Alex Balfanz

Alex Balfanz (born May 5, 1999) is an American video game developer, noted as the co-creator of the Roblox game Jailbreak.

Alex Balfanz
BornMay 5, 1999 (age 21)
Orlando, Florida
NationalityAmerican
Other namesbadcc, badccvoid
OccupationVideo game developer
Known forCo-creator of the Roblox game Jailbreak

Early life

Born in 1999, Balfanz began to code games using Roblox Studio at the age of 9.[1] Balfanz's father worked as a programmer, which Balfanz cites as one of the main reasons for his early interest in coding.[2] He attended high school at the Trinity Preparatory School.[3] Prior to releasing Jailbreak, Balfanz had made several other games on Roblox, which he stated had made him "maybe a couple thousand" dollars.[3]

Career

In January 2017, Balfanz, along with a partner who goes by the handle asimo3089, uploaded Jailbreak, a cops-and-robbers game, to Roblox. On its first day of release, it reached 70,000 concurrent players, a number which shocked Balfanz.[1] It quickly became one of the most popular games on the platform, causing Balfanz to become a millionaire.[4][3] Balfanz was cited by the Observatory of Educational Innovation as an example of a success story on Roblox, which they cite as one of the main reasons for its popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic.[5]

Personal life

Balfanz attends Duke University, where he was able to pay off his college debt using funds from his game.[2][6]

References
  1. Browning, Kellen (August 16, 2020). "You May Not Know This Pandemic Winner, but Your Tween Probably Does". The New York Times. Retrieved August 17, 2020.
  2. Fang, Shannon (December 10, 2018). "How the Jailbreak computer game made sophomore Alex Balfanz millions". Duke Chronicle. Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  3. Huddleston Jr., Tom (September 23, 2019). "This 20-year-old is paying for college (and more) off an amateur video game he made in high school". CNBC. Retrieved September 3, 2020.
  4. Power, Ed (August 19, 2020). "Roblox: The booming video game that's now bigger than Minecraft". The Irish Times. Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  5. García-Bullé, Sofia (July 3, 2020). "Social Distancing and Video Games: A New Way to Learn and Interact". Observatory of Educational Innovation. Retrieved September 3, 2020.
  6. Lufkin, Bryan (March 24, 2018). "How video games turn teenagers into millionaires". BBC. Retrieved September 3, 2020.
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