A video game so boring that people can rarely play it for more than a couple of minutes has become surprisingly popular.

The online game Waiting in Line 3D was released Monday by developer Rajeev Basu, and was played 50,000 times in its first 24 hours on its official website, www.waitinginline3d.com.

In the game, you are standing in a line of about 20 people, and as time goes on, you start to fall asleep, as indicated by a shrinking bar on your screen. You can wake yourself up by pressing the spacebar to "punch" yourself.

"The trick is you need to punch yourself, but not too much, or you die," Basu told Carol Off, co-host of CBC's As It Happens, in an interview.

He said his goal was "to create something that was so un-fun and uninteresting that it might come back full circle and you might stick with it and see what happens."

The game is not as easy as it looks, discovered Off, who lasted only about 10 seconds and scored "0" on each of her two attempts at the game.

Basu reassured her that most people only last a couple of minutes.

"You need a real iron will, I think, to get even a single point in this game," he said.