Tetris (Nintendo Entertainment System video game)
| |
| Tetris | |
| Developer | Nintendo R&D1 |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Nintendo |
| Platforms | NES, Nintendo Switch |
| Released | Nintendo Entertainment System North America: November 1989 Europe: February 23, 1990 Nintendo Switch (Switch Online emulator) Worldwide: December 12, 2024 |
| Added to Museum |
Windows: Not yet |
Tetris is a puzzle video game for Nintendo Entertainment System that was developed by Nintendo Research & Development 1. It is the second variation of Tetris published by Nintendo, following Tetris for the Game Boy.
Development
In early 1989, Henk Rogers, the founder of Bullet-Proof Software, met with Nintendo of America president Minoru Arakawa and suggested the Nintendo create a video game console port of Tetris. Rogers sought to acquire the console rights to Tetris for Nintendo by trying to negotiate with the computer rights holder of Tetris, Robert Stein. However, Rogers learned Stein had not secured the arcade or console rights from Elorg.
Henk Rogers, Robert Stein, and Kevin Maxwell, the son of the founder of Maxwell Communications Corporation, all traveled to the Soviet Union to negotiate directly with Nikolai Belikov, the director of Elorg for the console Tetris publishing rights.
When Henk Rogers met with Elorg director Belikov, the latter was angered upon seeing a Bullet-Proof Software cartridge of Tetris for the Family Computer console, as he had thought that only the rights to home computer versions had been signed. Belikov originally claimed Bullet-Proof Software had released the game without a contract, but Henk Rogers explained that he had acquired the rights from Atari Games, who had acquired the rights from Robert Stein.
After learning of the complex licensing agreements, Belikov sought to regain the rights and obtain more financially lucrative contracts. During this period, Rogers befriended Tetris creator Alexey Pajitnov, and Pajitnov supported Rogers during the contract negotiations. Belikov proposed that Stein would not gain console and handheld licenses, the console rights sublicensed through Stein would be invalidated, and Nintendo would be granted the rights to Tetris for both consoles and handheld systems.
Elorg claimed Stein had not made all the required payments for Tetris sales and had accrued penalties for late payments. Stein signed forms for these payments but overlooked the section that defined a computer as a machine with a monitor and a keyboard.
Rogers flew to the United States so that he could get Nintendo of America to sign the contracts. Nintendo of America president Minoru Arakawa and its lawyer Howard Lincoln signed the contracts, which had also been signed by Belikov and Rogers.
Nintendo released a cartridge of Tetris for the Game Boy handheld console in June 1989. Nintendo followed this with its Nintendo Entertainment System cartridge in November 1989.
Console rights dispute
Tengen, the console division of Atari Games, published a console port of the arcade version of Tetris for the Nintendo Entertainment System in May 1989. The Tengen version of Tetris was released for the system on a cartridge that was not licensed by Nintendo.
As the Nintendo and Tengen versions were released on the same system, this led to a complicated rights dispute. Atari Games held the rights from Mirrorsoft to publish an arcade version of Tetris. Elorg, the division under the Ministry of Foreign Trade of the USSR that held the Tetris rights, assigned the rights to publish handheld and console versions to Nintendo.
Atari Games argued that the Nintendo Entertainment System was a computer rather than a console due to the fact that it was called the Family Computer in Japan. On June 22, 1989, a United States federal judge did not accept the argument that the Family Computer was not a console and issued an injunction blocking the sale of the Tengen version of Tetris for the Nintendo Entertainment System, affirming that the exclusive rights to publish handheld and console versions of Tetris belonged to Nintendo.
As a result, publication of the Tengen version of Tetris had to cease and existing copies of the game had to be recalled.
Releases
Tetris was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System in North America in November 1989 and in Europe on February 23, 1990. It was released worldwide for the Nintendo Switch Online Nintendo Entertainment System and Family Computer emulation service on December 12, 2024.
