Mark Zuckerberg Excited Over Game Built By 11 Year Old Nigeria Boy

The lad pictured above is Olatayo Sobomehin, an 11 years old who built Spike Rush, an infinite, side-scrolling game.
Named after needle spikerush (a plant), the game is set in a magical forest where spikes are everywhere.
Players have super powers to help them learn to survive in the forest. At random times, the gravity reverses and players must live upside down.
The players must ensure the spikes don’t defeat them. To do this, they must swipe up to jump over the spikes, swipe left and right to move back and forth, and double tap to activate special powers.
Mark Zuckerberg, who only just got back from visiting Lagos, Nairobi and Abuja, caught up with Tayo recently and was impressed with his game.

Mark expressed his excitement about Spike Rush on his Facebook page (as he always does).
“I got my first computer when I was Tayo’s age, and just like him I started out coding games. I’ve always thought building simple games was the gateway to building more complex apps. My first games were simpler than Tayo’s, but no matter your level, there’s nothing like playing something you built yourself,” Mark said.
He added, “I’m looking forward to seeing what Tayo builds next!”
The app is doing fairly well on the Apple App Store. Now that Mark has endorsed it (sort of), I expect “fairly well” to become “paranormally well” in no time.
Tayo, who might be associated with East Palo Alto-based StreetCode, is just a reminder that coding and programming should be introduced to young lads. This, amongst other things, will prepare them for a future that’ll most definitely be about technology!
Lagos-based CcHUB is already preparing kids for the future through its Summer Coding Camp (Mark Zuckerberg met some of the kids) and Maker Club. Same thing can be said of Jos-based nHub, which runs the SevoCoder program.
Credit: Techloy