13 ms·

These days I'm a bit more intrigued by Roblox. My 11 year-old son and his friends have completely abandoned Minecraft for it. Roblox is designed for MMO play

These days I'm a bit more intrigued by Roblox. My 11 year-old son and his friends have completely abandoned Minecraft for it. Roblox is designed for MMO play from the start, but worlds (or whatever they're called) are completely open to modification with their free editor. Then you can script things in Lua. Lua! The other night my son was antsy at the dinner table. So I asked him why the rush. He said he "had a flight to catch". Turns out he's joined a group that operates an "airplane" that has scheduled flights in and out of an airport that someone has created. He interviewed to become the first officer on the flight. It's messier than Minecraft, but the players seem to understand the potential. They're hiring, actually. (no I don't work for them). The stats on this page are interesting too: http://corp.roblox.com/careers http://corp.roblox.com/careers

jshelly 11y ago
Agreed, my kids (10) gave up on Minecraft a while ago and have been completely focused on Roblox for the past year.
- Filligree 11y ago
  Did you look at the modded Minecraft experience at all, before doing that?
  - LoSboccacc 11y ago
    Ah good old tekkit. Now there is test pack please ignore which shows promise but to be honest the modding scene slowed down after the bukkit/forge mess and due to the fatigue of never receiving the promised stable api. The moment ic2 stopped development I lost interest. Buildcraft spawned factorio however, so my logistic nerd needs are satisfyed :)
    - asiekierka 11y ago
      IC2 never stopped development, it just became... different.
  - jshelly 11y ago
    I haven't but will now
    - Filligree 11y ago
      I recommend you start with a modpack. That said, not just any pack will do. My absolute favorite is TPPI2; I think it's by far the most professional one, but it does require a pretty hefty machine. If it doesn't work, then there are a number of smaller/more specialized packs that likely would.
WillPostForFood 11y ago
Roblox is designed like an MMO. But that also has drawbacks. They charge like an MMO (monthly subscription), and you are beholden to their system/servers. I don't think I've ever gotten more value from a software purchase than buying Minecraft for €9.95 in 2010.
- mjevans 11y ago
  If your data isn't in a free format that you can open and work with on your own then you don't own it.
  - Jtsummers 11y ago
    Being a free format helps. But it isn't necessary. The main thing is that you can access the data reliably even if the original software or servers disappear (may require you to make your own periodic backups).
- joezydeco 11y ago
  I think you can do a lot on the free tier, my son only recently started spending a little to unlock some of the upgrades. Personally I'd rather see subscriptions fund a server that's always up. I've researched running my own Minecraft server for the local kids, but it's really not worth it.
  - ehnto 11y ago
    You can do okay on a DO VPN for say $20/month. I did this for a while but it was only me and a few friends, and when we wanted to use a modpack I moved the server an oldish computer in my house as it needed more grunt. Calculating the power costs put it at about $30/month in electricity, ignoring all the time wasted getting it running.
  - stephengillie 11y ago
    That's a strange sentiment to hear, and somewhat disheartening. Minecraft servers are easy to set up, and can easily run in the background of an old server or PC. I've been running one for over a year on my gaming PC and home internet connection.
zanny 11y ago
The idea of a corporate for-profit proprietary video game being the centerpiece of a generation's learning is horrifying and dystopian to me. It is the same problem the last generation had, in large part, with the public schooling Microsoft monoculture. Kids grew up on Windows 95 and Office and are now indoctrinated into Microsoft tooling, probably for life, as loyal customers. A very valuable investment on Microsoft's part to capture the computer knowledge of a large portion of a generation.
- k-mcgrady 11y ago
  >> "It is the same problem the last generation had, in large part, with the public schooling Microsoft monoculture. Kids grew up on Windows 95 and Office and are now indoctrinated into Microsoft tooling, probably for life, as loyal customers. A very valuable investment on Microsoft's part to capture the computer knowledge of a large portion of a generation." I don't think this is as big of an issue as you think. I would be part of that generation. Almost everyone I know (and I mean regular people, I don't have many tech nerd friends) has switched to OS X in work and personal life. A few are on Chromebooks too. Most use a mixture of MS Office (when required for work/college) and Google Docs. So although I agree that there was an MS monoculture when growing up through the 90's/00's I disagree that has led to lifelong loyal custom.
  - sjm-lbm 11y ago
    As an alternative point of view, I've always heard that HP calculators were killed by TI giving free calculators to schools - which lead to an entire generation that had no desire to learn RPN, even if it has some serious advantages in a lot of areas. The counterexamples you provide (OSX and Chromebooks) follow basically the same UI paradigms as the Windows machines they replaced (even if some of those might have been copied from earlier Macs). There still may be less overall diversity in the computers we use, even if there are now a number if different logos on the box.
    - jcrawfordor 11y ago
      I don't think HP's RPN calculators were ever in competition with TI. The RPN calculators like the 12C are marketed to finance professionals, and TI has nothing like them. The HP graphing calculators like the 50g are infix (although there is a pretty good RPN app available). Edit: I do see that HP made graphing calculators with native RPN in the late '80s, so perhaps they were pushing these for academic markets, although today they seem to be the provence of surveyors. Random aside: I first learned RPN from my father, a budget analyst, and have used it ever since. RealCalc is an Android calculator app with an excellent RPN mode, if you're curious.
dividuum 11y ago
Haven't head of that game before. I looked at a few minutes of game play on Youtube and their website. This feels a lot like Second Life: A blank world were everything has to be developed in order to do anything meaningful. I might be totally wrong with my first impression so I'm curious it's comparable.
outworlder 11y ago
Well, if you are impressed by Lua scripting in a game, go back to Minecraft, then install OpenComputers. They have it all. Those computers have firmware, an OS (LuaOS), filessystems, network routers, you name it. You can do pretty interesting things with the peripherals. You can also program robots. https://github.com/MightyPirates/OpenComputers https://github.com/MightyPirates/OpenComputers
- joezydeco 11y ago
  Was more impressed that it's part of the system architecture from the start, instead of being grafted into the setup later.
- Houshalter 11y ago
  I'm a big fan of computercraft. You can quickly build turtles (robots) and program them to do almost anything a player can do. So you can automate almost everything and it's really fun. (Also in Lua.) Open computers does have robots, but they are much more difficult to actually build, and have more constraints. I did try to get into OpenComputers, but everything felt so much more limited and expensive, and I just wanted to program cool things.
mentat 11y ago
Lua, the new MUSH
spdustin 11y ago
Parents, watch your kids on this if you haven't already taught them about Internet safety. Many players creatively get around the kid-friendly chat filters and behave in ways you may not want your younger ones to mimic. Source: my 8 year old daughter who tattled on strangers and said "didn't their parents teach them to keep stuff private?" That kid. <3
dabit3 11y ago
Just downloaded it, fyi it tries to get you to buy money with money literally at the very beginning of the first two games I tried, definitely don't recommend this game.
awqrre 11y ago
Do they expect you to fix Roblox by reprogramming it? it seems pretty buggy... and it is quite different from Minecraft...
nullc 11y ago
Minetest is a minecraft quasi-clone that uses lua... and it's free software.
- megamark16 11y ago
  Free and open source, and way faster than Minecraft on older hardware.
- bobwaycott 11y ago
  Sat down with my son and Minetest a few weeks ago. The look on his face when he first succeeded in writing up a Lua mod that gave him super powers that worked in the game? Priceless.

jshelly 11y ago

Agreed, my kids (10) gave up on Minecraft a while ago and have been completely focused on Roblox for the past year.

Filligree 11y ago
Did you look at the modded Minecraft experience at all, before doing that?
- LoSboccacc 11y ago
  Ah good old tekkit. Now there is test pack please ignore which shows promise but to be honest the modding scene slowed down after the bukkit/forge mess and due to the fatigue of never receiving the promised stable api. The moment ic2 stopped development I lost interest. Buildcraft spawned factorio however, so my logistic nerd needs are satisfyed :)
  - asiekierka 11y ago
    IC2 never stopped development, it just became... different.
- jshelly 11y ago
  I haven't but will now
  - Filligree 11y ago
    I recommend you start with a modpack. That said, not just any pack will do. My absolute favorite is TPPI2; I think it's by far the most professional one, but it does require a pretty hefty machine. If it doesn't work, then there are a number of smaller/more specialized packs that likely would.

WillPostForFood 11y ago

Roblox is designed like an MMO. But that also has drawbacks. They charge like an MMO (monthly subscription), and you are beholden to their system/servers. I don't think I've ever gotten more value from a software purchase than buying Minecraft for €9.95 in 2010.

mjevans 11y ago
If your data isn't in a free format that you can open and work with on your own then you don't own it.
- Jtsummers 11y ago
  Being a free format helps. But it isn't necessary. The main thing is that you can access the data reliably even if the original software or servers disappear (may require you to make your own periodic backups).
joezydeco 11y ago
I think you can do a lot on the free tier, my son only recently started spending a little to unlock some of the upgrades. Personally I'd rather see subscriptions fund a server that's always up. I've researched running my own Minecraft server for the local kids, but it's really not worth it.
- ehnto 11y ago
  You can do okay on a DO VPN for say $20/month. I did this for a while but it was only me and a few friends, and when we wanted to use a modpack I moved the server an oldish computer in my house as it needed more grunt. Calculating the power costs put it at about $30/month in electricity, ignoring all the time wasted getting it running.
- stephengillie 11y ago
  That's a strange sentiment to hear, and somewhat disheartening. Minecraft servers are easy to set up, and can easily run in the background of an old server or PC. I've been running one for over a year on my gaming PC and home internet connection.

zanny 11y ago

The idea of a corporate for-profit proprietary video game being the centerpiece of a generation's learning is horrifying and dystopian to me. It is the same problem the last generation had, in large part, with the public schooling Microsoft monoculture. Kids grew up on Windows 95 and Office and are now indoctrinated into Microsoft tooling, probably for life, as loyal customers. A very valuable investment on Microsoft's part to capture the computer knowledge of a large portion of a generation.

k-mcgrady 11y ago
>> "It is the same problem the last generation had, in large part, with the public schooling Microsoft monoculture. Kids grew up on Windows 95 and Office and are now indoctrinated into Microsoft tooling, probably for life, as loyal customers. A very valuable investment on Microsoft's part to capture the computer knowledge of a large portion of a generation." I don't think this is as big of an issue as you think. I would be part of that generation. Almost everyone I know (and I mean regular people, I don't have many tech nerd friends) has switched to OS X in work and personal life. A few are on Chromebooks too. Most use a mixture of MS Office (when required for work/college) and Google Docs. So although I agree that there was an MS monoculture when growing up through the 90's/00's I disagree that has led to lifelong loyal custom.
- sjm-lbm 11y ago
  As an alternative point of view, I've always heard that HP calculators were killed by TI giving free calculators to schools - which lead to an entire generation that had no desire to learn RPN, even if it has some serious advantages in a lot of areas. The counterexamples you provide (OSX and Chromebooks) follow basically the same UI paradigms as the Windows machines they replaced (even if some of those might have been copied from earlier Macs). There still may be less overall diversity in the computers we use, even if there are now a number if different logos on the box.
  - jcrawfordor 11y ago
    I don't think HP's RPN calculators were ever in competition with TI. The RPN calculators like the 12C are marketed to finance professionals, and TI has nothing like them. The HP graphing calculators like the 50g are infix (although there is a pretty good RPN app available). Edit: I do see that HP made graphing calculators with native RPN in the late '80s, so perhaps they were pushing these for academic markets, although today they seem to be the provence of surveyors. Random aside: I first learned RPN from my father, a budget analyst, and have used it ever since. RealCalc is an Android calculator app with an excellent RPN mode, if you're curious.

dividuum 11y ago

Haven't head of that game before. I looked at a few minutes of game play on Youtube and their website. This feels a lot like Second Life: A blank world were everything has to be developed in order to do anything meaningful. I might be totally wrong with my first impression so I'm curious it's comparable.

outworlder 11y ago

Well, if you are impressed by Lua scripting in a game, go back to Minecraft, then install OpenComputers. They have it all. Those computers have firmware, an OS (LuaOS), filessystems, network routers, you name it. You can do pretty interesting things with the peripherals. You can also program robots. https://github.com/MightyPirates/OpenComputers https://github.com/MightyPirates/OpenComputers

joezydeco 11y ago
Was more impressed that it's part of the system architecture from the start, instead of being grafted into the setup later.
Houshalter 11y ago
I'm a big fan of computercraft. You can quickly build turtles (robots) and program them to do almost anything a player can do. So you can automate almost everything and it's really fun. (Also in Lua.) Open computers does have robots, but they are much more difficult to actually build, and have more constraints. I did try to get into OpenComputers, but everything felt so much more limited and expensive, and I just wanted to program cool things.

mentat 11y ago

Lua, the new MUSH

spdustin 11y ago

Parents, watch your kids on this if you haven't already taught them about Internet safety. Many players creatively get around the kid-friendly chat filters and behave in ways you may not want your younger ones to mimic. Source: my 8 year old daughter who tattled on strangers and said "didn't their parents teach them to keep stuff private?" That kid. <3

dabit3 11y ago

Just downloaded it, fyi it tries to get you to buy money with money literally at the very beginning of the first two games I tried, definitely don't recommend this game.

awqrre 11y ago

Do they expect you to fix Roblox by reprogramming it? it seems pretty buggy... and it is quite different from Minecraft...

nullc 11y ago

Minetest is a minecraft quasi-clone that uses lua... and it's free software.

megamark16 11y ago
Free and open source, and way faster than Minecraft on older hardware.
bobwaycott 11y ago
Sat down with my son and Minetest a few weeks ago. The look on his face when he first succeeded in writing up a Lua mod that gave him super powers that worked in the game? Priceless.