Metaverse prototype? Like in Roblox young gamers: being “exploited” inside
The “Roblox” gaming platform has existed since 2006 – a good 15 years before the term Metaverse became the buzzword it is today. Nevertheless, this game appears in most explanatory texts on the Metaverse and is considered a kind of prototype of this concept. However, several researches in recent months have shown that young people in particular can be exploited on the platform.
“Roblox” can be added to the category of Sandbox games can be counted, which goes back to the 80s. Players find themselves in a game world in which they are given as free a hand as possible. You can use tools to change the virtual world or interact quite freely with the environment within an existing world. “Minecraft” is now the prototype of a sandbox game. “Roblox” only half fits in there. Because while there is a big world in a “Minecraft” in which the players can freely dismantle and rebuild, the point of “Roblox” is to create your own world in the first place – or to try out the worlds of other users. The platform also has a strong social component: players can interact with each other or create their own events.
That is why the Roblox Corporation does not refer to its product as a game, but as a platform. It should be a possibility to create your own and to share what you have created with others. Without the players, there wouldn’t be much to experience on “Roblox”. And that’s where the metaverse comparison comes in. If “Roblox” is a metaverse, it is an incredibly fragmented one.
To what extent “Roblox” can be called a metaverse, we have summarized here.
“Roblox” is the platform from which players can build their own worlds. It is also the platform from which you can access the creations of other gamers. It is probably only a matter of time before blockchain and NFT come into play. Of course, to do this, these technologies must be made accessible in such a way that children can understand and use them as well.
Anyone who creates their own game with “Roblox” then has the option of offering it commercially. However, many do not take this option, but only use the platform for their creative development. The platform’s in-game currency, called Robux, can be exchanged for real money. There are developers who work with their Creations cost a lot of money. But the platform itself has also become rich on the inside thanks to its mostly underage users. The company went public at the beginning of 2021, and its value was then estimated at $ 35.5 billion.
Disclaimer: “Roblox” can, but does not have to be, a danger to young people. There are things parents can watch out for to keep their children from stumbling into expense traps or becoming victims of cybergrooming. There is information about it on Click safe, Internetmatters or Look at.
“Roblox” takes 75 percent of the revenuewho have favourited developers: inside of the page. A higher percentage than the Steam platform, for example, which takes 30 percent of the revenue. At first this is understandable. “Roblox” is free. As a platform, it provides many options for creating games yourself – and servers on which they can run. Steam is just a sales platform on which large and small studios offer their games. In order to earn real money in “Roblox”, however, the mark of 100,000 Robux must first be reached.
“If you (a Roblox user aged 13 or older) both have at least 100,000 Robux in your account and are a member of the Outrageous Builders Club, you have the option of buying your Robux at the current exchange rate set by Roblox will be exchanged for US dollars, ”it says in the terms of use of the platform. 100,000 Robux is about $ 1,000. But that fluctuates – and deduct the 75 percent that goes to the company. A rather opaque system.
Young gamers in particular create their own games within the “Roblox” metaverse, if we want to call it that. Most of them will not make any money. In People Make Games added a video A few months ago stated that the Roblox Corporation clearly advertised with the claim that players can make a lot of money. But most of them will never exceed the 100,000 Robux mark. The money stays within the system, as the players prefer to spend the little money they have earned on in-game items or the games of other creators. There are now items that sells for hundreds of dollars will. People Make Games speaks of targeted exploitation.
The platform lives from the fact that its tens of millions of users constantly create content, but for the most part are never paid for it. Most creations get lost in the mass of content. Very few manage to stand out and become truly profitable. But even there problems lurk, like People Make Games testified in a new video.
Many of the most successful games on “Roblox” were created by a team of several developers. The platform often seems miles away from the ideal that a child should discover the joy of development and perhaps even earn a little money with it. Instead, according to People Make Games, users are now using other platforms such as Discord to sell their skills. Young developers offer their services there and are hired by others to develop successful games for them on “Roblox”. Of course, that hardly happens in a legally secure framework. Instead, it happens that young developers are kicked out of their own project because they are seen as “employees” and not as owners. Since all of these businesses do not take place on “Roblox” itself, but on other platforms, the company cannot do anything about it – it claims.
So “Roblox” is not really decentralized. Everything depends on a company that offers tools and regulates who can start making money and when. But it is unregulated enough that fascist games and those with sexual content are not uncommon on this platform, which is specifically geared towards children. Meanwhile, there is an automatic moderation that, it is reported, filters out words like “gay” and distributes bans. People Make Games also reports cyber rooming cases.
Eliminating Roblox is not that easy. Just as “Metaverse” is the buzz word – especially among people from the media industry – “Roblox” is one of the buzz words for children. 2020 announced the Roblox Corporationthat half of the children in the US would use Roblox. So it’s the one company that has a kind of monopoly here. There may be platforms like “Dreams” that offer similar possibilities. But “Roblox” is by far the most successful sandbox in which players can create their own creations.
Meanwhile, the platform is a closed system. The currency cannot be spent in other games, nor can the games created in “Roblox” be offered or used outside of the platform. So if it is to be a prototype of the Metaverse, it is a centralized system. And it also shows where this dream of a world next to the world that exists far from any regulation can lead: Every loophole is used to take advantage of people.
