One 15-year-old player spent just over a month absolutely demolishing the game of Tetris, conquering pretty much every meaningful world record that's ever been set for the NES version of the game.
That player goes by the name Alex T, and on March 11, he became the first player to ever reach 10 million points in NES Tetris - a goal the community had been chasing for months, and one which had thousands of dollars in bounties up for grabs. The competitive classic Tetris scene has been exploding since the end of 2023, and 13-year-old Blue Scuti's accomplishment of 'beating' the game has seemingly set the community on a path of ever greater achievements and even bigger world records.
But Alex T went well beyond just beating a world record. He didn't just reach 10 million points in that March 11 run - he hit over 16 million, damn near doubling the previous high score. If you're curious about the full story behind the run (and it's a doozy), you should probably check out aGameScout's video below, but the highlights include Alex T popping off at his score, grabbing a thing of parmesan cheese, and briefly chugging its contents before pouring it over his head.
My other favorite bits include the part where Alex T makes a very accurate prediction, exclaiming "I can see the headlines now: 15-year-old kid demolishes the game of Tetris!" There's also the bit where he tells his dad that he just won $2,000 from Tetris. Who said video games were a waste of time?
This victory was not without controversy, however. It was done on a modded version of the game often used by top players which, among other things, does not have a risk of crashing at higher levels, unlike the original game.
So shortly after, Alex T set another record, achieving 12 million points before the first crash trigger. All told, between March 11 and April 14, Alex T set world records for score on a modded cart, highest level achieved on both modded and original carts, highest score achieved at a game crash, and highest score achieved prior to a game crash trigger. Then, on April 15, he broke his own modded cart score record.
This version of Tetris is now 34 years old, but it feels like the community is just getting started pushing it to its limits.
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