The 2023 Classic Tetris World Championship (CTWC) will be on October 13-15 at the Portland Retro Gaming Expo.
(Update 10/16/2023: The tournament has finished. Watch all of the matches)
The format of the tournament is the same as last year. Players will be given 2 hours to play as many games as they want during the Qualifying round.
After that, the Top 48 advance to the Main Bracket. Each match is a Best of 5. The players compete against each other in a 1 vs 1 format, where the player with the higher score wins the game.
What’s new for the 2023 CTWC? There will be a Level 39 Super Killscreen.
Why add the Level 39 Super Killscreen?
Theoretically, the game ends at Level 29, where the pieces move too fast for players to survive. The level is referred to as the Killscreen. This prevented players from being able to play the game forever. Even with hypertapping, players could not play indefinitely.
That is until Cheez discovered a new technique called Rolling. It was faster and more efficient than hypertapping. Ever since the discovery in late 2020, many players have mastered the technique and been able to play far past the Level 29 Killscreen. Effectively, allowing them to play forever.
To prevent games from going on indefinitely, a Super Killscreen will be implemented on Level 39. Going twice the speed of Level 29, which makes it nearly impossible for any player to survive even with rolling.
How will this change tournament gameplay?
Adding the Level 39 Super Killscreen will incentivize players to score Tetrises on the Level 29 Killscreen, instead of lining it out forever as seen at the 2022 CTWC Finals.
The most noticeable example of the Super Killscreen making a Tetris Match intense is the April 2023 Classic Tetris Monthly (CTM) Mega Masters Finals.
Where to watch the 2023 CTWC?
The 2023 CTWC will be livestreamed live on their Twitch Channels, ClassicTetris and ClassicTetris2.
Fans of the tournament can donate to the prize pool via Matcherino.
The rules and schedule of the event can be found on the CTWC website. Boom! Tetris for you!
