AI-generated editorial illustration; not a documentary photograph.
Meta announced Horizon Create and Horizon Studio on September 24, 2026, two AI-assisted development tools for building games on its Horizon social platform. Horizon Create is a mobile app centered on prompt-based creation, while the browser-based Horizon Studio provides more granular controls. Both are planned for early access, with prospective users currently directed to a waitlist.
Games Built From Prompts
Meta says creators will be able to turn an idea into a complete 2D or 3D mobile game, then refine individual elements. The company claims the tools can produce features including progression, difficulty balancing, art direction and multiplayer. The announcement does not provide independent tests showing how well those generated systems work or how much manual editing a finished game may require.
Distribution Beyond Horizon
Published games made with Horizon Create and Horizon Studio may be recommended through Facebook and Instagram, where users will be able to enter multiplayer sessions without downloading another app or leaving the feed. Meta says distribution will favor games that are stable, engaging, culturally relevant and able to retain players, making its recommendation systems an important route to visibility for creators.
A Mobile-Focused Strategy
The tools reflect Horizon's shift away from its origins as a VR app toward a primarily mobile platform. They also put Meta closer to Roblox's current direction: Roblox has been adding AI development features, including mobile prompt-based game generation.
Scale Remains the Constraint
Meta still faces a substantial audience gap. Roblox has 123 million daily active users, while The Verge reported that Horizon reached 300,000 monthly users in early 2022. Those figures cover different periods and activity measures, so they are not directly comparable, but they illustrate the sharply different scale reported for the two platforms. Early-access status also means the new creation workflow and feed distribution have yet to reach general availability.
Source: Meta is going to let you build games with AI right on your phone
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