- Source: Michael Artiaga
Michael Khanh Artiaga (born November 20, 2007), known online as dogplayingtetris or simply Dog, is an American Tetris player from Texas. He is best known for back-to-back victories in the 2020 and 2021 Classic Tetris World Championships (CTWC), the former of which led him to set the Guinness World Record for the "Youngest Tetris World Champion" at 13 years old.
From a young age, Michael and his brother Andrew Artiaga experimented in coding, computing, and gaming, alongside their father, who was a web developer. Practicing classic NES Tetris occasionally on their Game Boy, both brothers were inspired to pursue the game further after seeing 16-year-old Joseph Saelee's victory against the 37-year-old reigning champion Jonas Neubauer in the 2018 CTWC, marking the beginning of a new generation of Tetris players to the competitive scene. After his victories in the 2020 and 2021 CTWCs, Artiaga has continued to compete in Tetris tournaments, and has started his own titled "Classic Tetris Brawl" (CTB). On October 6, 2024, Artiaga became the first player to achieve a "rebirth" of the game after successfully clearing the highest level of the game, level 255, triggering the game to restart back on level 0. The same game saw Artiaga also break the high score record at 29.4 million points.
Personal life and upbringing
Michael Khanh Artiaga was born on November 20, 2007, to Van and Randall Artiaga, and is from Fort Worth, Texas. He and his brother Andrew Artiaga grew up around electronics, as their father was a web developer. At 5 years old, Artiaga learned basic coding, and further experimented in computing and gaming in elementary school. Artiaga and his brother practiced the skills they learned by creating characters and music for several of his father's gaming apps. Artiaga stated in an interview with The Guardian that his school work takes precedence over his gaming, and that math was his favorite subject. Outside of Tetris, Artiaga has also practiced speedrunning other retro games, including Super Mario Bros.
Tetris career
Artiaga was introduced to classic NES Tetris at 8 years old in elementary school, after playing it on the original Game Boy at home. He collaborated with his brother on their shortcomings while they practiced the game to better their playing. He was originally attracted to the game's need for quick-thinking, speed, and skill. Michael and Andrew, at 10 and 13 years old, respectively, began to play more intently after watching 16-year-old Joseph Saelee's victory against the 37-year-old reigning champion Jonas Neubauer in the 2018 Classic Tetris World Championship (CTWC), marking the beginning of a new generation of Tetris players to the competitive scene. After purchasing twin famiclones, Michael began to compete in tournaments under the name "dogplayingtetris" or simply "Dog", in reference to his avatar being a dog holding a Nintendo controller, while his brother took the nickname "P1xelAndy". In November 2019, Artiaga created his own Tetris tournament called "Classic Tetris Brawl" (CTB), which is made up of a number of events including three-player matches, level 0 to 19 speedruns, and a quarterly "Brawl Championship". In December 2019, Artiaga became the youngest person to complete a "maxout", a point in the game where the score becomes so high it no longer registers correctly on-screen.
During the COVID-19 lockdowns in the United States, both brothers began to practice more often while also learning from their competitors on Twitch. At 13 and 15 years old respectively, both Michael and Andrew qualified for the 2020 CTWC; Michael scored 1 million points in six games, making him the top seed in his double-elimination playoffs group. Michael was the second-youngest competitor there, and the youngest to make it to the top eight. After beating fellow competitor Jacob Huff (known online as "Huffulufugus"), Michael made it to the final round with his brother Andrew, where they competed against each other at home due to COVID-19 restrictions. Michael won shortly after reaching level 29, winning $3,000, which he used to buy a real Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), a Donner guitar, an electric drum set, and invest in cryptocurrency. Andrew celebrated the victory with Michael, giving him a high five immediately after the match; Michael remarked that the "great [thing] about being in the top two is that we both get great trophies". At 13 years and 16 days old, Artiaga set a Guinness World Record for the "Youngest Tetris World Champion".
After his 2020 CTWC victory, Artiaga remarked that, while he would "always go down as a 13-year-old world champion", he was motivated to win again at the next championship. Continued playing helped him secure a back-to-back win in the also virtual CTWC 2021, where he beat 19-year-old Jacob Huff 3–1 to secure another $3,000 prize. His back-to-back win also placed Artiaga in the 2023 edition of the Scholastic Book of World Records. On April 9, 2022, Artiaga set another world record for the highest scoring game on a level 29 start with a score of 2.2 million. From June 8–9, Artiaga competed in the 2024 Classic Tetris World Championship, where he lost against Alex Thach ("Alex T") in the finals, having him place second in the championship.
On October 6, 2024, Artiaga became the first person to achieve a "rebirth" of the game after successfully clearing the highest level of the game, level 255, triggering the game to restart back on level 0. After achieving rebirth, Artiaga continued to play the game from level 0 to level 91, where he finally ended the game with a final time of 121 minutes, a final score of 29,486,164 points, 346 levels reached, and about 3,300 lines cleared. The final score of 29.4 million points beat the previous high score record set by Alex Thach by more than 12 million points. The high level reached also had Artiaga achieve the first "line count overflow" in the game, which began at level 30 after the rebirth or level 285. Artiaga, who had live streamed the game on Twitch, celebrated by putting his hands on his head and exclaiming "Am I dreaming, bro?" and "I'm so glad that game is over". The achievement, which had only previously been possible through the use of AI scripts, was completed by using a modified version of the game which prevents the game from crashing after opportunities begin at level 155.
= Playing style
=Early in his Tetris career, Artiaga adopted hypertapping, a playing technique which emphasizes vibrating the buttons rapidly over pressing them; a technique first popularized by Saelee in his winning 2018 CTWC tournament. His success with the technique led his brother to adopt it to keep up with him before the 2020 CTWC.
Unlike the majority of his competitors, Artiaga continued to utilize hypertapping as late as during the 2021 CTWC; his handling of the controller in that competition was referred to by The New York Times as one "with the breeziness of a cocktail pianist". This was opposed to rolling, a new technique created by fellow Tetris player Christopher Martinez (known online as "Cheez") before the 2020 CTWC, which involves rolling the back of the controller with all five fingers to position the game pieces more quickly. To prepare for competitions, Artiaga typically plays for about 45 minutes to warm-up.
Competitive record
Below is a table of the Tetris tournaments Artiaga participated in and their outcome. It should be noted the table is likely incomplete, as results on the CTM website prior to February 2022 only list the name of a competitor if they won or were the runner-up, not including the names of those who competed otherwise.