The Sandbox Studio: September Update
Since Beta launched in August: 2 major engine updates, 40+ newly published games from the Beta Game Jam winners, an exclusive partnership with Meshy AI, and the last milestones before the Studio public launch
Product update: two Engine releases in one month
⚙ September 3: focused on control, cleanup, and reliability. It improved lighting and animation workflows, made prefab editing more dependable, refined the viewport and transform tools, and introduced new templates and playable examples.
🔗 Read the full September 3 release notes
⚙ September 22: focused on Studio’s deeper creation tools. Physics queries are faster, the Particle Editor now supports sub-emitters, plane collisions, and a new Clip Timeline, while the Animation Editor gets full undo/redo. The Outliner and Viewport also received workflow improvements, alongside three new starter templates.
🔗 Read the full September 22 release notes
The Beta Creators Game Jam: the winners are in
August’s Beta Creators Game Jam asked creators to interpret one theme:Overgrown.
Creators took that prompt in very different directions, and this month we announced the winners, with Larry Hryb aka @Majornelson leading the judging panel.
🥇 1st Place: Omniscient by @lifemademe
🥈 2nd Place: Farmadillo by @LeeOccleshaw
🥉 3rd Place: TERRA RIFT by @RicardoDeZoete
A fast-paced shooter where terrain becomes a weapon, portals open new routes, and dinosaurs carry you into battle.
The special awards went to Voridra by @IXURA for Best Movement, Reggae Riddim DJ by @theJoncrow for Most Atmospheric, Overgrown Ordinance by @Entenium for Best Idea We Want to Steal, Gary: Patient Zero by @rocksymiguel for Most Unexpected Take on Overgrown, and Overgrown Royale by @the_bit_fox for Hardest to Put Down.
Thank you to every creator who participated, built something, shared feedback, and pushed the theme somewhere we didn’t expect.
The Sandbox x Meshy AI: From idea to asset to game
This month, The Sandbox and Meshy AI teamed up to help creators move faster from an idea to a usable 3D asset and, ultimately, into a playable experience.
Meshy AI lets creators generate 3D models from text prompts or reference images. Those models can then be brought into The Sandbox Studio and used as part of a game, environment, or fully interactive experience.
The collaboration focuses on three things:
- AI-assisted 3D asset creation, helping creators move from a concept or reference image to a Studio-compatible model.
- Learning resources showing creators how to use Meshy AI and The Sandbox Studio together.
- Exclusive Meshy offers for Beta Creators, making it easier to experiment with new workflows.
For Beta Creators, the current offer includes $1 for the first month of Meshy Pro, with the offer available through October 31.
🔗 Learn more about The Sandbox x Meshy AI
A note to creators from Larry Hryb
Larry Hryb has been closely involved with The Sandbox Studio this September: from serving as lead judge for the Beta Creators Game Jam to sharing what he’s learned from more than two decades working around games and gaming communities.
Known to millions of players as @Majornelson, Larry spent 23 years at Microsoft, including 15 years as one of the most recognizable voices of Xbox. This month, he’s turning that experience toward the creators building with Studio.
More ways for creators to get involved
September also brought a new set of community initiatives designed to give creators different ways to participate beyond simply building a game.
The Companion Jam invites artists and designers to imagine the visual identity of Studio’s future AI companion, with $3,000 for the selected concept and the winning design set to be integrated into The Sandbox Studio.
The Content Creator Bounty is a first test ahead of Public Launch, with a $5,000 pool in SAND rewarding creators for sharing real mobile gameplay or showing how they build with Studio. The bounty runs through September 30, with additional rewards available for videos that reach view milestones.
🔗 Join the Content Creator Bounty
And for game creators, the new WTF? Jam is all about making something memorable and shareable: mobile-first games built around surprising mechanics, internet culture, memes, and ideas people immediately want to send to a friend. With $4,000 in prizes, including an additional social ads budget for the winning game, the goal is simple: find the fun fast.
Three different initiatives, but the same idea: give more kinds of creators a way to contribute to what’s being built around Studio.
On the road to Public Launch
The roadmap is still moving toward Public Launch, with:
- Multiplayer: matchmaking running on The Sandbox-hosted servers, lobbies, etc.
- Monetization powered by @Xsolla
- Avatar system that creators can integrate into their experiences, allowing players to bring the same customized avatar across supported The Sandbox games.
- In game Chat powered by Discord
- Others: broader platform and backend support, refined onboarding, and a larger asset library ahead.
Alongside with the revamping of sandbox.game as discovery platform for games built with The Sandbox Studio.
Next stop: Public Launch.