Zander Brumbaugh discovered Roblox when he was 12.
Quickly, he went from playing on the platform to creating his own user-generated content and games.
“The games I self-developed have garnered over 500 million visits, with titles peaking at over 80,000 concurrent users,” he told TechCrunch.
Brumbaugh noticed that Roblox still needed developer tools, such as LiveOps, A/B testing capabilities, and effective tools for real-time analytics. And, while serving as a consultant for entertainment studios like Netflix, Paramount, and NBCUniversal he found “they consistently expected standard tooling in the space to make data-informed decisions, and yet none existed.”
“This is where Gamebeast came in,” he said.
Launched late last year, Gamebeast started creating tools in January. It offers a live operations tooling platform that lets developers modify their games without needing to release a new version or interrupt a user’s ongoing game. Gamebeast says it is working with more than 40 game developers and is even in talks with the U.S. military to see how its no-code platform can be of use in defense.
On Wednesday, the startup announced a $3.7 million pre-seed round led by J2 Ventures, with participation from a16z Speedrun, The Mini Fund, and Spaceport CEO Le Zhang.
Brumbaugh started fundraising for the company after Gamebeast graduated from a16z Games’ accelerator program Speedrun in March. He then met lead investor J2 Ventures after the team had seen some of its Speedrun Demo Day materials.
“Gamebeast’s vision for the future of gaming is both innovative and deeply connected to the evolving needs of players,” Christine Keung, general partner at J2 Ventures, told TechCrunch. “We anticipate that all multiplayer games will be AI-enabled and optimized in real-time, and Gamebeast’s developer platform will push the boundaries of what’s possible.”
There are millions of Roblox developers, millions more monthly users, and hundreds of millions that are paid out to developers to keep users entertained. Naturally, other companies will soon emerge in this space as others seek to capitalize on the market.
Brumbaugh is setting forth on a path of which he’s always dreamed. He’s only 22 and decided from a young age that he wanted to be the first in his family to attend college and push for an advanced degree. He wanted to be a founder and a scientist. He wrote a book about Roblox games, guest lectures about gaming at universities and online, and is completing his master’s degree in computer science at the University of Washington as he still runs the company.
Gamebeast started with a team of four and has 16 employees today. The fresh capital will be used to expand product features for developers as well as extend support to new platforms.
