]. Watching the gameplay is a trip - it's like watching an i9 crunch numbers when you're used to a Pentium II. [1] https://www.youtube.com/user/SuPaSaYaJiN/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/SuPaSaYaJiN/videos
- vanderZwan 5y ago
  That's NES though, he doesn't seem to have his GBC records uploaded. I actually can't find any recordings of GBC records. But yeah, watching tetris pros is amazing. The "classic" is of course 2018's Jonas Neubauer vs. Joseph Saelee NES Tetris world championship match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_UPHsGR6fM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_UPHsGR6fM If you've never seen it before, you'd probably don't think you'd enjoy watching twenty minutes of two guys playing tetris. You'd be wrong.
  - glandium 5y ago
    Have you seen people play Tetris the Grand Master 3 past level 999?
    - vanderZwan 5y ago
      Oh yeah! Totally different type of Tetris though, kinda like... I dunno... rugby and Australian rules football?
  - manifoldgeo 5y ago
    Thank you so much for this; it was even better than I expected! I had no idea Tetris had such a big and thriving community. TIL!
ummwhat 5y ago
As far as I know, I currently hold the world record score at knife fairy. The game of knife fairy is very simple. You must sneak into your roommates room late at night and slip a knife under their pillow. My current score is 1, so it should be easy to beat. Good luck!

lqet 5y ago

Twin Galaxies did an interview with here [0], sadly that version is without line breaks. [0] https://www.twingalaxies.com/content.php/2614-Lori-Baker-Gameboy-Tetris-DX-Champion https://www.twingalaxies.com/content.php/2614-Lori-Baker-Gam...

mkl 5y ago
Run this in the browser console to insert line breaks: e = $('.article.postcontainer > font[size="2"]')[0]; e.innerHTML = e.innerHTML.replace(/(LB:|TG:)/g, '<br><br>$1');
vanderZwan 5y ago
> One of the things that interesting to me about coming to a place like Funspot is seeing things like what happened today with your score, where people start to congregate, including me, watching someone absolutely take control of a game like you did. People love seeing people be competent. I miss this in modern TV series, btw. It's one of those things that makes the older Star Trek series so compelling. Or for a relatively recent example: The Martian. I wonder why it's so rare to see stories like that in fiction though? (thanks to the other commenter for pointing out how to fix the article)

waterpowder 5y ago

That was a good read, thanks for sharing!

Arcorann 5y ago

Posted three days ago, funnily enough: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30820685 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30820685 I've never had much faith in 2000s-era Twin Galaxies scorekeeping, ever since I saw their recorded scores for Pokemon Pinball in the first Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition and realised that they were lower than my own (not especially good) scores. In this particular case, it turns out that if you count unofficial records, Japanese player Koryan (who incidentally is still active) recorded over 5000 lines in 2001 [1]; compare the TG verified record of 4988 set by Harry Hong one month after this article in 2007 and the current TG record of 5164 set by Tao Kitamoto in 2016 [2]. It's likely that Harry Hong could have beaten his previous record at any time if someone had contested it earlier. [1] http://www.din.or.jp/~koryan/tetris/sco.htm http://www.din.or.jp/~koryan/tetris/sco.htm [2] https://www.twingalaxies.com/showthread.php/154227 https://www.twingalaxies.com/showthread.php/154227

bena 5y ago
People have found out that if you get specific enough or if you choose something people don't really care about, you can get a Guinness World Record. For example: there's a guy who had a record invalidated for "fastest time to build the Lego UCS Millenium Falcon (75192)" because he forgot a piece. That's not the point. The point is that he clocked a time of right around 16 hours. Which I found weird. Because that's about what I clocked as well. Now, I wasn't super rigorous. When I started, I started a timer, when I finished for the day, I stopped the timer. At the end, I added all the times together. And I wasn't trying to build fast. I was just vaguely interested in how long it would take me to assemble a 7500 piece set. There's a guy on Penn Jillette's podcast, Michael Goudeau. He's a clown. Like, professionally. He has the Guinness World Record for most bites taken out of an apple in a minute while juggling. Dude Perfect holds the Guinness World Record for most ping pong balls stuck on a person's head using shaving cream. Remember, Guinness doesn't approach people, people approach Guinness. Then there's a whole process about getting the record verified. If it seems like a lot of work for a piece of paper and to be an answer to a trivia question, you'd be right.
- wmwmwm 5y ago
  I met someone years ago who was an adjudicator for Guinness. I remember two stories in particular. One was a trip to Venezuela to judge a biggest bowl of soup (chicken IIRC), the other to Italy for a biggest doner kebab! (yes Italy not Greece). She said her biggest concern was that the doner kebab would fall off an underspecced trolley and kill someone, though I imagine that would probably have achieved a record of its own!

beeforpork 5y ago

Fascinating! When I read the WR for Tetris was 327 lines, I realised that I was in that league, too, at the time. I never knew I was that good! I never thought about competition or even world records at that time! I remember it became boring after a few hundred lines, and I am sure I never made 800, let alone the 4988 someone else posted. Weird...

dudeinjapan 5y ago

Reminds me a story from my 6th grade teacher who lived with the Maasai tribe in Kenya. One day she brought one of the tribesmen named Moses to Nairobi and they happened to pass by a stadium field where some men were practicing the javelin throw. Moses said "let me take a turn" and his throw landed far beyond where all the other javelins were clustered. Turns out it was the Kenyan national team... apparently they recruited him! I just Googled this and lo-and-behold: https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA898C58S9MG8CMJB071BCIKO98-KENYA-MASAI-JEVELIN-THROWER-ASPIRES-TO-INTERNATIONAL-COMPETITION/query/Masais https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA898C58S9MG8CMJB071BCI...

ar_lan 5y ago

I'm 99% sure I'm the best NBA Live 2004 (PS2) player in the world (by a lot), if it means anything :)

HideousKojima 5y ago
If I bothered to actually submit my times, I'd be ranked #9 for any% and #5 for 100% for the 2014 reboot of Strider. Not because I'm any good, but because hardly anyone has submitted records.

kingcharles 5y ago

This was such a cute story, thank you.

lqet 5y ago

She had a score of 841, which was broken just 3 months after her record by Neil Gewirtz with 2,349 lines. The record is 5,164 points now. https://www.twingalaxies.com/game/tetris-dx/game-boy-game-boy-color/marathon-mode-lines/ https://www.twingalaxies.com/game/tetris-dx/game-boy-game-bo...

gverrilla 5y ago

Such a good read, thank you. There doesn't seem to be much content like this around: interesting, honest, non-directly-commercial, no fake news, no SEO bullshit. Really thanks was good 5 minutes.