Roblox: The Movie

Roblox: The Movie is a 2026 Robloxian animated adventure fantasy comedy musical film produced by Platinum Studio and Bloxy Animation Productions (as their first theatrical debut) and released by Universal Pictures. The film was directed by Harry Stone, who wrote the story with Daisy Gordon, Charlie Booth and Billy Wood and is based on a screenplay by Ben Clark and Ethan Powell. It stars the voices of Arthur Kaur as the leading protagonist, Samuel Grant as the villain, Toby Bailey, Morgan Willkinson and Daniel Fletcher. Taking place in a blocky world, the film follows Dylan, who is referred to as “Noob”, as he gets haphazardly involved in a wave of bans by corrupt leader Admin and is teleported to an hell-like world. In response, he set out to confront Admin and stop him from abusing power, meeting his former friend and various others on his journey.

The film experienced development hell in the 1990s and 2000s after several failed attempts by various directors, writers, and studios, including a planned live-action documentary. Roblox: THe Movie eventually entered development by January 2019.

Following an intense marketing campaign, Roblox: The Movie premiered at the Rensselaer Theater on November 13, 2026, and was theatrically released in the United States and other countries on November 27 of that year. It received widespread critical and commercial success, with praise for its animation, story, voice acting (especially those of Kaur and Grant’s), character development, emotional weight and themes, though some criticized its dark tone with the film’s rating being PG. It grossed over $1,093 billion worldwide against a budget of $200 to 250 million, becoming the highest-grossing film of 2026.

Plot

Dylan works at Roblox Headquarters after leaving his town. Seeing a picture of his friend Guest on his desk, he recalls the events that led to his friend's ban years ago; the both were musicians and after producing successful songs, they began to develop feelings for each other. However, Admin's obstreperous control of power, following the death of Bobby Saunders (believed to have been poisoned), causes everyone to go against him. In response, an enraged Admin leads a series of ban waves, resulting in nearly half of the population being wiped out while strictly controlling the media to hide suspicions at the same time. After performing at a concert, Dylan watches in horror as Guest abruptly fades away, causing him to wail in the streets, leading to depression and him giving up music while Admin revokes human rights. In the present, Admin sees himself as “unstoppable” and declares a new round of ban waves. Shortly, Dylan discovers a group of people disappearing. He eventually finds himself slowly passing out, as he is banned.

After waking up, Dylan realizes that he is in hell, where he discovers various people suffering. Horrified, Dylan attempts to return back without being caught, but fails and is seen by the leader Scott, where he brutally plays Dylan as a toy, before sending him to “Tower of Hell”. He tries hard to make it to the top, but fails numerous times, though he continues to be optimistic. But, the game suddenly “resets” rounds later, causing Dylan to noclip off the game and fall into the deep ocean. He is about to be eaten by sharks, where Dylan is saved by a person, who is revealed to be his friend Guest, leaving him in tears.

Meanwhile, one of Admin’s officials tells them that people are believed to have escaped from “Tower of Hell”. Angered by this, Admin teleports to the hell world, where he sees a few people and apprehended them before torturing them with the breaking wheel before sending his team out to catch more. Concurrently, Dylan and Guest rest in a town, where they discover that the people are treated as “slaves”. Soon, they are surrendered by the leaders, who force the two to work on the fields. There, they meet Madison, who reveals that she led a normal life, but changed for the worse when she was banned. Despite successfully beating the “Tower of Hell” game, she was teleported to the town where she was taken in as a slave, destroying her chances of freedom. Dylan snaps and walks up to a leader and punches him in the face, with the others rushing to attack. After a fierce battle, Dylan defeats them.

The slaves celebrate joyfully as they are free with one grabbing a boat and preparing to leave, but decided to bring the group along. The gang encounters a bunch of obbies and finds it tough, becoming entangled in its trickery until eventually finishing and crossing the Gates of Wonders, which cause them to travel at the speed of light and teleport back to the world. They travel to a futuristic city, which the group explores. After murdering the people who had previously escaped, Admin intended to announce a "earth-shattering" development. Back in the futuristic city, Dylan and the others began to plan on directly confronting Admin and his officials. Out of nowhere, the screens focus on a special announcement from Admin, who declared martial law and vowed vengeance on anyone who violated his rules. Shortly, Admin orders his team to apprehend protesting people. Dylan, Guest, and the others rush to the government building, but are stopped by police officers, who are beating a panicked crowd. Suddenly, the city is attacked by a series of missiles, and Dylan notices that everyone around them is gradually disappearing, realizing that Admin has banned everyone while he declares war on humanity.

Dylan and a dying Guest are left alone after the missiles successfully destroy the city, separated from the others, the fates of which are unknown and the latter is slowly fading away (due to a unknown error). Dylan decided he'd had enough of Admin's controlling behavior and the two rushes to battle him. Dylan and Guest locates the exact location but is blocked and pointed at with weapons, prompting Dylan to start a brawl, with Guest joining in later but collapses from being tired. After defeating them, they breaks through the gates and meets Admin, after fleeing from all of the guards inside and planting a bomb he had stolen, who revealed to him that he was the one that killed Bobby in the first place. Admin then smiles and prepares, thinking that he can kill him easily, but is unexpectedly kicked in the chest, starting the two's battle. Dylan, recalling the memories with Guest, uses it as a form of power to connect with his heart. However, upon seeing Admin punched Guest directly, a outraged Dylan defeats the former and throws him into a river and runs to press the button that unbanned everyone before collapsing to the ground, saving Guest at the last minute, but collapses to the floor.

Dylan awakens in heaven and prepares to enter the gates, but is sucked back to the present world after being in a coma for several weeks and is saved by doctors. Guest screams with joy and hugs him, thanking him for saving his life. Dylan is released a month later and greeted with cheers from the crowd. Following Admin's death, a new leader is chosen who promises to unite the world. Later on, Dylan decides to become a musician after being inspired by Guest's singing while he was in a coma. The two perform at a concert before going their separate ways to head home. Dylan smiles before falling asleep.

Production

Background

In the early 1990s, writer Paige Parry wrote a story treatment for a planned live-action film that was "about how nature works on the planet" and explored conflict themes. He described his draft as a documentary and planned to include the character Noob, who had previously been described as a "rude, yet cute person”. However, only months into production, reportedly by mid-1997, the project was canceled due to a lack of ideas from the writers and Paige's story problems with the main character and how the film would explore its character development, despite major rewrites of the first act and then the entire film, as well as a plan to completely redo the project. Paige had planned to introduce a villain to fit into the story well before the project was shelved, but it was cancelled before Paige could begin work. Paige revealed in an interview that his version of the film would have featured a "demon-like" villain who commands the extinction of all life. Storyboards, a script and concept art from Paige's version of Roblox: The Movie were released in 2009, during the production of another version of the film, showcasing Noob as a teenager and stating that the character would live in a village, attempting to save the world from danger from the planned villain, who wanted to take over the world in retaliation against humanity.

Director Andrew Powell, who had previously worked on the initial version, attempted to revise the film in 2007, stating that he intended to bring it "back to life". Universal Pictures greenlit the film's production in April of the following year under the working title Roblox, and writer Ruby Lewis was engaged to create the story, which featured Noob as he is compelled to defend the world by the villain Bob. Andrew said that Noob would have an animal sidekick, which in drafts was a dog and later a cat. By late 2009, the project was shelved for a second time, due to story problems. Between 2010 and 2018, four separate versions of the film were developed, one with a "completely different story," but all failed to get greenlit and were discarded. At least one version's title was Noob and the Admin and was originally scheduled for a release in the 2020s.

Development

Development began in January 2019, when director Harry Stone came across pre-production concepts and footage from the previous versions of Roblox: The Movie and expressed deep interest in creating his own version of the film. Not wanting to "have the same fate" as the other versions, Harry jotted down notes on the characteristics of the characters he wanted to focus on more, as well as character development for the rest of the supporting cast. A major problem with the story that Harry spotted was that Noob either didn’t “have a good reason” or “have any sense” to stop and defeat the villain. Additionally, Harry despised the main character’s name and rewrote it to Dylan. A script was written in April of that year, and it was approved in July.

The production team made "notes" on the most recent script that was handed to them, which was updated every two to four weeks and written by Harry, though later on several writers were hired which included Daisy Gordon, Charlie Booth and Billy Wood. The writers felt like the protagonist needed a much better personality as well as an interest for music and with Harry approving the idea, they rewrote the character into being a musician. By that point, the original plot had Dylan to be homeless and only work at a restaurant for free, where he was poorly treated and as a result of the change, the entirety of the first act was rewritten to fit with Dylan’s character. On January 28, 2020, Universal Pictures announced the film as Roblox: The Feature Film, Harry’s involvement as director and a release date of November 24, 2023.

During a test screening, particularly during the final minutes of the first act, Charlie Booth asked about the possibility of Dylan having a friend or an animal sidekick. Though the idea was forgotten for a couple of days among the production team, Charlie discussed the same topic and Daisy became interested. Harry believed that Dylan needed a companion, but had a hard time figuring the “right away to properly write the friend”. At a meeting, Harry and Charlie chatted with each other regarding the companion and the former accepted the concept, eventually leading into the creation of Guest. Dylan and Guest’s relationship in the film were originally different compared to the final version.

In an early draft, Dylan and Guest were considered as brothers, with the latter being kidnapped, but was scrapped early into the writing process. Voice actor Arthur Kaur explained that the film at that stage was heavily set to explore relationship problems between the two and during the planned climax, Dylan would have saved his brother from death. In another one, Dylan and Guest were friends that hung online, but hadn’t met in-person; the idea was discarded shortly after conception. Because Dylan and Guest were written as musicians, the writers opted to turn the picture into a full-length adventure musical, rather than a comedy action film, as they wanted to explore the “magic of music”. Between April and June 2020, songwriters Hannah May, Jay Gray, Anna Murphy and Cody Stone joined in the project and their involvement was confirmed by the following year; all four began writing the songs for the film in May. Various sessions about the development of the songs were held by the musicians to take notes on each other’s work and to fix potential problems with the lyrics; most of the songs that ended up in the film were first talked during those meetings, outside of discussions from the production team, though several were cut. A breakthrough in the project was to have the first act be entirely focused on Dylan and Guest's past and the consequences of the villain's acts, as previous drafts were about the two's daily lives, and Harry wanted the picture to have a very strong emotional opening.

Writing

The “core” of the film, which was described by Harry Stone, was “all about Dylan trying to stop Admin from damaging the world”, a concept that had already been developed in prior versions and the general hook. Even before writing on the film began, Harry stated “I had a clear mindset of what the story was going to be. It was going to be about an adult that is trying to save the world from an evil person. That was it” and mentioned that he had “already figured out what the ending would be”. However, when the film was in its middle stages of production, Harry said that “now, the film is loosely based on what my vision was like”, though it remained mostly unchanged since the original draft. One of the problems that the production team had to face during early development was the relationship between Dylan and Guest.

Originally, the team had written the character as brothers and early on wanted Guest to have a different point of view of the world. In earlier drafts, Guest was written as a “notably more spoiled brat” who refuses to listen to his parents, which changed when Admin kidnapped him, who was initially supposed to be his lost family member. However, Harry and the writers objected to the notion, claiming that the character Guest had caused the film's story problems on how his relationship between Dylan and Admin was handled. So, they rewrote Guest into a mature person and after various talks with the production team, the idea of the two being brothers was cut. Harry noted that the notion of Admin as a lost family member and Guest seeing him only "lived for a good three months" before it was realized that the idea was not working and was dropped along with the brothers' proposal. However, he added that in a draft that included the notion, Guest would have been indoctrinated by Admin to attack Dylan and hate him forever, resulting in a number of difficulties between the two and breaking their relationship.

Despite the draft's cancellation, it was where the "admin's true power of hate and abuse of powers" began, which would ended up in the final version; “Shortly after the draft was scrapped, I started to think more and more about the thought of abuse power and that Admin was severely abusing Guest in that draft. And while not directly, that moment between Guest and Admin made me realize that Admin needed a much bigger role than any other characters… in destroying the world and controlling all humanity. If he can brainwashed Guest in that draft, he can brainwashed everyone in the film”. Harry felt like the first act wasn’t “fitting on what Admin truly was. A monster that was created by demons”. The first act and Admin's personality were entirely rewritten with the assistance of screenwriters Ben Clark and Ethan Powell. Dylan was recast as a "random dude" who worked at the Roblox Headquarters, a place that hadn't been mentioned in any of the previous drafts until then, and his backstory as a musician; Dylan became very depressed and contemplated suicide in one scene, but it was cut because of its ominous messages; Admin had control over "how the world treats him," among other things that was added.

A song called "A New Day in Front of Us" was one of the ideas that was incorporated into the revised version as it would have opened the movie as the first musical number performed by the duo Guest and Dylan, setting the stage for the concert that would have taken place within the first ten minutes. However, it was scrapped late into production as a result of another series of rewrites. The team had thought about bringing an animal sidekick to accompany Dylan on his adventures during production, but all of their attempts during development had failed. However, storyboarder Samuel Cooper had planned an animal sidekick at the time Dylan and Guest were brothers. Cooper had in mind a dog, cat, pig, or sheep for the sidekick. The sheep was used as the animal sidekick after the concept was eventually accepted. Despite "countless efforts to make the animal to stand out from the rest of the cast" and multiple rewrites to give the Sheep a distinct, yet comic personality, the animal was eventually deleted from the film late during production, leaving Samuel very distraught.

Another breakthrough was to further develop the villain Admin's motivations, in which the idea of abuse of power was already being worked on, but several topics such as genocide were added into the character development, as well as the idea of Robloxians being "banned" by the villain serving as the main issues within the film. By that point, Admin was written as a “true lunatic” and “dictator”. Writers Ben Clark and Ethan Powell described the character as a “person that wanted to rule the world for himself”. Clark and Powell penned Guest collapsing to the ground before being banned in front of a horrified Dylan for the latter character, citing the scenario as the "way that Dylan was badly impacted by the effects” and to highlight Admin’s direct actions; it was also written to have the audience connect more emotionally with Dylan and less with Admin. The writers intended the audience to empathize with Admin, despite the fact that he was the villain. The production crew wrote a series of notes that featured numerous backstories; most of these were scrapped during production. According to an early novel treatment prepared by Ethan Powel, Admin was initially molested by his parents, who enslaved him to govern the lives of others and pushed him to become the world leader and even as one, the parents were the ones that have Admin to listen to them. However, it was removed because the writers feared that the viewers would be confused as to who the film's true villain was. The final version included an 8-minute backstory of Admin, who was mentally and physically punished by society for being "as mad as a hatter" and "psychopath," with his parents written out of the story and killed when Admin was a young child, eventually leading to him seeking vengeance and eventually becoming the world leader, where he wanted to "ban" everyone for the pain that he was given.

Another production breakthrough was having Dylan be teleported when "banned" to a hell-like world, as in earlier drafts, Dylan was originally meant to remain on the world despite the random bans and needed to find a way to enter the world that Guest was teleported to, resulting in major rewrites in the second and third acts. Furthermore, writer Ethan had planned a scenario in which Dylan would meet Guest in the world, but the crew had a "hard time figuring out how Dylan was going to meet Guest" for a couple of months during production, as Guest was supposed to be saved by Dylan by Admin at that stage of development, resulting in many concepts being prepared and abandoned. In one draft, Guest stopped Dylan from being beaten by world leader Scott, who was already regarded by the production team as the "secondary villain" and the first issue that Dylan "had to deal with" in his adventure. In a previous draft, the writers intended for Guest to meet Dylan after a family member who was supposed to be Guest's father informed him that Dylan was "banned". The problem was resolved when animator Oliver Williamson, alongside several others, pitched the “Tower of Hell” sequence. The sequence originally included a scenario in which Dylan was attacked by a mob of individuals for "being indifferent," but the writers decided to change the scene to Dylan struggling to get through the "Tower of Hell." In an earlier draft, the "Tower of Hell" scenario, in which Dylan first sees Guest after nearly beating the game, was discarded, and the scene was replaced with Dylan being nearly beaten by a group of sharks and saved by Guest, which ended up in the final version.

Controversy among the production team arose when storyboarder Luke Lewis presented a scene in which Dylan and Guest visit an island and meet slaves, leading to their being controlled by the leaders, who were members of the Admin administration. Several animators and writers did not like Luke's idea and requested that the scene be canceled, but it was green-lit. As a result, the second and first half of the third act were changed due to the length of the sequence, which was approximately 10 to 15 minutes, and how it would fit into the storyline. Writer Ben Clark was considering scrapping the sequence because he believed that it would slow down the movement of the film. However, songwriter Anna Murphy created a demo song titled "Under Control" in which the slaves sang about how they were mentally treated by the leaders and how they "wanted freedom," believing that it would save the sequence; however, while writing the lyrics, Anna realized that the song was not working and scrapped it. Later in the production, writer Ethan Powell created a new character named Madison, who was described by Harry as "trying to find a path out of a dark cave, but every time she would take a step, the light would move further and further away until it was all darkness," which was the focus of her character development.

Throughout the rest of production, Dylan, according to Ben Clark and Ethan Powell, was an "independent person" who prefers to work alone rather than with others. To explore the theme of depression, which played a significant role in the character, the production team organized a series of sessions named "Experiences with Depression," in which people discussed their own experiences with depression and made notes for the character to evolve throughout the plot. One of the many themes discussed for the character was the possibility of suicide, which was planned but was cut. The topic sparked concerns about the character being "too realistic" for young viewers, but Harry felt it was "perfect" to fit within the character as it would be relatable to people that deal with suicidal thoughts. However, due to high fears, the topic was toned down significantly. When approached about the matter after the film's release, Harry claimed that the idea would have made the "character much more relatable and had the chance to connect with people, mainly younger ones, around the world that deal with depression" and that it ruined the possibility of having the film go “beyond the expectations” with a protagonist. He stated that during early development, Harry had planned for the film to be “practical” with its emotional themes.

Casting and voice recording

Even before writing began, Harry had considered voice actors Adam Bloxvine, Thomas Tucker, and Caleb Thomson for the role of Dylan because he believed they "matched the personality and traits" of the character and would handle Dylan's voice acting "through strong emotions and feelings that could connect with all audiences”, particularly young children and potentially teeangers. Tucker was one of the initial candidates tested for the role of Dylan, but he chose to focus on voice Douglas for the television series Robloxians while the other two were unavailable. The production crew sought "someone that was just as independent and fully fledged" as Dylan as the script for the character Dylan varied throughout the production. Over the course of seven months, nearly 1,000 people aged fifteen to twenty were asked to audition for the role of Dylan. 17-year old Arthur Kaur was eventually cast as Dylan in late March 2022, when his mother saw the audition and invited him to participate; his position was not confirmed to him until April of that year. Because Arthur was in high school and his father wanted him to "keep focusing on his studies," his voice acting career during the production of the film consisted of him going to class and then being driven to the studio by his mother, where he recorded his lines for five to seven hours, depending on the type of scene in the film. During voice recording, Arthur Kaur frequently mispronounces his lines, therefore they show him storyboards of the scene as well as the precise text that Arthur needs to read. To perform the songs in the film, Arthur practiced for two to three hours at home in Robloxity County before recording a demo version of the song that was supplied to him by the studio.

Over 50 male actors auditioned for the role of Admin, the film's villain, during a "rough period" in production, when considerable changes were made, including those to the villain. Many of the voice actors "fit perfectly in line" with the character, but the studio was looking for the "greatest of the great" actor who would offer "amazing performances of full hate and rage". To identify one, the studio invited the auditionees to record their "greatest rage ever," and after hours of listening to the sounds of all 50 people, the production crew concluded that Samuel Grant was the "one that did better than all of the others”. Samuel Grant recorded the first ten minutes of lines for his character before being cast, and he was "hired on the spot". His role in the film was confirmed in December 2022. Later in the development of the film, a casting call for the remaining characters, including Guest, Madison, Toby, Amber, and Rory, commenced in the fall of 2023. John Holmes, Dakota Mann, Christopher Gates, Brady Williams, Brayden Rowe and Immanuel Solis were all considered for the role of Dylan's friend Guest, with the studio collecting notes on their performances. However, voice actor Toby Bailey learned about the audition for the role of Guest and was invited to perform. The studio gave him five minutes of the film's lines, and Harry believed Toby to be "among the best choices" and eventually hired him for the role.

Animation

Early in the film's development, Harry and the production team wanted it to be entirely hand-drawn animation to "not only stand out from the rest of the films," but to "be its own thing," but as the writing and storyboard were being worked on, the team considered switching to CGI-animation. However, Harry continued to contemplate employing 2-D animation as a way to "showcase art's true beauty," and during meetings, Harry spoke with animators about using the animation type he wanted to include in the film, but most disregarded him. Bloxy Animation Productions became aware of the project in January 2023, and by the following month had formally joined the film's production as an animation studio. At the time, the studio employed around 2,000 animators, who were divided into two groups: one for the Robloxians television series and another for the Roblox film. Harry was "deeply shocked" to learn that the studio employed 2-D animation for the show, but after reaching an agreement, the production team began using the animation.

To create the film's backgrounds, the production crew first produced pencil sketches of the scene, including the actors and conversation, before converting the background into a CGI-animated scene, which the designers recreated in 2-D animation on computers. The production team used computer animation, as with many animated films, after considering hand-drawn animation for the majority of the film but abandoning it due to the process "being lengthy" and "unusual" for animators. The backgrounds and general settings were influenced by the retro-futuristic worlds of the 1960s and 1970s, with some modern aspects like cellphones and realistic technology. During production, the multiplane camera was used to exhibit and handle the film's backgrounds, allowing the animators to demonstrate the work in depth and have "that sense of three-dimensionality" sensation; it was used in several scenes. The animators described animating the backdrops as "extremely challenging" because they had to draw about 40 to 60 individuals to "make the film feel as alive as possible," primarily throughout the first and second acts. The architecture of the hell-like planet was influenced by the genuine "hell" to highlight "the people suffering in pain" and "screaming for freedom". The animators added impact frames to Dylan and Admin's battle scenes, beginning with Dylan kicking Admin first. Key animator Corey Macdonald proposed the idea at a meeting with the production team as a means to emphasize the "feeling of a punch, a beat, or an explosion". To create the impact frames, the production crew considered utilizing white as the background and black for the lines. However, after conducting extensive research on the concept, the team decided to invent the hues and use flashes of various colors.

Costume designs

The character design was handled by Ollie Clark, Jayden Berry and Lucy King. The designers declined to make Dylan appear like a "regular Noob" and instead focused on creating a "real-looking" human person. Dylan was originally drawn with a coat to make him appear like a detective and to make him mature and strong in comparison to the rest of the group, since he had a different type of personality in various drafts. Harry portrayed Harry's early design as a person "looking to solve a crime" and stated that the character wore a floppy hat in yellow and white, while his coat was colored in blues and greens to fit the "mature" trait. As the script changed dramatically, Jayden Berry became the head designer and wanted Dylan to keep the coat on, mostly for the second and third acts, as well as the battle sequences in later scenes, to make him "not look like a scared man" and to emphasize that "he was strong no matter what". Dylan was dressed in clothes inspired by the notion of summer and the "magic of music" for regular designs prior to the film's events. The designers had planned to make Admin's suit entirely white and black, but Ollie Clark remarked that the design was "meant to reference who he really was" as a monster and a dictator. Earlier designs gave Admin a design similar to that of a country's president in an attempt to portray him as a "respected person on the outside, but cold on the inside". The concept was rejected, and due to huge revisions to the main character, they preferred giving Admin a black and scarlet coat with red pants and shoes to match his "evil personality". He was supposed to wear a hat, but it was cut and replaced with a hoodie over his head.