A strange little side quest
Grombi trivia break for Shoot and Merge: Alexey Pajitnov created Tetris in 1984 after drawing inspiration from pentomino puzzles, then simplified the idea around shapes made from four squares. The timeline takes another interesting turn: Games resembling checkers were being played thousands of years ago; evidence of related games reaches back to around 1600 BC. That long chain of experiments is part of why puzzles still feels fresh when a game finds the right twist.