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Is Roblox a kind of Minecraft + modding with better meshes and physics? Honestly I'd find a "realistic looking by default" Roblox with good animations and ligh

Is Roblox a kind of Minecraft + modding with better meshes and physics? Honestly I'd find a "realistic looking by default" Roblox with good animations and lighting much more appealing. Unreal engine is already almost there, gamify the UI, invest a few millions in creating good quality assets and you have it.

landtuna 6y ago
It's a massively, massively popular platform of games for the elementary school crowd. You can buy gift cards for it in grocery stores. Each game is different, but the look, feel, and controls are mostly the same. Most games are multiplayer.
webwanderings 6y ago
Roblox is bigger than Minecraft. Just ask any 9 year old. Any!
- slightwinder 6y ago
  Its 126 Million (minecraft) vs 150 Million (roblox) users at the moment. Though it seems roblox outgrew minecraft just this year, for obvious reasons. They were competing for a longer time now, but so far minecraft had the upper hand. I guess minecraft is more popular with older people who grew up with it and there is some limit reached which slows down minecrafts success at the moment. It seems minecraft was also rather silent in the last year. Animal Crossing and now Among Us are the hottest games everywhere, but aroung minecraft it was rather silent, even though it should have been more succesful with people staying at home the whole time, giving people more reason to do stuff in Minecraft.
  - dagw 6y ago
    My daughter has almost completely switched from Minecraft to Roblox (and she was heavily into Minecraft) simply because Roblox makes it really easy to play with her friends and Minecraft doesn't.
zemo 6y ago
roblox is designed to let other people write server-side code in a way that minecraft isn't. yeah, it's possible to mod a minecraft server, but the engine isn't built around making that easy, so it's a lot more involved in minecraft than it is in roblox.
foobarian 6y ago
> Unreal engine is already almost there, gamify the UI, invest a few millions in creating good quality assets and you have it. Far from it. Roblox solves the multiplayer part of the equation very well. Authentication, social graph, transactions for players; game server hosting and API for creators. It took me 5 minutes from starting up Roblox Studio to having my own game live and discoverable by all other players - this is huge.
tgtweak 6y ago
Few differentiating facts about roblox that aren't immediately obvious: * All games play on all platforms. You can play cross-platform on any game. * You can buy "robux", the in-game currency, in every retail store under the sun * There are 2 million content creators alone in roblox * Nearly every kid under 10 knows about roblox * You can run it on a potato * You can spend 1000 hours playing it while never playing the same mini game twice * It is still growing and has since 2006
nvarsj 6y ago
Both of my kids, on their own initiative, have made their own roblox games (it even uses Lua!). The incentive is that if other people play them, they can get Robux and use that in yet other games to buy cosmetics and so forth. I have been blown away by Roblox. I thought this kind of tinkering no longer existed, but it's still there.
corysama 6y ago
The same author has done a lot of work on the lighting of Roblox. https://medium.com/roblox-tech-blog/the-future-is-bright-updating-lighting-systems-in-roblox-27dcc85cc391 https://medium.com/roblox-tech-blog/the-future-is-bright-upd... If you are referring to the blockiness, the blocks are a major factor in the game’s appeal -and not just as a reference to Minecraft. Because everything is blocky and nothing can look super detailed, no one need be too embarrassed to make crappy art. You can go ahead and just make stuff that looks crappy without feeling judged. That way, instead of leaving most players sitting around watching a few elite fine artists, pretty much everyone has fun contributing.
dagw 6y ago
The biggest selling point is that Roblox solves multi-player and multi-platform out of the box and is completely free. Unlike Minecraft, Roblox in itself doesn't actually do anything, all you can do is play games you or other users have created. In many ways it closer to the old Second Life than Minecraft. My daughter treats it as equal part social network and multi player gaming platform.
whywhywhywhy 6y ago
Think the hmmm lets say "homely" look of Roblox is one of its strengths, content people build on the platform doesn't have to be polished in looks to be successful it just has to be fun or interesting. It's like cruising Kongregate or New Grounds was for Flash games. Sometimes they looked like trash but were fun to play. Means Roblox games can load in seconds too.

landtuna 6y ago

It's a massively, massively popular platform of games for the elementary school crowd. You can buy gift cards for it in grocery stores. Each game is different, but the look, feel, and controls are mostly the same. Most games are multiplayer.

webwanderings 6y ago

Roblox is bigger than Minecraft. Just ask any 9 year old. Any!

slightwinder 6y ago
Its 126 Million (minecraft) vs 150 Million (roblox) users at the moment. Though it seems roblox outgrew minecraft just this year, for obvious reasons. They were competing for a longer time now, but so far minecraft had the upper hand. I guess minecraft is more popular with older people who grew up with it and there is some limit reached which slows down minecrafts success at the moment. It seems minecraft was also rather silent in the last year. Animal Crossing and now Among Us are the hottest games everywhere, but aroung minecraft it was rather silent, even though it should have been more succesful with people staying at home the whole time, giving people more reason to do stuff in Minecraft.
- dagw 6y ago
  My daughter has almost completely switched from Minecraft to Roblox (and she was heavily into Minecraft) simply because Roblox makes it really easy to play with her friends and Minecraft doesn't.

zemo 6y ago

roblox is designed to let other people write server-side code in a way that minecraft isn't. yeah, it's possible to mod a minecraft server, but the engine isn't built around making that easy, so it's a lot more involved in minecraft than it is in roblox.

foobarian 6y ago

> Unreal engine is already almost there, gamify the UI, invest a few millions in creating good quality assets and you have it. Far from it. Roblox solves the multiplayer part of the equation very well. Authentication, social graph, transactions for players; game server hosting and API for creators. It took me 5 minutes from starting up Roblox Studio to having my own game live and discoverable by all other players - this is huge.

tgtweak 6y ago

Few differentiating facts about roblox that aren't immediately obvious: * All games play on all platforms. You can play cross-platform on any game. * You can buy "robux", the in-game currency, in every retail store under the sun * There are 2 million content creators alone in roblox * Nearly every kid under 10 knows about roblox * You can run it on a potato * You can spend 1000 hours playing it while never playing the same mini game twice * It is still growing and has since 2006

nvarsj 6y ago

Both of my kids, on their own initiative, have made their own roblox games (it even uses Lua!). The incentive is that if other people play them, they can get Robux and use that in yet other games to buy cosmetics and so forth. I have been blown away by Roblox. I thought this kind of tinkering no longer existed, but it's still there.

corysama 6y ago

The same author has done a lot of work on the lighting of Roblox. https://medium.com/roblox-tech-blog/the-future-is-bright-updating-lighting-systems-in-roblox-27dcc85cc391 https://medium.com/roblox-tech-blog/the-future-is-bright-upd... If you are referring to the blockiness, the blocks are a major factor in the game’s appeal -and not just as a reference to Minecraft. Because everything is blocky and nothing can look super detailed, no one need be too embarrassed to make crappy art. You can go ahead and just make stuff that looks crappy without feeling judged. That way, instead of leaving most players sitting around watching a few elite fine artists, pretty much everyone has fun contributing.

dagw 6y ago

The biggest selling point is that Roblox solves multi-player and multi-platform out of the box and is completely free. Unlike Minecraft, Roblox in itself doesn't actually do anything, all you can do is play games you or other users have created. In many ways it closer to the old Second Life than Minecraft. My daughter treats it as equal part social network and multi player gaming platform.

whywhywhywhy 6y ago

Think the hmmm lets say "homely" look of Roblox is one of its strengths, content people build on the platform doesn't have to be polished in looks to be successful it just has to be fun or interesting. It's like cruising Kongregate or New Grounds was for Flash games. Sometimes they looked like trash but were fun to play. Means Roblox games can load in seconds too.