From Quiz Whiz to Roblox Boss: Exploring the creative mind of David Baszucki (‘81)

Albert Einstein once said, “Creativity is seeing what others see and thinking what no one else ever thought.”

Perhaps it should come as no surprise that David Baszucki, the man who co-created gaming company Roblox in 2006 and remains its CEO to this day, once said in an interview with Wired, “We want Roblox to be everywhere that people are being — or want to be — creative.”

In creating Roblox, Baszucki and his late friend Erik Cassel were seeing what others saw, video games, and thinking what no one else ever thought: What if there were a video game engine that allowed anyone to create and play their own games? As they say, it was a million-dollar (or in this case, billion-dollar) idea.

From an early age, Baszucki had a penchant for imaginative thinking and creative tinkering. As a Canadian kid growing up in Eden Prairie, he loved spending time outdoors riding dirt bikes and building go-karts. When he wasn’t satisfying his need for speed, he enjoyed soaking up facts from the encyclopedia, visiting new worlds in science fiction books  and coding on his Apple II computer.

Baszucki attended Eden Prairie High School (EPHS), graduating in the Class of 1981. During his time at EPHS, he kept himself active as a member of cross country and skiing, led the school’s quiz bowl team, played saxophone in Eagle Band, and played on the varsity soccer team. The bio next to his 12th grade yearbook photo reads, “David Baszucki plans to go to college…says he remembers messing around during school years most…plans to design space colonies.”

“It’s fun to think back to my time at Eden Prairie,” Baszucki recalled. “I remember doing my physics project measuring the paint on the famous graffiti bridge. I have fond memories and it’s a special place.”

Baszucki followed through with his plans to attend college at Stanford University, graduating with a degree in electrical engineering in 1985. Four years later, he and his brother Greg Baszucki (‘83) founded Knowledge Revolution, a company that produced educational physics and mechanical simulation software for kids. The first and most popular application they created, “Interactive Physics,” allowed users to learn physics with 2D models. In 1998, MSC Software bought the company for $20 million.

Encouraged by the fact that children were using his physics software to create their own simulations, Baszucki tapped Cassel, the lead engineer on “Interactive Physics,” as creative partner for a new venture that thought outside the box of software development to invent a virtual space for creation and play. Thus, Roblox was born.

When he isn’t pioneering new frontiers in the modern metaverse at Roblox, Baszucki is also known for his philanthropic efforts. Baszucki firmly believes in determination and hard work; as he once said, “persistence is the bridge between dreams and reality.” 

“Persistence is the bridge between dreams and reality.” – David Baszucki

In 2021, Baszucki launched Baszucki Group, a philanthropic organization transforming mental health outcomes by supporting initiatives at the intersection of metabolism, psychiatry and neuroscience. As part of these efforts, Baszucki Group launched Metabolic Mind, a nonprofit working to transform the study and treatment of mental disorders by exploring the connection between metabolism and brain health. Other focus areas of Baszucki Group include supporting nonpartisan electoral innovations and regenerative agricultural practices. His dedication to driving system-level changes continue to make a significant impact.

18-year-old Baszucki dreamed of building space colonies. He has, virtually — and millions of Roblox users will continue to build with him for many years to come.

This story includes contributions from EPHS Multimedia Story Production students Santosh Bommareddy, Zander Hemmesch (‘24), and Tyler Santy.