N-is: A Generalized Tetris Game

N-is is a terminal-based puzzle game that generalizes the classic Tetris concept to work with polyominos and polykings of any size from 1 to 6 blocks. Play traditional Tetris (4 blocks) or experiment with Tris (3 blocks), Dis (2 blocks), Pentis (5 blocks), or even Hexis (6 blocks)! Made for Summer of Making

Features

• Flexible Block Size: Choose your game style with different block counts:

  • 1: "Monois" (single blocks)
  • 2: "Dis" (domino shapes)
  • 3: "Tris" (triomino shapes)
  • 4: "Tetris" (classic tetromino shapes)
  • 5: "Pentis" (pentomino shapes - more challenging)
  • 6: "Hexis" (hexomino shapes - extremely challenging, nearly unplayable)

  Heptis will probably never be made because even hexis is not very fun, and heptis just simply has no reason to exist.

• Interactive Menu System: Run without arguments to access a user-friendly curses-based menu for selecting game options

• Extended Mode: Enable with -e flag to add non-standard polyominos (polykings) that can connect at vertices

• Mix Mode: Enable with -m flag to include polyominos of lower order (e.g., in Tetris mode, also get Tris, Dis and monois pieces)

• Advanced Gameplay Features:

  • Hold System: Hold pieces for later use with 'c' key
  • Ghost Piece: See where your piece will land
  • Hard Drop: Instantly drop pieces with Enter key
  • Combo System: Chain line clears for bonus points

• Customizable Appearance:

  • Choose block and background colors with -c and -bc flags
  • Change colors during gameplay with j/k and u/i

• Progressive Difficulty:

  • Fall speed increases with each level by around 14.5%
  • Scoring system with level and combo multipliers

• Background Music: Multiple music options available in the interactive menu

Arguments:

• N (optional): Number of blocks (1-6). If omitted, interactive menu appears
• -e: Enable extended mode (polykings/pseudo-polyominos)
• -m: Enable mix mode (include lower-order polyominos)
• -c COLOR: Block color (r, g, b, y, m, c, w or 0-255)
• -bc NUMBER: Background color (0-255)
• -h: Show help message

Examples:

n_is              # Interactive menu
n_is 4            # Classic Tetris
n_is 3 -e         # Tris with polykings
n_is 5 -c g -bc 0 # Green Pentis on black background
n_is 4 -m         # Tetris with Tris and Dis pieces included

How to run:

n-is

or

n_is

Game Controls

Movement & Rotation

• Left/Right Arrow: Move piece horizontally
• Down Arrow: Soft drop (faster fall + 1 point per cell)
• Up Arrow: Rotate piece clockwise
• Enter: Hard drop (instant drop + 2 points per cell)

Game Features

• C: Hold current piece (swap with held piece)
• P: Pause game (press any key to resume)
• Q: Quit game

Audio Controls

• M: Toggle all sound and music on/off
• Page Up/Page Down: Adjust music volume

Visual Customization (During Game)

• U/I: Change main block color (previous/next)
• J/K: Change background color (previous/next)

Game Mechanics

Scoring System

• Line Clears: Points based on number of lines cleared simultaneously
  • 1 line: 60 × (level + 1)
  • 2 lines: 120 × (level + 1)
  • 3 lines: 360 × (level + 1)
  • 4 lines: 1200 × (level + 1)
  • 5 lines: 4096 × (level + 1)
  • 6 lines: 16384 × (level + 1)
• Combo Bonus: Additional points for consecutive line clears
• Drop Bonus: 1 point per cell for soft drop, 2 points per cell for hard drop

Level Progression

• Fall speed increases by ~14.5% each level
• Minimum fall speed prevents game from becoming unplayable

Music Attribution

The game includes background music from the following sources:

• Clair de lune (Claude Debussy) Suite bergamasque by Laurens Goedhart is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0

• Tetris Theme (Korobeiniki) arrangements by GregorQuendel are licensed under the Pixabay License:

  • Piano arrangement
  • Music box arrangement
  • String arrangement

Compatibility

Troubleshooting

Error: "Your terminal may not be supported, or it probably is too small"

• Solution: Increase your terminal window size, or make font smaller
• For higher N values, larger terminals may be required

Colors not displaying correctly:

• Try different color values (0-255)
• Some terminals may have limited color support