It’s been a little less than a week since the Roblox game was released on theApp Lab (the waiting room of the games not having received the approval of Meta). If it is not available natively on the Meta Quest Store, this in no way prevented the software from being downloaded a million times in just… 5 days!
Mark Zuckerberg may take it the wrong way, but Horizon Worlds attendance could drop in the coming months (is it still possible some would say?) thanks to the arrival of the new Roblox. Well, new, not exactly (or at least on Quest) sinceit is a software that still has almost 20 years of existencetwo generations of children and teenagers who grew up with it.
Roblox is a game with a social dimension where the player can create worlds (including their own game mechanics) and join those of others and vice versa. It is possible to converse textually and vocally. The game appeals to children and teenagersfor many reasons:
- Roblox is free-to-playno need to ask for your parents’ credit card to take advantage of it, an account is enough;
- Roblox runs decently on low-end devices. At an age when children do not necessarily have the latest machine, it is the guarantee for them to play with their friends and to feel fully integrated;
- Roblox has been available for a few years on almost all platforms (except PlayStation and Switch), which further enhances its accessibility;
- Roblox is a sandbox (a sandbox), a perfect world where it is forbidden to ban. The young player can finally do “whatever he wants with whoever he wants”, something less and less possible IRL (in real life). This feeling of freedom greatly contributes to the success of the genre;
- Roblox is addictive, most worlds include a series of challenges and points to be collected allowing to customize his character or to unlock certain levels, objects or portions of the world in which the player finds himself. This drives players back to the game to get more choices, impress their friends and have more adventures with it;
- Roblox is an all-in-oneunderstand that most known multiplayer games (Call of Duty, Minecraft, Among Us…) are copied there, which means that the player in question is not obliged to leave the Roblox universe and to pay to enjoy it;
- Roblox allows to play simple games without any pretension. Whether the player understands the rules or not, they will still have funthe interest being to be able to browse them with friends or to worry about them on the way;
- Roblox is the perfect game for streaming, the game being infinite, each world can reveal its share of surprises. Each universe can thus be shared, commented on, recommended, thus reinforcing the community aspect of the title. Like Minecraft, the player embodies an avatar and, if he is young (and shy), he can more easily stream his content without having to worry about his IRL image;
- Characters look like LEGO minifigures (this is reassuring), who move intentionally in a burlesque way, in a universe that does not take itself seriously. The physics of some games can be unpredictable and therefore hilariousthe same recipe that we find in other known sandboxes such as Goat Simulator;
- Like Fortnite, world famous celebrities can invest the world of Roblox (Mariah Carey, Elton John, Lil Nas X…) and offer concerts and other entertainment, thus transforming the game into a real community “place to be”;
- World creation is done using a real 3D engine (Roblox Studio), which allows the title to have more advanced interactions and interfaces than in Horizon Worlds, which remains limited by a drag & drop system, where Roblox allows you to run code based on the LUA language.
These are various reasons that largely explain the success of the game. Roblox has over 66 million daily users and 200 million monthly active users, the success is simply staggering. To give an idea, it would be necessary to add the active players of Minecraft and Fortnite to arrive at such a figure !
The version VR allows you to immerse yourself in worlds that other players (or yourself) have created, bringing with you a whole new perspective. If this contribution is inherent to the support, what about the other functionalities?
- The interface has been designed for consider Meta Quest controllers ;
- It is possible to play games specifically designed for VR ;
- It is possible to play some non-VR games in 1st and 3rd person (which we don’t recommend), the toggle being done by clicking the right joystick.
Here are some items that the player will not have in the current version:
- Chat with other players, whether voice or text;
- World creation through VR. You will need a PC and the installation of Roblox Studio;
- Smooth movement! The game is slow (in addition to being ugly). As incomprehensible as it is aberrant, the game runs in HD+ (> 2,000 pixels) while it struggles to keep up.
- Movement recognition of your controllers in non-VR games. The player will be forced to play in controller mode.
- The ability to play certain titles. We were treated to a forbidden symbol on the page showing that the world was not supported for VR headsets (see image above).
- A catalog of VR Ready games worthy of the name. Virtual reality having arrived late on Roblox, the titles that are really planned for can be counted on the fingers of one hand. It will be necessary to wait a few months and the popularity of the title on Meta Quest to delve into other VR Ready universes.
To conclude this overview (enjoy the pun), we were not convinced by experience. And for good reason, we are clearly not the target: the title is aimed at very young players casuals eager to discover with friends worlds where the unexpected can arise at any timeeither by the wonky physics engine of the game or its proposal.
The playfulness is quite poorbut the interest of the title is elsewhere. Roblox is, like Horizon Worlds, an ersatz video game pretext for social interactions. Moreover, on this subject, it is necessary quickly that this version VR can allow players to chat, otherwise the download of the application will not exceed the fad.
Interested in Meta Quest 2 ? Know that you can afford it at the Fnac, Darty or Amazon from €349.99.