A couple weeks ago, I expounded on the similarities between ROBLOX users and independent game developers. I hope, if nothing else, it empowered some readers. In the article, I cited Base Wars: The Land, Apocalypse Rising and Natural Disaster Survival as examples of indie development happening in ROBLOX. Of course, those games fall into the upper echelon of popularity and quality, and represent a standard that few ROBLOX games reach.

It might seem like a lofty goal to create the next Base Wars: The Land or Apocalypse Rising, but you can get there. It probably just won’t happen on your first try.

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Every week, we’re busy telling the stories behind our platform, our technology, and our place in the gaming and technology industries. For those of you who catch up with ROBLOX over the weekend, the Weekly ROBLOX Roundup collects the best stuff to hit our various avenues of publication in the last week. This time: the RoWars revival, LEGO Hero Factory: Breakout, what happens when you press the “Play” button on ROBLOX and more.

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Every week, we’re busy telling the stories behind our platform, our technology, and our place in the gaming and technology industries. For those of you who catch up with ROBLOX over the weekend, the Weekly ROBLOX Roundup collects the best stuff to hit our various avenues of publication in the last week. This time: ROBLOX users as indie game developers, the new Build page, an inside look at popular Catalog items and our thoughts on your feedback.

ROBLOX users as indie game developers

Independent game development hit its stride in the mid 2000s, when technology and distribution got good enough that small teams — even individuals — could develop full-featured games and get them in front of consumers without the help of publishers. In many ways, ROBLOX users function like indie game developers: creating unique, outside-the-box gameplay and distributing content via the web, all with the minimal resources of a small team (or less).

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Indie gaming. It might make you think of small teams – even teams of one – holed up in home offices; focused experiences that put more stake in creative game-play mechanics – your Braids and Fezs – than next-generation, video-card-frying graphics; unique aesthetics and memorable styles.

But 10 years ago, you might not have thought… Well, anything. It’s only been in the last six or seven years that the indie gaming scene has exploded. And in the future, we believe user-generated gaming platforms, including ROBLOX, will not only sustain the explosion, but grow it, as more and more people pick up on what it takes to independently develop games well before going pro.

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Every week, we’re busy telling the stories behind our platform, our technology, and our place in the gaming and technology industries. For those of you who catch up with ROBLOX over the weekend, the Weekly ROBLOX Roundup collects the best stuff to hit our various avenues of publication in the last week. This time: ROBLOX’s virtual economy and how you use it to make money, hack week coverage, the end of bytecode in ROBLOX and developing scary ROBLOX games.

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Every week, we’re busy telling the stories behind our platform, our technology, and our place in the gaming and technology industries. For those of you who catch up with ROBLOX over the weekend, the Weekly ROBLOX Roundup collects the best stuff to hit our various avenues of publication in the last week. This time: how ROBLOX has inspired young entrepreneurs, robust hinges, motors and vehicles, the inspiration and making of Apocalypse Rising and more.

ROBLOX inspires young entrepreneurs

Sure, ROBLOX users create a lot of impressive games — that’s why our site exists. But there are a few users who have gone above and beyond, and it’s been hard for us not to notice. Brandon LaRouche, otherwise known as CowBear16, is one such example; he harnessed his own motivation to write a book about scripting with Lua and create mobile ROBLOX apps. Now, it’s paying off, as he sells hundreds of books and delves deeper into iOS development under his LLC, Double Trouble Studio. Read about Brandon and two other young entrepreneurs in this blog article.

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Every week, we’re busy telling the stories behind our platform, our technology, and our place in the gaming and technology industries. For those of you who catch up with ROBLOX over the weekend, the Weekly ROBLOX Roundup collects the best stuff to hit our various avenues of publication in the last week. This time: graphics rendering, the first ROBLOX Hackathon, new groups features and more.

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