The most impressive thing about Roblox is how many predatory parties they have managed to pack into one children's platform. The company itself with its microtransactions, cash hungry creators with lowest common denominator and/or sexualized content, creepy adults behaving badly, probably some hostile foreign governments in all likelihood. Maybe add in a 4chan integration next just to cover a wider spectrum of villainy.
There are parental controls that don’t seem to do much good at all. I set a filter so that my 6-year-old son would only see content that was rated for kids. The next thing I know I see he’s playing a prison riot simulator and having a shootout with the police. There were some appropriate games, but the screening just isn’t serious. When it’s game time, we pretty much stick to Mario and offline Minecraft.
Be sure not to pay for switch online. They bury a bunch of social media / data sharing opt-ins about halfway through the game, where parents will not discover them. (Look for Luigi to see if your kid opted in.)
I've implemented the per-day time limit and it's just broken? It's very hard to measure how much time has been spent on the day, their measure is often above the limit I set, and sometimes a low limit will trigger immediately.
It seems like the limit and time measurement is based on the US time zone alone, not the local time zone. We're in Australia and that's the only explanation I can think of.
Thanks :) I've gone back to just being vigilant, regular parenting; often joining the games myself. I can recommend 99 Nights In the Forest, nice simple survival-style game with very little in-your-face-monetization.
I don’t think it’s serious in any platform of any scale. I remember having some pedo on AOL try to groom me as a 7(?) year old, except I was aware enough to punch out of the situation very quickly. The kind of thing basic keyword filters could have flagged and caught.
Similarly, I remember my families account being banned because I dared to say “Santa isn’t real” in a chat around the same timeframe.
Very serious administration for a billions dollar firm…
It’s almost like age-appropriate is subjective. Roblox is primarily concerned with child safety when it comes to communication, and less about dictating what’s appropriate and not appropriate for arbitrary ages.
Isn't Roblox owned by a publicly traded company? No shit they aren't concerned with child safety, that would cut into profits, which would make shareholders deeply upset.
4chan would be looking in the wrong direction since it has nothing for kids. Other games and game-like experiences are probably just as bad as Roblox and just haven't been brought out into the light. I personally remember Gaia Online being pretty bad back when I was a teen.
Now they’re trying to normalize mandatory “turn on the camera to access porn” services. Really?!?
As a parent, all I want is for the fucking thing to let zero people that I have not approved communicate with my kid in any way. This especially includes people that made games and gambling dens.
