40 years ago, a young Soviet researcher invented a unique computer game.

In 1984, Alexey Pajitnov, who worked at the Computer Center of the Moscow Sciences Center, had tirled his work.He found a new place for his math skills -he wrote a video game.

On June 6, 1984, the first simple prototype of this game was run on the computer "Elektronika 60" made by the Soviet Union.

Paggitorv's Witness History program in 2011 recalled: "When the first prototype came out, everyone was very curious and asked for a trial."

"Everyone tried this game, everyone likes this game, including myself."

Five Company Block Games

This is the beginning of the Russian block-a simple modelThe charming puzzle game is destined to be popular all over the world.

The creativity of this game comes from the classic five -company block game.In the game, players need to accurately adjust the strange geometric graphics to fill out a continuous canvas without a gap.

The Russian square uses a very similar concept: Players must put the landing geometric figure (each geometric figure consists of four blocks, also known as "four consecutive")The edge to the edge is connected into a solid line.

The Soviet Union has almost no personal computer at all, but this does not hinder the spread of this game.

This game is copied from one machine to another, which is circulated among the few computer users across the country.

How to cross the iron curtain of Russian cubes is worth writing a spy novel.

Global Interest

A British software manufacturer accidentally discovered the game in Hungary and talked about the issuance right with the Russian government.Soon after, European and American people played Russian cubes at home.

With the rapid development of the video game industry, a new platform appeared at the end of the 1980s: palm game consoles, such as GameBoy.

Nintendo Game Machine

In 1989, when American software producer Henk Rogers was working to a Japanese company, he realized that this Soviet game had greater market potential.

Therefore, he decided to transplant the game from a bulky computer to the palm device.

But to do this, he needs to get the right to distribution from the creator of the game.

In order to obtain the right to issue the Russian square on the handheld equipment, Heke Rogers (the picture shows its premiere of the Russian block movie in the Southwest Southwest Southwest Southwest Southwest).

In order to find the father of the Russian block, Rogers came to Moscow.After decades of Cold War, the relationship between the Soviet Union and the West began to recover.He took a new camera and sneaked into the unknown world with passion.

"I just bought this new camera, which is exciting ... I just want to record it and enjoy the fun." He said to the BBC witness historical program in 2011.

Find State -owned Enterprise Office

At first, the February of Moscow left Rogers a gloomy impression.The sky is always gray, and the TV and radios in the hotel cannot be used.

"No one can provide me with any information," he said.

Rogers has been looking for the office of Elektronorgtechnica (ELORG), which is a Soviet institution engaged in hardware and software imports and exports.

He hired a translation, and also his driver, she seemed to know everything right away.One afternoon, she took him to the office, but refused to go in with Rogers, "because she was not invited."

He gathered courage and walked in alone.

He explained in some way that he wanted to buy the copyright of the Russian block, which immediately caused a sensation in the entire building.

Rogers smiled and said, "This is like inserting the hot fire stick into the ant nest."He was introduced to Alexey Pajitnov and eight other people, "including Agent KGG, who knows who else."

They interrogated him for several hours.Rogers recalled: "They want to know if I am really doing computer game business."

"What is intellectual property?"

It is difficult for Soviet officials to understand the concept of intellectual property and video game business in the West, because at that time, the two were basically strange and unspeakable for them.

Although the two sides did not trust each other at first, Rogers' persistence still won their favor.

"I have seen some merchants before, but they have not left a deep impression at all because they are more like a liar, not a businessman. And Heng has left a very deep impression on me, because he really understands it.The core of the game, the essence of the game industry.

Signing

After a week of negotiations, Rogers and Pagigitnov signed a contract, which guaranteed that the Soviet programmer obtained personal sharing from all Russian block sales from overseas sales of all Russia.

"They are very surprised," Rogers explained.

"They have never seen the contract in the contract. If I do not pay on time, there will be a penalty of liquidated damages. I mean, this makes them very satisfied."They used the contract as a blueprint for all the contracts since then.

Rogers believes that the Russian block is very popular because of its unique gameplay.Different from most of computer games based on violence and destruction, Russian squares provide players with opportunities to participate in construction and creation.

Rogers believes that this is a more interesting activity because it is more in line with some basic happy center points of humans.

"People want to create something and feel very good after creating it."

Players over 1 billion

Today, Russian blocks have a glorious historical status.

According to the most conservative estimation, at least one billion users have tried at least once in their lives to stack the colored graphics of the fall into orderly lines.

Although Paggitino was not easy to obtain the version tax in the first few years, when he moved to the United States in the mid -1990s and cooperated with Rogers to establish a company, he began to obtain a version tax.

Today, Pagigitorov lives in Washington, DC, and is one of the richest and well -known figures in the video game industry.