If you’ve spent any time at all on the internet in the last decade, you’ve seen the blocky avatars. They're everywhere. But while millions of kids—and increasingly, adults—log in every single day to escape into user-built worlds, surprisingly few people can actually name the person who started it all.
Honestly, the story of who is the creator of Roblox isn't just about one guy in a garage. It’s actually a tale of two engineers who were obsessed with physics long before they cared about "gaming" as we know it today.
The duo behind the digital universe
The short answer is that David Baszucki and Erik Cassel co-founded Roblox.
They weren't your typical "gamer" founders. Before they were building a global metaverse, they were knee-deep in educational software. Back in 1989, Baszucki started a company called Knowledge Revolution. Their big hit was a program called Interactive Physics.
It was exactly what it sounds like: a 2D space where you could drop weights, attach springs, and watch how gravity worked. It was meant for classrooms. But something weird started happening. Kids weren't just using it to finish their physics homework. They were using it to build crazy contraptions, Rube Goldberg machines, and demolition derbies.
Baszucki noticed. He realized that the "tool" was more fun than the "lesson."
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Erik Cassel was the lead engineer at Knowledge Revolution, and he and Baszucki became a tight-knit team. When they sold that company to MSC Software for $20 million in 1998, they stayed on for a bit, but the itch to build something bigger—something that combined that physics sandbox with the social power of the internet—never went away.
From DynaBlocks to the Roblox we know
In 2004, they finally got to work.
They didn't call it Roblox at first. The initial name was actually DynaBlocks. If you’ve ever seen the super old logos from the mid-2000s, you’ll see that clunky, "early internet" aesthetic. They eventually realized DynaBlocks was a mouthful and a bit hard to remember.
In 2005, they officially pivoted to the name Roblox—a portmanteau of "robots" and "blocks."
It’s easy to forget how primitive the early days were. The platform launched in beta in 2004, and when it officially went public in September 2006, it was a ghost town. Baszucki and Cassel actually had to play their own games to make the site look active. They’d hang out in the few "places" that existed, waiting for some random person to stumble in.
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The philosophy from day one was simple: they wouldn't make the games. The users would.
This was a massive gamble. Most gaming companies at the time were spending millions to develop high-end graphics and scripted stories. Baszucki and Cassel just wanted to give people a "digital box of LEGOs" and a scripting language called Lua.
The tragic loss of a co-founder
You can’t talk about who created Roblox without mentioning the tragedy that hit the company in 2013.
While David Baszucki (often known by his username Builderman) is the face of the company today, Erik Cassel was the technical heart of the operation. He was the one who architected much of the early infrastructure that allowed thousands of people to play together in physics-based worlds.
In February 2013, Erik Cassel passed away after a three-year battle with cancer.
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The community's reaction was unlike anything seen in gaming at the time. Thousands of players held in-game vigils. They wore "Erik Cassel" shirts on their avatars. Even today, if you look through the Roblox catalog, you’ll find memorial items and tributes to him. He didn't live to see the company go public or reach its current status as a multi-billion dollar giant, but his fingerprints are all over the code.
Why it didn't fail (like everyone thought it would)
For a long time, people in the tech industry ignored Roblox.
It looked "ugly" compared to Minecraft or Call of Duty. But Baszucki stayed the course. He’s often described as a "zen" leader—someone who doesn't get rattled by short-term trends. He focused on three things that basically guaranteed the platform's survival:
- The Economy: They introduced Robux and the Developer Exchange (DevEx). This changed everything. Suddenly, a teenager in their bedroom could make $10,000 a month by designing a popular game.
- Cross-Platform Play: They pushed for Roblox to work on phones, tablets, and consoles way before it was cool.
- Safety First: Because the audience was so young, they invested heavily in moderation tech that most other social sites ignored until it was too late.
What David Baszucki is doing now
As of 2026, David Baszucki is still at the helm as CEO. He’s transitioned from the "Builderman" who used to send a welcome message to every new user into a tech mogul managing a public company (NYSE: RBLX).
He’s moved the vision past just "games." He now talks about Roblox as a utility—a place for virtual concerts, digital fashion shows, and even remote work. The goal is to capture 10% of all global gaming revenue, and with nearly 400 million monthly active users, he’s not exactly dreaming small.
If you’re looking to dive deeper into the history or even start building on the platform yourself, here is how you can actually use this information:
- Study the Lua Language: If you want to follow in the founders' footsteps, don't just play. Learn Lua. It’s the same language Cassel and Baszucki baked into the platform 20 years ago.
- Check Out "Classic" Places: Look for games created by the user accounts Roblox, Builderman, or Shedletsky. These are the digital museums of the platform’s history.
- Follow the RDC (Roblox Developers Conference): This is where Baszucki announces the future. It’s the best way to see where the "creator" vision is headed next.
The story of the creator of Roblox is really a story of patience. It took two decades for the "physics simulator for kids" to become the dominant social platform for an entire generation. It wasn't an overnight success; it was a slow build, one block at a time.