Classic Tetris World Championship 2022 - 5 - The Second Day, Bracket Play Begins

It is Saturday October 15, the second day of the Classic Tetris World Championships.

Today's schedule:

Silver Rounds 1 & 2 (32 seeds - single elimination)

12:30PM – Round 1 (16 continuous Best of 3 matches)
3:30PM – Round 2 (8 continuous Best of 3 matches)
5:00PM – Finish

Gold Rounds 0 & 1 (48 seeds - single elimination)

12:00PM – Class Photo
12:30PM – Round Zero (16 continuous Best of 5 matches)
2:30PM – Round 1 (16 continuous Best of 5 matches)
6:30PM – Finish

The small interview area located in between the Main Stage and Stage 2 with the 1st and 2nd prize trophies. The trophies used to be T pieces but were changed to J pieces in 2021 to honour Jonas Neubauer.

No way to sugarcoat it. Yesterday was mentally and physically exhausting. I could still feel the creak in my knees from all of the standing, kneeling and squatting. Knowing that there was another photographer solely dedicated to the event, I told myself to stop taking pictures of everything, take a slower approach, and look for stories.

While taking a seat to eat some snacks, I could see a person playing Tetris at one of the casual play stations. Obviously someone playing Tetris at a Tetris tournament isn't unusual. But this person was using a guitar. I sat there for a few minutes, watching this person try again and again. Ambling up to the side, there were a few words written in big bold black letters . . .

THE SHREDDER

And then realization hit me. This person was in yesterday's qualifiers. He was up on the Main Stage, using The Shredder.

I waited for his game to finish and upon seeing me, he introduced himself as Noel. I moved in closer to see how he used The Shredder to play Tetris. Upon closer inspection, a NES controller was inserted into the neck of the "guitar" so that Noel could place his hands as if playing on an actual guitar. There was even a strap.

Noel was obviously familiar with using a guitar controller. As it turns out, Noel was a big Guitar Hero fan and he would often play Tetris on an emulator using his Guitar Hero controllers.

Despite it being early and not qualifying, Noel was still grinding it out. He had promised Steve Deluca, owner of TotalRADNes and creator of The Shredder, that he would get a max-out using The Shredder and was hoping to get it done that day.

It was still early in the morning but I could see his determination shining through . . . I didn't want to disturb him any longer so I left him to it.

Myles's controller was broken, and right taps were no longer registering consistently. Even then, he still qualified in Silver Bracket. On the Discord server, other competitors offered to loan their controllers but getting used to a new one would be too risky at this point. Above, before bracket play began, Myles taking his controller apart in an attempt to fix it.

Jakub excited about getting a mint NES and getting his first signature from Peyton.

Wren proactively troubleshooting all of the spare NES consoles to verify that they were in good working order. Here, he is inspecting the internals of the NES and showing the NES's internal security chip.

Getting 48 people to sign the CTWC poster and line up for the Gold Bracket class photo took a fair amount of time.

Thankfully, dansushi, the event photographer, was up to the task and took a better photo than this one.

Chris Tang receiving a lifetime CTWC award in recognition of his years of commentating at CTWC

To hear Chris's speech: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1625507828?t=00h34m40s

The Start of Gold Bracket - Round 0

Judges taking up position behind the players. During bracket play, the judges play a variety of roles. Aside from ensuring good sportsmanship, they determine piece sequence (i.e. the order in which the Tetris pieces fall) via rolling dice and inputting that sequence into the game.

Pumpyheart and Vandy commentating on Stage 2. Commentators have a tough job. The role demands a ton of research and familiarity with the subject matter in order to break it down for the audience.

Stage 2 Gold Bracket action with Somalian (sitting, with glasses and black gloves) vs Scotto.

Sharky (center) fist bumps Smol Jordan (left) after being defeated 3-1 in Gold Bracket play.

And right afterwards, he would commentate the rest of Gold Bracket's Round 0 with Chris Tang.

Birb (left) looking at Cheez's screen during their Gold Bracket match. Birb comes into this match as a heavy underdog due to his opponent being the person who made the rolling technique competitively viable.

The crowd looking on in silence during the Birb vs Cheez match.

Birb wins 3-2. Even with a score of 994, 680 points and a 140, 000 point lead, Cheez still had the potential to come back with his rolling expertise. In the heat of the match, Cheez misplaces the long bar leading to a cascade of placement errors and being eliminated from the tournament.

Ella B vs Tugi in Gold Bracket. Ella B's rolling technique is a thing of beauty, neatly tucking and spinning into place at the last possible second. She would later tell me that she never expected to advance this far in CTWC because, like Myles, her controller had broke on her way from Northern Ontario. Despite the controller issues, Ella B stated that this was her favourite performance.

Ella B almost clinched the win with a 2-0 lead. In the end, Tugi would storm back and take the following three games to win the set. Throughout this match, the following chant was heard . . .

LET'S GO TUGI!!!! TUGI SUCKS!!!!

Upon learning that Tugi had self-proclaimed himself to be a heel (jokingly), the European Tetris community decided to take it a step further and parodied the John Cena WWE chants. Anytime Tugi is in a match, someone is bound to start the chant and another is honour-bound to finish it.

Needless to say, there were many Tugi chants and slightly confused faces during CTWC 2022.

Nowi beats Birb 3-0 and celebrates with Pollo. After a relatively easy first two games, the third game is a back and forth affair, with both scoring Tetrises one after another in a slugfest. In the endgame, a long piece drought forces both players to top out at Level 29 with each scoring more than a million points. The point difference was only 31780 points, about equivalent to a Tetris.

Kofi (foreground) vs Fractal (midground) with BeastinShen and Sharky (both in background) commentating.

Fractal's father and Lok taking pictures of the Kofi vs Fractal match.

This Tetris suit was a lot better than expected.

A brief look at Silver Bracket

A quick diversion to Silver Bracket at the back of the venue. Alas, a lot of the day's Silver Bracket action had already completed . . .

The community showing their support to the players. They are often the ones with the most expressive reactions as they know all too well the feeling of a brilliant play or an unexpected miscalculation.