Letter Mahjong

A strange little side quest

Zoom out from Letter Mahjong for a moment and the timeline gets surprisingly deep. Alexey Pajitnov created Tetris in 1984 after drawing inspiration from pentomino puzzles, then simplified the idea around shapes made from four squares. The broader history adds one more wrinkle. Space Invaders, released in 1978, helped push video games into mainstream popular culture. Not bad for a few facts hiding behind a Play button.