The multi-platform tile matching game Tetris has reached 425 million paid downloads on mobiles.
With countless iterations of the hugely popular title, the huge figure is even more impressive when you take in to consideration that it does not include every version of the game.
Consequently, an additional 35 million physical copies of Tetris were sold on the original Game Boy. And the official figures also exclude the free-to-play version of Tetris Blitz released by EA.
The rise of smartphone gaming is largely responsible for the increase in downloads. Tetris reached 100 paid mobile downloads in 2010, meaning over 300 million downloads were paid for over the past four years.
Russian computer programmer Alexey Pajitnov created Tetris in 1984, and it became a global hit after game designer Henk Rogers acquired the rights to the game. Rogers, who saw the game at a trade show in Las Vegas, landed a deal with Nintendo to develop the game for its original Game Boy.
Since then it has been developed for 30 different platforms, with the next big release in the series being developed by Ubisoft and due to appear on next-gen consoles the PS4 and Xbox One.
At Philly Tech Week, an interactive version of Tetris was played across skyscrapers – further evidence of the game’s enduring popularity. Check out the video of the cool interactive display below:
