Alexey Pajitnov: Creating and Clearing Lines

 Alexey Pajitnov was a computer engineer from the Soviet Union. He is also the developer of one of the most recognizable games of all time, Tetris. 

While working at a computing lab, he had to test how powerful new hardware was by creating programs for it to run, and this was his "excuse for making games". The inspiration for Tetris came from a childhood puzzle game with pentominoes, shapes made out of five squares, where the goal was to make certain shapes with those pieces. Due to the limitations of the original computer, letter characters were used instead of proper graphical blocks. The original build of the game filled the playing space pretty quickly, so Pajitnov soon added the line clear feature, then later implemented a point system. According to himself, he would give debugging the program as an excuse to keep playing the game during work. 

Pajitnov initially was unsure how to publish the game, though he found an opportunity when the Soviet Union was undergoing reform. He granted the rights to the game to the government, and Tetris became the first computer game to be exported from the Soviet Union. Pajitnov didn't get much money initially, but his main goal was "to see people enjoying my game". Today, Tetris is one of the best-selling video games in the world, so it could be argued that Alexey Pajitnov is a Pro-c creative, from the sheer success and popularity of Tetris.

Sources:

Tetris: how we made the addictive computer game

Happy Birthday, Tetris. 35 Years Later You're As Addictive And Tetromino-y As Ever