Quadra FAQ

3) Single Player

3.1) The aim of the game

The aim of the game is to achieve the most points. The number of points given out depends on a number of factors including:

Number of lines cleared with your last block
How many recursions were needed until everything settled into place
Level number you have reached

How do you clear lines you ask? Well, assume a setup like below consisting of 4 straight pieces:

Now the player drops a J piece into the position shown:

This will cause the whole 2nd line to vanish:

The rest of the J block will now fall down:

See how the rest of the J block fell down 2 rows? That is because it was free to do so. In Tetris, the remaining section of the J block would only fall down 1 row.

3.2) How the scoring works

Here is the coding from the game itself:

switch(depth) {
    case 1: score_add = 250; break;
    case 2: score_add = 500; break;
    case 3: score_add = 1000; break;
    case 4: score_add = 2000; break;
    default: score_add = 200 * depth * depth; break;
}
int complexity_points=1000*(complexity-1);
if(game->net_version()>=23)
    complexity_points=200*(complexity-1)*(complexity-1);
score_add += complexity_points;
if(send_for_clean && game->net_version()>=23) {
    int clean_points;
    if(depth<=4)
        clean_points=depth*1250;
    else
        clean_points=depth*depth*500;
    score_add += clean_points;
}
score_add += (score_add/10)*level;
stats[SCORE].add(score_add);

Depth is the number of lines you just cleared. Complexity is the number of recursions it took before everything fell into place. net_version is the version of the game you are playing, which is different than the Quadra version. In single player, net_version will be 23 or higher for the latest version. send_for_clean indicates that a clean canvas was achieved.

So if you can follow that good! If not here is a list of scores for level 1 going up to a depth of 10 with all different complexity levels:

Depth

Complexity

Score

Score with Clean

S+C

275

1650

550

3300

770

3520

1100

5225

1320

5445

1980

6105

2200

7700

2420

7920

3080

8580

4180

9680

5500

19250

5720

19470

6380

20130

7480

21230

9020

22770

7920

27720

8140

27940

8800

28600

9900

29700

11440

31240

13420

33220

10780

37730

11000

37950

11660

38610

12760

39710

14300

41250

16280

43230

18700

45650

14080

49280

14300

49500

14960

50160

16060

51260

17600

52800

19580

54780

22000

57200

24860

60060

17820

62370

18040

62590

18700

63250

19800

64350

21340

65890

23320

67870

25740

70290

28600

73150

31900

76450

22000

77000

22220

77220

22880

77880

23980

78980

25520

80520

27500

82500

29920

84920

32780

87780

36080

91080

39820

94820

3.3) Eh? How do you clear so many lines at once?

The best way to learn how to play single player games well is to watch the world top score replays. See the replay section for how to do this. But I will demonstrate how to clear 11 lines at once.

You could build up the blocks like so:

Now a Square piece is added which completes a line:

The line is cleared and the stacked straight pieces fall into the hole:

Now another 10 lines are completed, making a total of 11 lines completed by dropping just 1 piece in! This leaves:

Doing this kind of move is usually called a "Build Up", as you build up all the blocks then remove heaps of them at once.

3.4) How do you get really good high scores?

As a beginner, you should try to do build ups on the early levels, and then concentrate on staying alive once you get to the higher levels. But once you get more experienced you should find that you will be able to do big build ups on higher levels where the blocks fall faster. Learning how to use the left rotate and the right rotate buttons is also very important and will help you place the blocks in the right positions on the faster levels.