Investigation: How Roblox Isn’t Exploiting Developers And Why People Make Games Isn’t Trustworthy
A response video to People Make Games is now out! A response article is also now out!
A YouTube video (and now a Wired article) pertaining to issues regarding development on Roblox has been circulating both within the Roblox game development community and the general indie community. However, the topics discussed in the video either are not exclusive to Roblox, or simply do not exist at all. The creator of the video, a well-acclaimed game journalist has also been found to have misrepresent certain facts in his video as well as denying criticism towards it.
Whilst Roblox does have it’s flaws in regards to smaller developers such as poor game discovery (promotion without advertisements or word of mouth) and poor support with the more indie side of the community, the video discusses none of these. Instead, it’s main point is that “children are being exploited for labour and need to rise to seize the means of production” which will be debunked through use of excerpts from the video.
This article is written in response to a YouTube video made by People Make Games/Quintin Smith.
“20 Billion Experiences”
Alright. Roblox doesn’t actually have 20 billion experiences. In reality there’s probably thousands of experiences being actively developed on. Most of the twenty billion probably consist of starter places — places generated when you sign up. But pushing that aside, Roblox still hosts a healthy game selection that could definitely rival competitor platforms.
“24.5% of every game sale, but in reality even less”
There is no basis to this argument. You can literally divide $350 fine dollars and divide it by $1000 (10,000 Robux is US$100, minimum is 100,000) and get 35%. However, this does not account for marketplace tax, therefore it is 70% of that which is 24.5%, exactly as Roblox describes. Whilst it is true that Roblox developers take less with even more tax from governments, it is ludicrous to suggest that the statistic is an outright lie, as Quintin does in his video.
“one of the lessons is how to earn money”
Because I’d assume Roblox wants you to be fairly compensated for your work. There’s nothing inherently evil about this — every game hosting platform has the lure of money and all of them have lessons in regards to game monetisation. This argument is ironic as prohibiting developers to make money can be considered withholding pay — exactly what Quintin is arguing that Roblox is already doing.
We soon see Quintin introducing 11 year old Emil, a hopeful Roblox developer like other developers on this platform because proving your point that children are being abused as forced labour on a platform for digital experiences also apparently involves making a child out as some sort of fallen messiah, which is inherently exploitative of Quintin to do so given the age of Emil and the subject in question.
The only reason why Quintin is not interviewing a much older developer is because older developers are wiser about how Roblox works with children much more likely to drum up ethos and pathos to generate engagement to his video. This has clearly worked with over 50 thousand views on the video as of time of publishing. Quintin uses him multiple times in the video to prove that no, development life on Roblox isn’t fair, ignoring that in other development circles, it isn’t fair either.
“The average game on Steam makes developers several thousands of dollars, the vast majority games on Roblox earn zero dollars”
This is an inherently biased statistic because how games are released on Steam is different to that on Roblox. Steam requires developers to pay US$100 for every game they put out, in addition to any additional costs related to hosting the game such as servers for multiplayer. This makes Steam games more likely to succeed with more money pumped into them during development. With Roblox — the base cost is usually zero with free resources such as licensed music from Monstercat or higher with audio purchases or… sponsorship! This statistic also assumes that every developer wishes to cash out their Robux in to real world cash which is definitely not the case, especially on the indie side.
“…hustle and get it in front of content creators or pay Roblox to advertise”
There’s actually a third option. Roblox frequently puts out events (of dubious quality) or special sorts such as Learn and Explore which game developers can join in attempt to promote game development in that particular direction. Developers can easily get boosts from a few hundred to a few thousand active players, which also give them a monetisation opportunity to hit that mark.
“Ads system being a bidding war”
I do not know of an ad system on the internet that isn’t inherently a bidding war. This argument doesn’t exactly apply to Roblox anyways — ads aren’t the only way to advertise, as discussed above. In fact, word of mouth is the most effective form of reaching the most players, with some developers getting to the front page spending nought.
“there’s only one big market right now and that’s kids”
Over 50% of the userbase is greater than 13. Whilst this statistic is potentially inaccurate given the frequency of younger players entering much older birth dates, given the livelihood of sections of the platform designed for use by teenagers and above, it is a growing age bracket.[Note that whilst Bloxy News is a trustworthy news source, it is not an official Roblox Twitter account and EcoScratcher is unable to verify this claim]
“the minimum withdrawal amount is 100,000 Robux”
I have no clue why Quintin keeps harping over this magical 6 figure number. Generally, if your game has earnt 90 thousand Robux, it will also most likely earn the last ten thousand through mere passiveness. Sure, it will take time but you are talking about children who should have the ability to wait. Roblox is volatile enough that it shouldn’t be recommended as a guaranteed way to make money like any other online business, as demonstrated by Emil.
“you have to use a Roblox Premium subscription”
It’s $5 out of $350. Compare that to the $100 that Steam and Apple ask upfront. It’s also a delayed capital cost, and you only need it when you need a pay out. (In fact — it is a security risk if you have it).
“Roblox is increasing the chances you won’t hit that cap”
…No? This has always been the minimum. And digging up drama from over 2 years ago makes your argument look even worse.
“Roblox will get a cut of that paycheck too [if you’re transferring via a group]”
They’re not double dipping, If it’s transferred via Robux via group payouts it needs to be taxed appropriately as well to ensure fairness on the platform instead of developers finding workarounds.
“tonnes of Robux don’t make it off the platform”
The value of Robux actually increased with older Robux actually worth less then Robux earnt more recently. It’s a clever incentive created accidentally through obscurity. Also over 130 million dollars was paid out to developers in Q2 2021. That’s a lot of Robux.
“historical mining and logging currencies paying in scrip”
What? Nobody is getting poorer when they previously earnt no money over the creations as is the case with other platforms targeted towards children? Not to mention that there is a big difference between developing a game and torturing your body. Not to mention that mining was one of the few employment opportunities for workers back then when there are more avenues for Roblox developers to make money other than Roblox games. It’s an extreme hyperbole which makes no logical sense.
“it’s hard to migrate”
Unturned says hi. Also MiniToon, the “celebrity” in the video. It’s hard but not flat out impossible.
“unsustainable expansion”
Roblox has existed for over 15 years now and only started growing rapidly recently as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Not exactly “unsustainable” and “rapid” as you thought it was.
“control the entire market sector”
They already do. Heard about Roblox competitors? They have to aggressively push and sponsor just to even be heard. They are not getting mentioned here because it’s their business model: market when Roblox encounters negativity.
“Roblox could reasonably turn around and say — why not?”
Because Roblox has demonstrated an ability to listen to community outcry, whether for the better or for the worse. This also applies to other online platforms that give creators money, such as YouTube.
“cycle of spikes that go up and down”
You want to hear about Adopt Me’s origin story? There are multiple stories of simulators/lower effort experiences that are made to actually give a money shot in the arm to more original games. Whilst it is true that more successful developers will be more cushioned from spikes, it doesn’t mean that large game development studios will come out with a hit every time. (See RedManta’s A Pirate’s Life).
“a very small fraction of it’s developers get all of the money”
Not exactly. You will cover this next.
“go full time and hire people for them”
This is literally the benefit of the Developer Exchange (DevEx, the program allowing Roblox developers to earn real world money)— it benefits more people than just the bourgeoise. While I’m not going to advocate for trickle down economics here, the effects of more money results in big development groups which benefits a group of people who may not have had the opportunity to develop their skills at a high calibre. This is because owners are much more likely to treat their subordinates better than in other fields because of high competition, as will be discussed later.
“the only concession is Premium Payouts which [only make the rich richer]”
Very wrong indeed. Yes it does do that (as a side effect) but it also gives Robux to those games which aren’t exactly monetarily focussed and are lacking in much more avenues to do so such as showcases and hangout games, both much smaller than the monoliths that you and I know which are also the more “creative” and “social” sides of the platform. It’s like objecting to a universal basic income or other forms of welfare just because Jeff Bezos can apply for it. You’re ignoring the 99% deliberately to hone in on the 1%.
“their interests do not align with workers”
It’s actually somewhat simple to switch jobs on Roblox. Go onto the Talent Hub or another place when you can get hired and ask the people recruiting for a job. There are plenty of great ideas that need to be developed therefore there’s lots of competition to hire the best developer to suit your needs. Of course, there’s legal paperwork to do if you’re bound in that sense but that applies to every job in existence.
Man, it was a mistake to get a labour advocate to comment on Roblox development, was it?
In the latter parts of the video Quintin talks about the inevitable game developer crunch, a common symptom of mental health issues not only exclusive to Roblox but also the entire industry and probably the only part of the video that I do agree with. But if your purpose on Roblox is only to make money as the video sets it out to be, it’s too late—everyone else has beaten you there. Games need to have a bit more of a soul to rise nowadays with the shovel ware firmly locked down by bots.
Crunch also isn’t a problem exclusively related to the Roblox platform and it shouldn’t be framed this way. It also is incredibly hard to think of a solution to mental health issues on Roblox that other game development corporations are doing without appearing out of touch, given that Roblox is a platform, not a game development corporation.
“kids working too hard with unreasonable expectations isn’t bad [for Roblox]”
Yes it is. Bad publicity, like every single article that covers a moderation debacle that was easily fixable by the parent. Trust me, Roblox actually do read the news.
“by my estimation 99% don’t make money”
Here’s some graphs from last year. The money figure on the left tells you how much money was made at that band, slowly multiplying up until US$10 million. As you can see, there’s a lot of developers being paid a lot even at the bottom rung of the ladder.
At December 31, 2020, there are 3,300 developers with active DevEx accounts. This doesn’t account for developers not directly paid by Roblox, which is also a large group of people. You can make your estimations with how many developers aren’t earning any money at all, but it is not as high as 99%.
“It is impossible to extract skills from Roblox”
Unturned and MiniToon say hi again. Scripting/coding/programming is also a valuable job in today’s economic climate of increasing automation and with Lua, the programming language that Luau is based off of being particularly useful with other game engines. There’s also some digital multimedia skills as well as you guessed it — monetisation and marketing skills to learn which can be beneficial in various fields. Vice versa can be said and it is one of the factors of Roblox becoming better over these years — the influx of skill rushing in to share their education with the world.
“empowering kids as workers and as what they would achieve”
The child labour thing is over-arching this entire piece and it needs to stop. It’s creepy and it doesn’t happen (except for very few edge cases).
Quintin also doesn’t realise that the minimum age to even access DevEx is 13, and those who are aged lower than 18 will require parental permission to be able to make any money in line with regulations across the world, contradicting this stance of being in the legal “grey area” for child labour. These checks are also outsourced to a much more specialised company dedicated to doing this kind of authorisation so it cannot be said that Roblox is not performing the proper checks — they’re not doing any.
Not only did we witness misinformation debunked but a Roblox developer has come out and felt that his interview in the production of the video was cut so that Roblox was portrayed more in a negative light.
Yours truly also got blocked for expressing his opinion on the article on Twitter.
So call the video what you like, but I prefer misinformation. It’s poorly written and does not utilise actual statistics instead opting for ethos and pathos by ironically exploiting children to persuade the audience and is not of a quality that I would consider from a well-acclaimed “journalist”.
