About

Agar.io is a web browser-based game where the player must increase the size of of their own circular cell by engulfing other player's cells and pellets called "Agar". The game is notable for its simple addictive gameplay. It gets its name from Agar, a substance found in cell walls of certain algae.

History

The Java script-based game was originally created by a user of 4chan's /v/ (Video Games) board and launched under the domain name Agar.io^[1] per another anonymous poster's suggeston^[6] on April 28th, 2015. On the the day of its launch, the game began attracting massive attention after it was linked on 4chan. On May 3rd, the game was submitted to Steam Greenlight, where it was promptly approved.^[4]

Gameplay

In Agar.io, the player is a cell with the objective of growing larger by engulfing three types of pellets called Agar as well as other players. The player can split into smaller cells by pressing the space bar or colliding with viruses. The player can also shoot parts of their cell at other players by pressing W.

Features

Custom Skins

Players can apply a skin to their cells by selecting certain hidden keywords as their nickname, including Doge, Wojak, 4chan, 8chan (under 8ch), and 9gag., among many others.

Game Modes

As of May 11th, a new game mode was added where players can play as teams in addition to free-for-all. In the teamplay mode, the players are divided into three teams wherein cells of the same color cannot be engulfed. The leaderboard in this mode was removed in favor of a pie chart showing the three teams total mass. Custom skins are disabled for this mode.

On June 17th, an "Experimental" mode used to test new entities for the game was added, with minor differences from the main game such as brown viruses that spit out Agar that players can consume, and also break down players that go into them.

On July 12th, Party Mode, Facebook profile linking, and endgame stats. were added to the game. The party mode allows players to play with friends (Or enemies) on a server with other players. The facebook profile login starts the player with extra mass and the player can level up to start with more mass. The endgame stats display statistics of the players game once they die (Mass, time alive, cells eaten, etc.)

Online Presence

A subreddit for the game was created at /r/Agario on April 29^[2] and small Russian-language Wikia for the game was created around the same time.^[3] On May 2nd, Let's Player ZeRoyalViking uploaded a YouTube video of himself playing the game, which received over 50,000 views over the next few days. On May 3rd, YouTube video game channel Vinesauce uploaded footage from a stream of the game, which gained over 25,000 views.

Reception

Throughout May 2015, the growing popularity of the web-based multiplayer game was reported on by dozens of video game-focused news sites and blogs from all around the world, including BoingBoing^[10] (United States), CHIP^[11] (Germany), Beşer Haber^[12] (Turkey), CanalTech^[13] (Brazil), FOK^[14] (Netherlands) and Playground^[15] (Russian), among many others. As of early June, the game serves between 100,000 to 150,000 simultaneously active players in a 24-hour period.^[8]

Derivatives

[Researching]

Several games have later appeared utilizing a similar format to Agar.io, in an attempt to replicate the success of Agar.io, most sharing the .io domain of the original.

Slither.io^[17] functions similarly to Agar.io, with collecting pellets and consuming other players being the main goal, however the players control a snake that grows longer as they progress and "kills" other snakes by having them run into the side of another snake.

Supersnake.io^[18] functions more similarly to Agar.io then Slither.io, with differences such as abilities, unique pellets, and snake skins.

Search Interest

External References