This week's Arcade Archives release is... Tetris The Grand Master (Arika, 1996).
Arika's take on Tetris has a strong reputation behind it, with a grading system that updates as you play through the game and blocks that get pretty fast, although this first release doesn't go in quite as hard as the third game, TERROR INSTINCT. As explained in this interview, the Sega version of Tetris was an influence on this one, which is why it feels a little different from modern Tetris games that adhere to the Tetris Guidelines (this interview also mentions the one true Tetris game, Tetris with Cardcaptor Sakura: Eternal Heart, also by Arika).
This is a big one- until now the only home version of any of these games was Tetris The Grand Master Ace on Xbox 360, and that was a Japan-only release. I'm not a Tetris expert by any means, but as is my understanding Arika have been trying to do something with The Grand Master for quite a while (including a fourth game in the series) and I guess The Tetris Company had the final say on some things, so I'm glad they were willing to let this version come out again.
This game also has some pretty wild secret modes, so via Arcade-History, here they are, entered on the title screen after inserting a coin:
Big Mode (BIG PIECES) : Left(x4), Down, C, B, A
Mono Mode (Play in black and white) : Right(x3), Up, C, B, A
TLS Mode (Pieces will still have shadows beyond lvl100) : A, B, C(x2), B, A(x2), C, B
Uki Mode (Adds a laughtrack) : A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B(x2)
20G Mode (Pieces will drop 20 spaces per frame from the off) : Down(x8), C, B, A
Rev Mode (Play the game upside down as pieces rise instead of fall) : Down, Up(x2), Down, C, B, A
As this is the most recent hardware Hamster's ever dealt with for the Arcade Archives series, there are some unfortunately teething problems- Gosokkyu's got the info on Twitter of reports of freezes and graphics corruption on the Switch version in particular, but Hmaster are looking into it and they get patches done pretty quickly.
As someone who owns an original arcade board of TGM1, I can confirm that there are some growing pains with this release, so if you're not a weirdo like me who's been desperate to throw money at someone just to tell the Tetris Company to just shut up about their guideline hangups and let Arika re-release these games at last so people have a legal way to play some of the finest Tetris ever made, you should probably hold off on at least the Switch version for a little while, though I'm also confident Hamster will get their house in order soon enough.
That said, as much as I think Arcade Archives releases tend to be on the pricey side for how much you actually get, honestly? For a game this iconic and mechanically sound, I think it's $8 well spent and still worth playing even if you've only seriously played more recent Tetris games. This is a game that came out before the Tetris Company had completely hammered out the founding principles of the guideline in terms of piece handling and systems they since deemed essential by way of Tetris Worlds in the early 2000s, so you'll definitely find a less kind game on the whole compared to even later TGM games (at least, in select ways). There are no hard drops or holds, for one thing, which is par for the course for a Tetris game of this vintage. But what will most likely prove hardest for newcomers to adjust to is the very brief window of time you're allotted before a piece locks in once you make contact with the board. It's a system that Tetris games struggled to hammer out for some time given its implications on score attack balance and while it's still a bigger window than some of the most famous older entries, including games that directly inspired TGM, people accustomed to playing Tetris Effect or Tetris 99 will probably be in for a rude awakening. To those players going into TGM1 for the first time, my single biggest piece of advice is to not count on that window being on your side to help course correct potential mistakes and that even more so than other games, you should always build your board with the next piece in mind.
TGM1 is the old hermit living on the mountain away from society among Tetris games. It's an austere, ornery game in a lot of respects and the 20G mode it pioneered is no joke. But the differences compared to those later games aren't as stark as you would find if, say, you went back from Tetris 99 and played the Game Boy game for the first time. All those hurdles it likes to throw up in terms of its rapidly escalating gravity and tight piece locking windows will hone your skills in ways that are pretty much universal to all other Tetris games that came after it. Be prepared to be humbled by it and you'll definitely come away thinking differently and more deeply about how you build up your board in other games. Because if you can hold your own in TGM1 for at least a little while, you'll go even farther in just about anything else; in that sense, it's still as rewarding now as it ever was back in 1998.
