On the evening of October 5, 2024, Michael “Dog” Artiaga became the first player to achieve rebirth in NES Tetris. Finishing the game by going past Level 255, where the game loops back to Level 0.
When Blue Scuti crashed the game in December 2023, it became a phenomenal achievement that was reported by various news media from around the world. Describing it as “beating” the game.
It turns out, there is more to NES Tetris than just crashing the game. If a player can dodge all the points where the game could crash, they could reach Rebirth by advancing past Level 255. At that point, the game loops back to Level 0.
Dog’s Classic Tetris World Championship Background
Before I elaborate on Dog’s achievement, I want to give you some background on his achievement at the Classic Tetris World Championship (CTWC).
At the age of 13, he made his debut appearance at the 2020 CTWC, where he defeated his brother, PixelAndy, in the Finals to become the Tetris World Champion. The following year, he won the 2021 CTWC to become the back-to-back champion.
Since then, Dog had practiced the Rolling technique, eventually mastering the technique. That became his dominant playstyle at future World Championships.
He finished in the Semifinals at the 2022 and 2023 CTWC, after being defeated by the eventual winner of both of those years.
At the 2024 CTWC, he made it to the Finals for the first time since his win in 2021. From there, he finished in second place after losing to Alex T in a decider.
Failed Attempts At Rebirth
Needless to say, getting rebirth is very difficult to achieve. One reason for this is the endurance required to play a single game for more than an hour.
On May 18, 2024, Dog reached Level 235, the infamous 810 line level. Becoming the 2nd person to reach that level. He topped out 13 lines into the level. Finishing at Level 235 after clearing a total of 2,303 lines.
Depending on the player’s starting level, there will be a level (between Level 219 and 235) that will last 810 lines instead of 10 lines. At Level 19 starts, the 810 line level happens at Level 235. HydrantDude explains why that happens in this video.
He tried again on May 21st, but topped out on Level 234. One level short of the 810 line level.
On July 29, 2024, Dog was doing another of his many attempts at achieving rebirth. He made it past Level 200, getting closer to Level 235. Only to top out at Level 214.
In all of the rebirth attempts, you may have noticed that Dog’s game did not crash. That was because he was playing on a Modified NES Tetris Cartridge that removes the Crash triggers. The Classic Tetris community will accept the Rebirth run on that cartridge.
As far as we know, it is humanly impossible to achieve rebirth on an unmodified cartridge.
Biggiemac’s article and EricICX’s video provide in-depth analysis of the path to avoiding game crash.
Hydrant’s spreadsheet lays out all of the crash points in the game.
Dog Becomes The 8th Player To Crash NES Tetris
On September 13, 2024, Meme became the 7th player to crash NES Tetris. This inspired Dog to also go for game crash.
So Dog decides to play on an Unmodified NES Tetris Cartridge in order to go for game crash.
The next day, Dog uploaded a video of his gameplay of him crashing the game. Becoming the 8th player to crash the game.
Going For Rebirth, Finishing The Game
On October 5, 2024, Dog went for another Rebirth attempt. Playing on the Modified NES Tetris cartridge that removes the crash points.
For a second time, he reaches Level 235 (810 line level). But this time, he cleared 810 lines on Level 235 to advance to Level 236. No one had cleared the 810 line level before, but Dog was the first one to do so. When that happened, Dog said “I will see the light”. Which are part of the chorus lyrics to his song, Disillusioned.
He was only 15 Levels (150 lines total) away from achieving rebirth.
At Level 254, he counted down the lines remaining until Level 255. He has miscalculated when Rebirth happened which ruined the moment for a bit. Anyways, he cleared Level 255 and the game looped back to Level 0. Dog became the first player to get rebirth in NES Tetris, completing the game.
It took 1 hour 21 minutes 24 seconds for Dog to reach Rebirth from a Level 19 start.
After achieving Rebirth, Dog took advantage of the slower levels to celebrate. From there, he kept playing to see how far he could go. Possible getting 2 rebirths in a single game.
While continuing to play, he decided to give some shoutouts. It was as if we reached the staff credits on Dog’s Livestream.
At the end, he topped out at Level 91. He had gone through a total of 347 levels. (255+91+1=347; there was a Level 0) The game lasted 2 hours 1 minute 33 seconds.
Game Stats
Score – 29,486,164 points
Level – 347 levels
Lines – 4,216 lines
Check out the game
Here are the Livestream recording of the Rebirth run as it happened.
YouTube Livestream VOD | Twitch VOD
This run puts him on the top of the score leaderboard.
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