[fragmede]

72% cut's still pretty steep for all that. Like, these aren't large corporations Roblox is working with, it's kids. It's their platform, and they get to charge whatever they want, and kids can choose not to use it, but 72% still seems exploitative to me. Not a parent tho.

[WaxProlix]

Post-appstore cut it's 42%, which is high but doesn't seem crazy. The unsuccessful attempts and idle piddling all need to be subsidized to allow the successes to exist in the first place, and I suspect we all know better than to undercount cloud, hosting, SRE, and staffing costs. They're all ongoing and pretty painful, and getting a shot at creating something with effectively zero downside risk (vs making a game in Godot and building/buying all of the other parts yourself or with staff) will always come with a lower upside.

[Retric]

> Post-appstore cut it's 42%

That’s ~60% of the post AppStore cut or 42% of the total. If they took 42% of what remained developers would be getting more money than them.

Further there’s no App Store cut when people buy this stuff on PC. The platform is ridiculously exploitive.

[Heliodex]

> Further there’s no App Store cut when people buy this stuff on PC.

Plenty of PC Roblox users use a version of Roblox downloaded through the Microsoft Store, whom charge a 12% cut on all money spent on gaming apps <https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/publish/publi...>. The only place where no app store cut applies is when purchasing Roblox products through the non-Microsoft Store PC app or through the website. Surprise, doing this gets the user ~20% more Robux than buying through an app store <https://www.roblox.com/upgrades/robux>.

If a user buys Robux through a platform where the app store fee isn't charged, then it isn't charged to developers either because the user will receive, and thus spend, more Robux. Creator rewards work differently to ensure that developers owning experiences played primarily by app store users aren't unfairly punished by this <https://create.roblox.com/docs/creator-rewards>.

[Retric]

> whom charge a 12% cut on all money spent on gaming apps

How ridiculous, why that’s almost as high as what Roblox does below.

> ~20% more Robux than buying through an app store

1 / 0.7 = 43% more money.

Which might not be such a big deal except it clearly show the kind of Hollywood accounting going on in their other posts.

[Heliodex]

> How ridiculous

The default app store cut for most other platforms (Google Play, Apple App Store) that Roblox operates on is 30% (and similar for other distribution platforms, such as Steam), so in the grander scheme 12% isn't even that ridiculous. Including payment processing fees, this averages out to the 22% mentioned at <https://create.roblox.com/docs/monetize-experiences> for all of Roblox's sales.

> 1 / 0.7 = 43% more money.

Can you clarify where the 0.7 is from? My assumption is that it's from the 30% fee charged by some app stores, though not every app store charges the same fee so not using an average figure isn't truly representative of how much more money Roblox & its developers would actually earn in the event that there were no such fees.

> except it clearly show the kind of Hollywood accounting going on in their other posts.

Do point out mistakes if you see any, I would be happy to correct them (-: I made another comment on how different methods of purchasing Robux affects the value at <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340570> if that helps clear things up.

[Retric]

I was being sarcastic with my how ridiculous post.

> mistakes if you see any

https://create.roblox.com/docs/monetize-experiences

First no mention of the float between purchase of Roblox and transactions, but whatever platforms regularly pull that one.

As to Hollywood accounting. There is no single exchange rate between dollars and Roblox on a platform, a 5$ purchase = 5:4 on App Store, but a 100$ purchase is a 1:1. https://www.roblox.com/upgrades/robux

Of course they ignore this only saying app stores and payment platforms get a 22% cut. Ok sure you have some average numbers of Roblox per dollar and then work out an exchange rate sure that’s reasonable.

But wait on that page: users can now receive up to 25% more Robux when purchasing through gift cards, computer, or web. This extra Robux translates into higher revenue shares on Robux purchased on those channels. (As high as 25% or less than 7%) So now they aren’t averaging the exchange rate instead doing yet another calculation even though a 20$ purchase on their store has a worse exchange rate than a 200$ purchase on the App Store…

Meanwhile an account with 6k Roblox at time of purchase may have been filled by some gift cards and some App Store purchases at different ratios over time while the user is spending money on the platform meaning that 6k doesn’t actually correspond cleanly to either App Store or gift cards Roblox…

But like trust US bro even if we aren’t saying what the actual formula is it’s fine. I can’t help but wonder what the actual numbers look like if such a lopsided deal is still presented with such weasel wording.

[Heliodex]

I suppose it could be considered steep for anyone making a multiplayer game while managing the hosting for themselves on a tight budget. Developers with strong knowledge of monetisation strategies can make good revenue streams from games with self-hosted or self-managed servers. Maybe these developers wouldn't be able to get the same amount of revenue if they used Roblox instead.

What Roblox provides is a platform to upload experiences to with minimal risk or skill required, and services that are heavily subsidised by money redirected from their most successful experiences. The barrier to entry is lowered to the floor, and most kids using the platform to learn game development wouldn't have otherwise learned about it if they had to manage servers, study networking, etc.

Cloud services are a thing, but they're usually expensive and Roblox is paying for them for you. Free cloud services are a thing, but they're usually very limited and what Roblox is providing is essentially unlimited.

For me, the killer app for Roblox is none of this. It's Creator Rewards <https://create.roblox.com/docs/creator-rewards> (previously Engagement-based Payouts (previously Premium Payouts)), a programme where any player that pays for a Roblox Premium subscription (or is a new/returning user and buys anything on Roblox in the future) results in money earned for the developers of the experiences they play. This happens without requiring any monetisation strategy, microtransactions, or paid in-game products to be created by the developer. Nothing similar is provided by most other popular game engines or platforms.

For myself as a smaller Roblox creator with no interest in creating such monetisation strategies on my own experiences, Creator Rewards makes up a much bigger income proportion than it does for most large developers on the platform. Instead of ~10%, it's more like 90% for me, and I suspect that most kids learning to code games on Roblox without having good marketing skills are in the same bucket, and so the cut won't be nearly as steep for them.