If You’ve Ever Wanted to Be in ‘Hamilton,’ You Can Now Do So — on Roblox 

This screengrab provided by Super League shows an Alexander Hamilton game avatar from the "Hamilton" simulator for Roblox. (Super League via AP)
This screengrab provided by Super League shows an Alexander Hamilton game avatar from the "Hamilton" simulator for Roblox. (Super League via AP)
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If You’ve Ever Wanted to Be in ‘Hamilton,’ You Can Now Do So — on Roblox 

This screengrab provided by Super League shows an Alexander Hamilton game avatar from the "Hamilton" simulator for Roblox. (Super League via AP)
This screengrab provided by Super League shows an Alexander Hamilton game avatar from the "Hamilton" simulator for Roblox. (Super League via AP)

The landmark Broadway musical “Hamilton” has landed on Roblox, turning the innovative stage show into an immersive online environment for a new generation.

“‘Hamilton’ has global recognition. Roblox has 66 million daily active users from all around the world. What a perfect match,” Matt Edelman, president and chief commercial officer for Super League, which designed and built the online experience in collaboration with Small World Games.

In the Hamilton Simulator, players use their own avatars as they rub shoulders with the musical’s characters and negotiate through 10 levels set during the Revolutionary War. It starts at the New York docks and the goal is to free the city from British yoke. Appropriately, the music-filled game requires no real money from players.

“The intent here was to create a fun experience for this community and by doing so, introduce them to ‘Hamilton’ if they don’t already know it, or to honor and inspire the passion that they have if they’re already fans,” says Edelman.

The game has the blessing of writer-composer Lin-Manuel Miranda, whose blockbuster musical charts the rise and fall of statesman Alexander Hamilton and stresses his orphan, immigrant roots as well as his near-Greek tragedy of a fall.

Roblox is the largest immersive gaming platform on the planet and businesses like Mattel, the NFL, Dave & Buster’s and Cirque du Soleil have all planted a flag there, as have fashion labels Vans, Ralph Lauren, Nike, Tommy Hilfiger, Givenchy and Gucci.

“If you are an intellectual property owner and you want to connect to the younger generations — people really under 25 and particularly under 18 — that’s where they socialize, that’s where they learn. More than half of Gen Z expects to discover a brand for the first time in an immersive space,” Edelman says.

Hamilton Simulator players assemble a squad from characters in the musical — James Madison and Charles Lee, perhaps, to begin with, and more valuable characters like Maria Reynolds and Angelica Schuyler coming later — to confront Redcoats. Victories earn coins, which can be used to better arm companions as stronger enemies lurk.

The 10 settings include a tavern, George Washington’s office, town squares, the ballroom where Hamilton and Angelica fall in love and the Battle of Yorktown. Each level has songs from the musical, including “Guns and Ships,” “You’ll Be Back,” and “The Schuyler Sisters,” used as a sort of sonic laser to wear down and defeat enemies.

“For us, being able to allow the player to connect to the characters and the music was really important. And that really inspired the general approach to the gameplay,” Edelman says.

The simulator currently ends around the midpoint of the musical, with British rule defeated and a nascent country needing its Founding Fathers to guide them into becoming a nation of laws. Creators hope the simulator can also grow.

“We have plenty more in the future to expand on and we’re really excited about what we can do with this experience moving forward over the coming months to really be able to expand gameplay, expand the story and really be able to listen to our players and what are they doing,” Edelman says.

Each scene is carefully realized, with ceremonial swords, candles burning, flowers, artwork, sandbags and smoke. David Korins, who designed “Hamilton” for the stage, consulted on the look of the simulator and offered his tweaks. (There are also Easter eggs, like The Public theater, a nod to the off-Broadway space where “Hamilton” premiered.)

“‘Hamilton’ has achieved something that feels timeless. And if you can achieve that with an intellectual property, you can bring it into any channel and have success because it has that innate feel of belonging everywhere,” Edelman says.

The genesis of the idea came from Maggie Brohn, the executive producer for “Hamilton” worldwide and chief operating officer of Adventureland LCC, the lead producer for “Hamilton” and other Broadway shows.

She had been pondering a marriage between the musical and a gamemaker, eventually turning for advice to Edelman, her brother, who knew the perfect platform.

“My kids during COVID were glued to Roblox,” she says. “They became our our test group as we’ve been going through this.”

The hardest part was taking an award-winning linear narrative and turning it into an interactive experience. The breakthrough came when it was conceived as a simulator, one of the most popular Roblox genres.

“When you bring intellectual property to a medium where it did not originate, if it doesn’t have kind of some of the natural components to it already that belong in that new medium, it isn’t easy,” says Edelman.

Super League and “Hamilton” creators suspect their simulator will attract some visitors who have never heard of the musical, but will get caught in its gravitational force — much like the cast album became a hit by people who hadn’t yet seen the show.

“The music brought people to ‘Hamilton’ in some cases before the actual production of the show brought them there,” says Edelman. “I don’t think this will be any different if we achieve our primary goal, which is to make this a fun gameplay experience that attracts the Roblox community.”



Brian Wilson's Top Five Beach Boys Songs

Musician Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys performs onstage at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. KEVIN WINTER / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
Musician Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys performs onstage at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. KEVIN WINTER / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
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Brian Wilson's Top Five Beach Boys Songs

Musician Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys performs onstage at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. KEVIN WINTER / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
Musician Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys performs onstage at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. KEVIN WINTER / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File

From the carefree sound of California surf music to the sophistication of later darker works, here are five of the top hits penned by influential Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson.

'Surfin' USA' (1963)

"Surfin' USA" was the Beach Boys' first global hit, taken from their eponymous debut album. A youthful ode to sea, sun and girls, it became an anthem for the West Coast and beyond.

It demonstrated Brian Wilson's increasing songwriting prowess as well as the band's unique vocal sound achieved thanks to double tracking.

"We'll all be gone for the summer/ We're on safari to stay/ Tell the teacher we're surfin'/ Surfin' USA," it rang out.

Wilson intentionally set his lyrics to the music of "Sweet Little Sixteen," by Chuck Berry, leading Berry to take legal action.

'California Girls' (1965)

On the big hit of the summer of 1965, Wilson's cousin Mike Love burst into song to celebrate the sun-tanned women of California.

"I wish they all could be California girls," the band members sang in seemless harmony.

It was also the first song written by Wilson under the influence of LSD, "which could explain why the accompaniment seems to move in a slow, steady daze at odds with the song's bright, major-key melody," Rolling Stone magazine wrote.

'God Only Knows' (1966)

It took Wilson just 45 minutes to write "God Only Knows," the legendary eighth track on the album "Pet Sounds" which has gone down as one of the greatest love songs ever.

Sung by brother Carl Wilson, Brian's rival Paul McCartney declared it to be his favorite song of all time and said it reduced him to tears.

But the record company and other members of the group were wary at the new turn in style.

'Good Vibrations'(1966)

"Good Vibrations" was a massive commercial success, selling one million copies in the United States and topping charts there and in several other countries including the UK.

At the time the most expensive single ever made, the "pocket symphony" was recorded in four different studios, consumed over 90 hours of tape and included a complexity of keys, textures, moods and instrumentation.

The song was a far cry from the group's surf-and-sun origins and the enormity of the task brought Wilson to the brink. He was unable to go on and complete the album "Smile," of which the song was to have been the centerpiece.

- 'Til I die' (1971) -

On side B of the album "Surf's Up,'Til I die" was composed in 1969 by a depressed Wilson worn down by mental illness and addiction.

He wrote in his 1991 autobiography that it was perhaps the most personal song he had written for the Beach Boys.