Michael Artiaga

Michael Khanh Artiaga (born November 20, 2007), known online as dogplayingtetris or simply Dog, is an American Tetris player from Texas. He won the Classic Tetris World Championship (CTWC) three times, in 2020, 2021, and 2026. For the 2020 win, he became Guinness World Record holder 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, a web developer. Practicing 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. After his victories in the 2020 and 2021 CTWC, Artiaga continued to compete in Tetris tournaments, and additionally founded his own tournament series titled "Classic Tetris Brawl" (CTB). On October 6, 2024, playing on a modified version of the game, Artiaga became the first player to achieve a "rebirth" of NES Tetris after successfully clearing the highest level of the game, level 255, triggering the game to restart back on level 0. In the same event, Artiaga also broke the game's high score record at 29.4 million points.