The optimal age to be a top Tetris player

[SpawN]

In a lot of sports out there once you reach 30 you are pretty much done. Early 30s is the rule for retirement in soccer.(Goalies last longer). In American football it is more like late 20s. Then there is basketball, where you can be Kobe and still rock in your mid 30s. There is hardly any sport that i can think of where you can be a top player in your 40s.(Golf and snooker immediately come to my mind and yet people still struggle to remain at the top at this point).

So, what do you guys think is the age at each a player can reach his/her peak at which point there will be an inevitable decline or at best keep some decent level, before your play eventually degrades.

Obviously, skill will always be there, but tetris nowadays it is all about speed. You can get slower over time, but if you are good you can compensate. However, there is that threshold level where if you fall below it you are pretty much out of the picture. As efficiently and as optimally as you may play, the other guy can simply overwhelm you with superior apm. If tetris is to become a spectator sport with professional players that seems to be a relevant question.

So, I am curious what do you think is the age range where one can expect to be at the top of their abilities. What do you think is the best age for a tetris player and after what age can we expect an inevitable decline in one`s game?

[jkwon23]

There isn't an optimal age for a Tetris player. One can be 40s or even 50s while having great physical health. Since multiplayer Tetris is mostly about speed, good hands and arms are most important regardless of age. I think it's mostly about mindset.

The idea that old age causes a "slow" mental side is merely a mentality that's proven true if one believes it. For example, Two Twin old people with the same age, same physiques and physical performance go through countless physical exercises. The first person will undoubtedly do worse because he thinks that old age makes him feeble and weak-minded, while his twin thinks no such thing. The difference would be much more significant if he didn’t have any worries like the second person who seems just like him.

[officegunner]

In a lot of sports out there once you reach 30 you are pretty much done. Early 30s is the rule for retirement in soccer.(Goalies last longer). In American football it is more like late 20s. Then there is basketball, where you can be Kobe and still rock in your mid 30s. There is hardly any sport that i can think of where you can be a top player in your 40s.(Golf and snooker immediately come to my mind and yet people still struggle to remain at the top at this point).

So, what do you guys think is the age at each a player can reach his/her peak at which point there will be an inevitable decline or at best keep some decent level, before your play eventually degrades.

Obviously, skill will always be there, but tetris nowadays it is all about speed. You can get slower over time, but if you are good you can compensate. However, there is that threshold level where if you fall below it you are pretty much out of the picture. As efficiently and as optimally as you may play, the other guy can simply overwhelm you with superior apm. If tetris is to become a spectator sport with professional players that seems to be a relevant question.

So, I am curious what do you think is the age range where one can expect to be at the top of their abilities. What do you think is the best age for a tetris player and after what age can we expect an inevitable decline in one`s game?

There isn't an optimal age for a Tetris player. One can be 40s or even 50s while having great physical health. Since multiplayer Tetris is mostly about speed, good hands and arms are most important regardless of age. I think it's mostly about mindset.

The idea that old age causes a "slow" mental side is merely a mentality that's proven true if one believes it. For example, Two Twin old people with the same age, same physiques and physical performance go through countless physical exercises. The first person will undoubtedly do worse because he thinks that old age makes him feeble and weak-minded, while his twin thinks no such thing. The difference would be much more significant if he didn't have any worries like the second person who seems just like him.

I agree with jkwon, and would even go as far to say that being old is an advantage, as at that age one can invest more time in the game, which is something many pros seem to struggle with. Why else are the best Go players 90+ in age?

[entrayer]

To determine the declining age of a professional tetris player, we need to look at what makes them a "professional tetris player".

From what ive seen there are two major things that you need to have to be a top tier battle(er)

1. Speed

obviously speed is important but a player's speed is not just in finding out where to place the next block. it takes fast hands and fast fingers to keep up with the average 200 TPM that the pros keep churning out game after game. take into account the amount of time they practice every day (average 3-4 hours or more) and that adds up to an ungodly strain on the wrist, metacarpal joints and tendons in the hands. after years of playing its not hard to imagine that physical limitations such as carpal tunnel and tendinitis begin to be a problem.
(professional starcraft player) Liquid TLO has been suffering from carpal tunnel for years now and has been quoted on it interfering with his practice regiment.

2. Technique

an increase in a players technique or efficiency will come in time and as a pro gets older they surely will develop more efficient means of sending lines. a players ability to spot a potential t-spin in the garbage lines heading his/her way gets better with practice. a player can memorize the bags and know which pieces are coming up next even though the "next slot" only shows the next four. t-spin triples are extremely hard to find but they payout very well. the older a player gets the more likely they are to be better at these type of things.

A players ability to compete will definitely deteriorate over time due to the physical limitations of our bodies ;However, the way we play may be able to combat old age for a little while. All in all we can compensate for getting old for a little while, but in the end everyone will retire one day.

My estimate is that the average player will last anywhere between 10 to 15 years in the pro scene.
assuming they started before age 40.

[gerdhal]

yes even if mind is quick.. to be on top hand speed rules...

i want to see that grandfather sending 40 line in 25 sec!!!  

I think top players are around 20 30

[caffeine]

Optimal age for Tetris = [(Age of which you have a lot of free time) * (age at which Tetris is new and "fresh" to you) * (age at which you are single) * (age at which your reaction time hasn't been that affected)]

So pretty much, young students who don't work full time and are single.

(The formula is tongue in cheek and not meant to be actually calculated.

[officegunner]

Optimal age for Tetris = [(Age of which you have a lot of free time) * (age at which Tetris is new and "fresh" to you) * (age at which you are single) * (age at which your reaction time hasn't been that affected)]

So pretty much, young students who don't work full time and are single.

(The formula is tongue in cheek and not meant to be actually calculated.

Its confirmed. Worlds best tetris player is a Japanese baby.

[Alexandra]

Optimal age for Tetris = [(Age of which you have a lot of free time) * (age at which Tetris is new and "fresh" to you) * (age at which you are single) * (age at which your reaction time hasn't been that affected)]

So pretty much, young students who don't work full time and are single.

(The formula is tongue in cheek and not meant to be actually calculated.

Bingo.

[gerdhal]

Was a while i laughed soo hard!  

[Shuey]

I definitely think it's good for kids to learn Tetris at a very early age because they will be developing skills during an optimal development age.  But at the same time, things can also get better with age.  I started playing Tetris at 16-17 years old, and then when I was in my late 30's, I blew the door off "pattern building" and set a new precedence in the Tetris world.

I may not play Tetris like I did a couple years ago, but I know I still have room for growth if I put time back into it.  My recent world record combo race score is evidence of that .

[Blitz]

If Tetris is to become a spectator sport with professional players, and if those professional players are free to play Tetris all day and has no other things in life to worry about, then I think they would just get better and better and not reach a point where their skill starts to decline unless they quit playing.
The physical pressure put on the hands when averaging over 600 keystrokes per minute along with the aging process of the human body are very likely to slow down the players over time.
But if we assume a professional player plays Tetris 8 hours a day every day, and assuming he could keep this going for 10 years before physical limitations starts forcing his speed to decline. Then this player would have played Tetris for 29200 hours. That is A LOT of time so the player is likely to have learned a lot of techniques and gained so much Tetris experience and knowledge that he can trade the loss of speed for greater efficiency and still be able to compete with the younger and less experienced players even if they are faster than him.

[officegunner]

If Tetris is to become a spectator sport with professional players, and if those professional players are free to play Tetris all day and has no other things in life to worry about, then I think they would just get better and better and not reach a point where their skill starts to decline unless they quit playing.
The physical pressure put on the hands when averaging over 600 keystrokes per minute along with the aging process of the human body are very likely to slow down the players over time.
But if we assume a professional player plays Tetris 8 hours a day every day, and assuming he could keep this going for 10 years before physical limitations starts forcing his speed to decline. Then this player would have played Tetris for 29200 hours. That is A LOT of time so the player is likely to have learned a lot of techniques and gained so much Tetris experience and knowledge that he can trade the loss of speed for greater efficiency and still be able to compete with the younger and less experienced players even if they are faster than him.

/thread

[nc4228]

To be honest, in my opinion, there is a "peak" level for everyone and that would probably be around a person's early/mid 20s. However, because Tetris is kinda more of a mental sport than a pure physical sport (kinda similar to pianism as I can tell u), masters can probably remain in the picture longer (I say to even mid 40's) as long as their brains are still sharp!

[rockywi]

Interesting Topic:

For the record:  I am 59 years old.  I have played in a LOT of gaming tournaments over my lifetime.  My primary game/sport of choice is Foosball (I meant that in the U.S. version of the word--Table Soccer, the little tables with the rods sticking through the men.  Yes, there is a pro tour in that sport, believe it or not.  An aside: one of the younger top players of our sport just happened to garner one of the top 9 spots in another "sport's" world championship, the 2014 World Series of Poker.  This has given him some notoriety in the World of Sports, and now some media outlets are taking interest in him and Foosball.  We, in Foosball circles, know him as Billy Pappas.  He is listed on the WSOP websites as William Pappa+somethingorother that is real long.  Enough of that.)

More about me:  I've played tournaments in Foosball, Chess, Billiards, Magic the Gathering, both cards and online, Pac-Man (in 1981 or so).  I played the World Championships of Video Games in 1981 (Centipede) where I won my trip back to Chicago to play.  (The checks bounced on that one.)  I've never been a Top contender worldwide in any of the games or sports or whatever you call them, but I usually am competitive with even the best, just enough so I know how ungodly good they really are.  I sometimes characterize them as not really being human anymore.

In other words, I've been around the block, gaming-wise, anyway.

I will be the first to say that I'm not as quick as I once was, but I feel that I really have a grasp of how good I am and who I should and should not be losing to.

I play Tetris to maintain my eye/hand coordination.  Mostly Tetris Friends online.

So, here is my opinion of the subject at hand:

Yes, younger folks are usually quicker and can be more competitive in games/sports like Tetris & Foosball.  That being said, top players in Chess, poker, and the like can be quite a bit older.  I've also heard that Ultramarathon Runners tend to be more middle aged than young, too, and if anything is a physical sport and requires good conditioning, Ultramarathoning is.

So, like many of you have concluded, age is only one of many factors in performance.  Still, no one expects to see any 70 year old heavyweight boxing champions an time soon, so at some point, in some sports, age can be a deal killer.

.....Rocky

I'll continue this in a separate post.....

[rockywi]

So, hopefully my last post brings me to why I came here today:

As mentioned in my last post, I play mostly (almost exclusively) Tetris Friends online.  I've done this for a couple of years now.

At first I discovered that my opponents seemed to have an advantage in that their blocks did things that mine could never do.  I then found out that there is something called "tuning" that is sold by the site that allows you to play quicker.  I paid for it and found that I was still slower than others.  Then I found out that they were still faster than I was, so I found out that some of them used a special URL code to get the speedups without paying or even playing the game to pay with coins.

This seemed to be the best option for maximizing my speed, but others still seem to have an edge.

What I hear in other places is that they think that I am just slower and not as good as others.  I will concede that point for the most part, but I'm NOT half as fast as a large group of others.

I've noticed that one of my three computers is much faster than the other two.  I've also noticed that IE seems to be much faster than Chrome or Firefox.  Unfortunately IE doesn't work very often anymore.

I've also noticed that USB keyboards are much more sluggish than PS2 keyboards.  

I don't know from computers, so I don't know how to tweak my computers to optimize them.

I am planning to buy a new computer in a month or so.

Can anyone offer me suggestions on how to optimize my platform (and what to buy for my new one) so I can at least be on par with other players hardware wise?

Thanks in advance.

...........Rocky