“ This version of the platform, officially known as LuoBu, was published and operated by Tencent, and was heavily restricted due to China's regulations on video games.
Efforts were also made towards making Roblox more accessible, with automatic machine translation being added to
in-game chat in 2020, initially supporting 9 languages. He
also announced a partnership between Roblox and record label Monstercat, giving users and creators the
ability to use their catalog in games. In July
2020, Baszucki formally announced plans and goals for Roblox developers and users to build a "metaverse", a concept that refers to several interconnected virtual worlds.
By this point, over 20 games had been played more than one billion times,
and at least 5,000 had been played more than one million times.
One of the most successful creators on the platform at the time was Luke Weber, known on Roblox as "Stickmasterluke", who had a following
of over ten million plays across all of his games combined.
Also announced in 2022 were age ratings for games, a system
created by the company to increase the platform's
appeal to the young adult audience, which was the fastest growing demographic on Roblox, by allowing for more mature experiences.
Other updates released around this time included adding support for character animations, Roblox Studio plugins, and Developer
Stats, a feature that shows developers various statistics about their games, such
as how many players were playing their game
and for how long. By May, they had already released a stripped-down version of
the platform for iOS that only included its social features, but did not
allow users to play games on it. During this time in 2007, Roblox
introduced the "Builders Club" membership subscription, which allowed for users to create
more games under their account, sell virtual clothing, remove
outside advertisements from the site and gain Robux daily.
While Roblox is free-to-play, it features in-game purchases
done through its virtual currency known as "Robux", and game developers on the platform are able to create items
that cost Robux.
Furthermore, there are people in the community known as "beamers" who compromise Roblox accounts to steal and sell
their items on the platform's black markets.
Avatar item creators have also been able to generate profit with the platform,
with some individuals designing items as a full-time job.
In 2020, Roblox reported that roughly 345,000
game developers on the platform earned money through the program.
Robux can be used to purchase virtual items that the player can use on their virtual character
(or "avatar") on the platform, or access experiences that require payment.
While Roblox is free-to-play, it features a virtual currency known as
"Robux" that can be purchased with real-world money. The games featured on Roblox vary in genre, from role-playing games to ones
centered around escaping prison, among others. ”