The Tetris community has reached another major milestone, with 16-year-old Michael "dogplayingtetris" Artiaga becoming the first player to clear level 255 and achieve the mythical "rebirth" — community parlance for reaching the game's highest possible level and looping all the way back to the beginning.
As reported by Ars Technica, Artiaga accomplished the feat in front of hundreds of Twitch viewers, clearing some 3,300 lines over the course of 80 minutes. It's an achievement that was thought to be impossible until techniques like rolling and hypertapping came into play, inspiring a new generation of Tetris pioneers.
35 years after its release, @dogplayingtris just became the first person to get the NES Tetris rebirth. He made it all the way to level 255, then the game wrapped around and restarted from level 0. pic.twitter.com/Igwa2fIrmJ
— SummoningSalt (@summoningsalt) October 6, 2024
Notably, Artiaga was playing on a special version of the Tetris NES rom that keeps it from crashing after passing level 155. Earlier this year, Tetris expert and fellow teen Willis "Blue Scuti" Gibson managed to beat Tetris for the first time by hitting one of these crashes on level 157, marking the first ever instance of a human player getting one over on Alexey Pajitnov's classic. After level 157, the crash points continue to proliferate, making them virtually impossible to avoid.
Still, that doesn't make Artiaga's feat any less impressive. As Ars Technica notes, the NES version of Tetris actually has a glitch in level 235 that results in it taking an incredible 810 lines to clear — an eternity when you're playing at the fastest possible rate. Artiaga spent 20 minutes on this level alone, finally proclaiming that he had "seen the light" when it was finished.
Artiaga went on to clear level 255 and finally pull off the "rebirth," sending the game all the way back to level 0. Then, incredibly, he kept right on playing, continuing all the way to level 91 before finally giving up. His final score was 29,486,164, breaking the previous world record by Alex Thach by more than 12 million points.
"Oh my god, I'm so glad that game is over, bro," Artiaga said. "I never want to play this game again, bro… I was starting to lose my mind."
Fans hailed Artiaga's accomplishment online, not just because he pulled off a world first rebirth, but because he proved that endless play was indeed possible. Now speculation has already begun on who might pull off the first "double rebirth." If records keep falling at the pace that they have been, it shouldn't be long. After all, it's been less than a year since Blue Scuti beat Tetris, and he's now crashing it for fun.
Kat Bailey is IGN's News Director as well as co-host of Nintendo Voice Chat. Have a tip? Send her a DM at @the_katbot.
