Hacker News is turning into every other platform over time it seems. More and more folks just see a headline and comment rather than understand that headlines are designed to mislead you for clicks.
These requirements make sense. They're additional verification steps in place for people trying to publish games for very young users.
No this does not make sense for the platform. Roblox has some of that old Flash feel, where anyone can just create a game, no matter if you are 14 or 88. If you read the comments, most people are fine with the ID checks ( i would not, but fine) but are completely against the charging of a monthly subscription to publish games. All the people that would do it for fun, wont anymore now. Basically, the corporate greed machine has now turned the platform into a "professional" platform, where you pay-to-build.
As a side note, if someone is working on something similar, then now is the time to start talking about it! ;)
The step is a significant one, and Roblox has taken one other measure recently, restricting chat a lot for minors (https://x.com/Roblox_RTC/status/2043723470899437623) . I think this is a move to satisfy people concerned with child safety, not a cash grab. I think RB hq probably know they're making tradeoffs of keeping parents happy, while devs will be annoyed/fewer. But everyone can still make games and play them with trusted friends. Likely damages the network effect (Roblox's multiplayer aspect being one of its best parts), but oh well.
I agree with you that the HN title is editorialized and misleading, but I disagree that these requirements make sense.
They only make sense if you think it's OK for kids to send face scans to scary faceless corporations. And even if you do that, you can't share your game with friends unless they also take a face scan! (cause that's what "Trusted Friend" means - it doesn't mean trusted by you, it means trusted by them)
People here in comments seem to not read past the title that editorized, but in a wrong way.
This is basically only requirement to make games available for players under 16 so its certnly done under regulatory pressure because no way on earth they can moderate every game from unpaid users.
My kid is 13 and likes to make silly Roblox games. No way I'm going to let him take a face scan with whatever creepy unaccountable AI data hoarding outfit Roblox decided to team up with, just so share his creations with 6 friends. How is it protecting him that he's not allowed to share creative work with people?
Good thing he was already messing around with Godot as well cause this kills Roblox for him.
Oh boy, the reason Roblox was this famous was that anyone could share their games publicly and people could play
Having a subscription kills Roblox and its ecosystem.
For context, Roblox has 170 million peak concurrent players, All of Steam had 85 (I got this data from someone at hackernews's comment)
This might be the end of Roblox. I hope more roblox's alternative spring up preferably open-source. There is luanti which is a minecraft alternative but I suppose a lot of games can have overlap to luanti and it runs on lua too.
These requirements make sense. They're additional verification steps in place for people trying to publish games for very young users.
As a side note, if someone is working on something similar, then now is the time to start talking about it! ;)
The step is a significant one, and Roblox has taken one other measure recently, restricting chat a lot for minors (https://x.com/Roblox_RTC/status/2043723470899437623) . I think this is a move to satisfy people concerned with child safety, not a cash grab. I think RB hq probably know they're making tradeoffs of keeping parents happy, while devs will be annoyed/fewer. But everyone can still make games and play them with trusted friends. Likely damages the network effect (Roblox's multiplayer aspect being one of its best parts), but oh well.
They only make sense if you think it's OK for kids to send face scans to scary faceless corporations. And even if you do that, you can't share your game with friends unless they also take a face scan! (cause that's what "Trusted Friend" means - it doesn't mean trusted by you, it means trusted by them)
This is basically only requirement to make games available for players under 16 so its certnly done under regulatory pressure because no way on earth they can moderate every game from unpaid users.
Now they need a subscription with an id check to become a 'trusted friend'.
Good thing he was already messing around with Godot as well cause this kills Roblox for him.
[1] https://storage02.forbrukerradet.no/media/2026/02/breaking-f...
Having a subscription kills Roblox and its ecosystem.
For context, Roblox has 170 million peak concurrent players, All of Steam had 85 (I got this data from someone at hackernews's comment)
This might be the end of Roblox. I hope more roblox's alternative spring up preferably open-source. There is luanti which is a minecraft alternative but I suppose a lot of games can have overlap to luanti and it runs on lua too.
Capitalism: Shareholders need to be satisfied every year.
This is move to moderated censored platform under regulatory "protect the children" pressurre and hysteria.
This is not affecting publishing games for 16+ audience.