Just before the new year a new tetris champion emerged to crush the competition! On December 21, a thirteen year old boy by the name of Willis Gibson made an incredible advancement for the tetris community by finally beating the old NES version of the game. 

Willis Gibson’s achievement was not accidental. Racing to crash the game had already been popular in a subgroup of players for a couple of years. Most influential in this race is Justin Yu, known online as fractal161, a 22 year old MIT student. Justin announced his mission to crash the game when he won the 2023 October Classic Tetris World Championship.

Previously Willis was known for being a tetris prodigy. He started playing in 2021 when he was 11, winning several regional tetris tournaments, and placing third in the same Classic Tetris World Championship as Justin. Inspired by Justin’s announcement, Willis had started to race for the crash as well.

“It’s a very difficult goal. You have to play the game for longer than anyone has ever played before,” said Justin in an interview with MIT News. On December 21, the two competing players, live streaming their games, would get impossibly close to being first.

Willis got to level 157 before the game stopped, making it the first time the feat was ever completed by a human. An error in the games code could not allow you to play further and had crashed the game, making it the first time the game was ‘beat’. Willis later posted his accomplishment on Youtube under the name Blue Scuti where it reached 2.1 million views and major news coverage. 

Justin Yu had not been discouraged by not being first and even celebrated Blue Scuti. He continued to push even harder to get it for himself. Only days later, on January 3, Justin had also beat the game. Are there more Tetris champions to come or are these the few able to do it? 

Just before the new year, a new Tetris champion emerged to crush the competition! On December 21, a thirteen-year-old boy by the name of Willis Gibson made an incredible advancement for the Tetris community by finally beating the old NES version of the game. 

But his achievement was not accidental. Racing to crash the game had already been popular in a subgroup of players for a couple of years. Most influential in this race is Justin Yu, known online as fractal161, a 22-year-old MIT student. Justin announced his mission to crash the game when he won the 2023 October Classic Tetris World Championship.

Previously Willis was known for being a Tetris prodigy. He started playing in 2021 when he was 11, winning several regional Tetris tournaments, and placing third in the same Classic Tetris World Championship as Justin. Inspired by Justin’s announcement, Willis had started to race for the crash as well.

“It’s a very difficult goal. You have to play the game for longer than anyone has ever played before,” said Justin in an interview with MIT News. On December 21, the two competing players, live streamed their games, to see who would get impossibly close to being first.

Willis got to level 157 before the game stopped, making it the first time the feat was ever completed by a human. An error in the game’s code could not allow you to play further and had crashed the game, making it the first time the game was ‘beat’. Willis later posted his accomplishment on YouTube under the name Blue Scuti where it reached 2.1 million views and major news coverage. 

Justin Yu had not been discouraged by not being first and even celebrated Blue Scuti. He continued to push even harder to get it for himself. Only days later, on January 3, Justin had also beat the game. Are there more Tetris champions to come or are these the few able to do it?