Video Captures The Moment 13-Year-Old Becomes First Person To Ever 'Beat' NES 'Tetris'

On January 3, 2024, Willis Gibson, a 13-year-old boy from Oklahoma, became the first gamer to ever beat the NES version of Tetris.

Tetris is a wildly popular video puzzle game created in 1985 by Soviet software engineer Alexey Pajitnov that has different iterations across various gaming consoles and other electronic devices.

In the game, players manipulate the lateral direction and positioning of descending puzzle pieces called tetrominoes into evolving grooves to clear lines as they accumulate from the bottom of the playing field.

The longer you play, the faster the puzzle pieces fall, hitting maximum speed at level 29, which was presumed to be the end of the game, and therefore, a kill screen.

But because the game can continue in "endless mode," it was considered unbeatable until Gibson masterfully played the game for so long that it forced a "True Kill" screen and inevitably caused a software crash.

Gibson, who goes by Blue Scuti on YouTube, recorded his impressive 38 minutes of gameplay, and you can see it here.

The First Time Somebody Has Ever "Beat" Tetris youtu.be

He is reportedly the first human to successfully conquer Tetris.

The unique distinction of being the first Tetris victor belongs to an AI program called StackRabbit, which forced a kill screen with NES Tetris back in 2021.

While early game players used the default DAS play style and the hyper-tapping technique, Gibson hit the True Kill screen through what's called the rolling technique, also called "flyheccing."

Through this third technique, players strum or "roll" the controller from behind with their fingers while the other hand's thumb remains pressed on the D-pad. This can enable speeds of up to 20hz, or 20 times per second.

Social media users were impressed.

Envious much?

Gibson said he dedicated his achievement to his late father, who passed away in December.

The teen also noted that he couldn't feel his fingers following the frantic game play.