At the beginning of this year, we witnessed the young prodigy Willis Gibson, a mere 13 years old, shatter the Tetris game record on the Famicom/NES version, causing the game to freeze up (reaching the so-called kill screen). But just a few months later, another record was broken by Michael Artiaga, a 16-year-old teenager who managed to beat the final level of Tetris, level 255, and reset the game back to level 0 for the first time ever.
The legend of completing Tetris only to “be born again” (rebirth) has been a belief spoken of for decades, but had never come to fruition until now. Artiaga successfully demonstrated this live in front of a large audience on Twitch.
The difference between both record-breaking feats is that Gibson used the original Tetris version, while Artiaga used a modified version to prevent block stacking leading to a game crash, a situation that caused Gibson to fail. This allowed Artiaga to avoid the game crash scenario and continue playing all the way to level 255.
The path to level 255 is no easy feat, as various bugs in the game from that era made certain levels extremely challenging. For example, at level 235, the block colors are so dark green that they almost blend with the background seamlessly. Artiaga had struggled with level 235 previously but managed to conquer it successfully this time around.
Source: Ars Technica
During the historic moment, timestamped at 1:21.
TLDR: Young Tetris players defy odds and make history by beating the game in ways never seen before, showcasing skill and determination.
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