724: Hell
| Hell |
 Title text: There's also a Katamari level where everything is just slightly bigger than you, and a Mario level with a star just out of reach. |
Explanation
Tetris is a game where the player has to manipulate falling blocks into forming complete rows. This comic is a play on this, presenting the player with a version of the game with a curved bottom that renders forming rows nearly impossible. Hell is a religious concept of a posthumous punishment for wrongdoers, depicted in many religions as eternal torment.
The title text presents similar situations where frustration is likely to occur. Katamari Damacy is a video game in which the player controls a sticky sphere which grows by assimilating objects smaller than itself. Super Mario is a long-running franchise of platforming games; in most of the games which utilize a 3-dimensional engine, levels are completed by collecting large, golden stars.
Also see comic 888: Heaven, which presents an opposing situation in which the game is trying to help the player win.
There is a playable version of this comic at Kongregate, which, unsurprisingly, is frustratingly difficult (but not impossible) to play.
Transcript
- [A basic Tetris screen is depicted, with a next piece indicator (an L piece), score (0) and top score (also 0), and level listed as 01. The bottom of the pit is curved into a semicircle. A square and reverse L piece are sitting crookedly in the pit; an S piece is falling.]
- HELL
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That playable version is actually quite fun. My best was 22 pieces on the screen (screenshot). Shine (talk) 18:20, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
Guess what, this is actually scorable. The trick is to form a solid base with your blocks, and play normal tetris over that. 116.76.175.236 13:56, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
I'm not sure if saying the hell came "cannot be won" is worth saying. Keep in mind, the regular game of tetris can't be won either. 70.31.159.230 01:29, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
"In Soviet Russia, game wastes time with you!"?! 31.111.2.74 23:28, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
If Heaven was #888, why wasn't Hell #666? --Quicksilver (talk) 02:39, 20 August 2013 (UTC)
Super Mario Bros with a star just out of reach - reference to Tantalus? 108.162.242.120 03:23, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
For posterity, there's also not tetris, by stabyourself.net, which is similarly hellish in that you freely rotate the tetronimoes, and they will most likely not align perfectly, although its bottom border is a straight line. --108.162.231.215 11:53, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
For the star just out of reach, there's also the SM64 A Button Challenge stars which are just out of reach of a dive recover 172.69.68.231 02:46, 10 September 2021 (UTC)
