Video game created by a 16-year-old in a few days shatters records, humiliates professional games designed with mega-budgets

·Gaming game created by a 16-year-old in a few days shatters records, humiliates fessional games designed with mega-budgetsBy Barbara OrtutayBy The Associated PressBy Barbara OrtutayBy The Associated Press This image vided by Janzen Madsen shows the Roblox game called "Grow a Garden." Janzen Madsen via APWhether it serves as a chill escape from the onslaught of the real world or simply a way to beat vacation doldrums, a viral Roblox game gardening has become the surprise hit of the summer

And there’s no one to shoot, fight or race

Grow a Garden is as simple as its name suggests — players can fill a plot of land with plants and animals, harvest and sell, trade or steal each others’ bounty

The game is low stress, with an aesthetic reminiscent of Minecraft and a soundtrack of soothing classical tunes such as Mozart’s Rondo Alla Turca playing in the background

Its ity has further cemented Roblox’ place not the gaming world but in culture — for better or for worse, it’s where the kids hang out. “The word I keep hearing used over and over to describe this particular game is that it’s chill, which is just such a nice alternative

I get a lot of of that Animal Crossing vibe from it

You know, you can check in, you can check your gardens, you can get some new seeds, you can plant them,” said Becky Bozdech, editorial director at the nonfit Common Sense Media. “I have an 11-year-old son who (plays it) and he says to him the big difference is that a lot of games have a big giant objective that you have to do, but in Grow a Garden, you can just kind of hang out and do what you want.” Coincidence or not, Grow a Garden soared to ity around the same time that Take-Two Interactive announced it would delay the launch of its wildly anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6 until next year

In late June, the gardening game logged 21.6 million concurrent players, surpassing Fortnite’s previous record of 15.2 million according to Roblox

Analysts who Roblox’s stock say Grow a Garden is helping boost the company’s revenue and will push the company’s quarterly earnings numbers above Wall Street’s expectations

While it’s not if the GTA audience flocked to this simple gardening game to pass the time until then, the timing reignited the age-old debate who gamers are and what titles are taken seriously by the game establishment

It happened with Candy Crush, with puzzle games, with Animal Crossing

Are people who play cozy games true gamers? Or is the title reserved for the folks who shoot enemies in Call of Duty or drive around creating mayhem in GTA? “There’s a huge percentage of gamers that play Roblox and the actual industry just views it as this esoterically immature platform of weird gameplay habits,” said Janzen Madsen, the New Zealand-based CEO and founder of Splitting Point studios, which acquired the game from its teenage creator. “Well, I actually think in five years this is what player expectation is gonna be

And because you guys haven’t embraced it, you’re not gonna know how to make games.” To start growing your garden, you’ll need a Roblox account

The game will start you out with an empty plot and some money — sheckles — and a starter seed

From there, you can plant seeds, harvest and sell your crops and buy more seeds, animals or tools for your garden

While it is possible to play the game without spending real-world money, it will take longer

Once you sell enough crops, you earn money to buy more expensive seeds beyond basic carrots and blueberries. “For me, I just, I really want to get all the rarest stuff

I’m a completionist, so I want everything and that’s what’s fun for me,” said Leah Ashe, a YouTuber who plays Grow a Garden and other games to an audience of 5.3 million. “It’s really cool because you can come together because the seed shop is global, so everybody’s shop is the exact same

So you can work with other people and be , ‘Oh my gosh, the sugar apple is in stock

Get online!’ The seed shop every five minutes, so there’s always something pulling you back into the game.” For Roblox, which has faced a backlash for not doing enough to tect kids on its gaming service, Grow a Garden has served as something of a reprieve — along with new safety measures such as chat restrictions and privacy tools

New players get help from more established peers who send them gifts and let them know when rare seeds become available in the seed shop

Bozdech said that “if you have the right supervision and guidance,” Roblox can be a positive experience for kids, allowing them to create their own designs or practice coding, for instance. “Something Grow a Garden, particularly, is a nice opportunity maybe for parents and kids to play together,” she said

And perhaps the slow cultivating of a magical garden can benefit parents too. “It’s hitting a nerve, you know?” Bozdech said. “People need an escape from the world, I think we all do.” Introducing the 2025 Fortune 500, the definitive ranking of the biggest companies in America

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