As a Roblox developer, it is currently too hard to quickly start a multi-client test session with more than 2 clients. Every time I launch an 8-player local test, I have to manually close the Explorer, Properties, and other side panels on every single client window, then drag each window onto the correct monitor and resize it to fit. With 8 clients across 3 monitors, this setup takes longer than the actual test in many cases, and I have to redo it from scratch every time. If I don’t close those panels, the viewport on each client becomes tiny, which makes the test almost unusable for anything visual.
If Roblox is able to address this issue, it would improve my development experience because I’d get 2-5x faster iteration on every feature that needs multi-client testing. For a PvP game built around duels and team modes (DUELS), every feature has to be checked across multiple clients, so this setup time adds up over hundreds of test runs per week.
On top of that, a speedup on raw launch time would help a lot too. Regular playtest launches got significantly faster 1-2 years ago, and a similar pass on multi-client + server launches would be huge, since they’re noticeably slower per client and the gap only grows with 4-8 clients.
Use Cases
- PvP / multiplayer testing: Duel and team-based games (1v1 up to 5v5, plus spectating board and late joiners) can’t be meaningfully tested with 1-2 clients. 4-8 client tests are routine.
- Verifying changes and bug fixing: Most fixes in a multiplayer game can only be confirmed with several clients running at once, so multi-client tests happen constantly throughout the day.
- Replication checks: Making sure weapons, hits, and UI sync correctly across clients requires seeing all of them at the same time.
- Recording / debugging across clients: When recording footage or comparing client behavior side-by-side, every closed panel and dragged window costs real time.
Severity by Client Count
- 1-2 clients: manageable, sometimes need to close Explorer/Properties for clean recording.
- 4 clients: noticeably painful.
- 8 clients: a serious time drain, several minutes of pure window-management per test, and viewports end up too small to be useful unless every panel is closed first.
Proposed Direction (minor note)
A test session layout preset system would solve this. Ideally I could configure, per client count:
- Which side panels (Explorer, Properties, Output, etc.) open by default on test clients
- Window positions and sizes per detected monitor
- Save/load named presets (e.g. “8-player 3-monitor”)
Studio already detects monitor setup for normal window placement, so extending that to multi-client test launches feels like a natural fit. A general speed pass on multi-client launch time, like the one done for regular playtests, would also go a long way. The exact API/UI is up to the team, what matters is that test client windows come up fast and in a predictable layout without manual setup every time.