From my understanding, you answer the questions honestly and it automatically puts your game on a list? For example if you have tradeable paid items with no regard for policies, your game won’t be shown/playable(?) to those who are in a region where that’s prohibited?
What happens if someone doesn’t fill this form out? Will they automatically be hidden from these regions? If someone lies on their questions, will they be at risk of moderation?
Hey robotyser, I just wanted to follow up and let you know we’re looking into this issue.
When it says, “it will not be available in certain regions after you click the submit button.”, what does that mean?
Are experiences that are not available in certain regions just hidden away from users or is there a message put at the Play button’s place telling the users that the game is not available in their region?
The questionnaire states ‘paid items’. Does this imply any item involving a transaction, regardless whether Robux is involved or not in any way?
If we look at the required ArePaidRandomItemsRestricted policy API, it describes ‘via in-experience currency or Robux’, implying it doesn’t matter whether Robux has been involved or not.
Hi MatkeFTW - Currently, if an experience is unavailable in a region due to compliance reasons, it is visible to players in the region but not playable. On the web, the Play button is replaced with a short message.
I feel like this is just a way to catch people out honestly
It’s like telling your friend “hey wanna touch those black lines? u go first” (overhead wires)
This is very useful for developers who are unsure about certain country policies without having to look into each country. I really hope this gets pushed out for everybody soon.
Did some of this update introduce a feature to prevent users from playing the game for a long time?
From December 2021, the “Game Addiction Prevention Warning” popped up on a trial basis, and I know that it was withdrawn after receiving criticism from many users. After that, the “warning window” began to appear forcibly from February 2022.
A warning message will appear on the screen to users who currently play Roblox for more than an hour in South Korea. This has been known to appear in adolescents.
The “game addiction warning window” is an ineffective policy as it has no effect even with the research results.
Shouldn’t there at least be a choice? There should be a button in the settings to forcefully turn off the warning window.
Users who want some FPS or AFK status feel very inconvenient.
Of course, we know that this update protects the health and risk of users, but before implementing this update, shouldn’t we accept users’ votes and opinions?
Apparently it’s an actual law in China, where <18s can only play online games for up to an hour, but not sure if it’s a thing in South Korea.
Is purchasing virtual currencies like cash and giving it to your friend using in game donation feature considered trading?
That is the point of the policy API. If your game respects the PolicyAPI then filling out the questionare will return that no restrictions need to be impossed (as those features won’t be availible in banned regions). If you don’t make use of the PolicyAPI your game could be breaking the law in countries Roblox has expanded to, and thus this questionaire can be used to disable your game in regions in which those features are not allowed rather then you needing to figure out what regions have what laws and restricting access based on them (such as if they provided a checklist of regions and you could hand pick them).
Any in-game feature which allows paid content be transfered to another user should be conisdered trading, because user’s will always be capable of using this to complete trades outside of or in conjunction with your officially implemented features to support it.
On 24 April 2014, the constitutional court ruled that the shutdown law was constitutional.
As of August 2021 the law was abolished.
Does a random paid item also count as a permanent item?
Didn’t the Netherlands ban lootboxes, only if they were transferable (i.e. tradable)? But as of now, if I choose “Yes, but my experience does not respect the ArePaidRandomItemsRestricted policy API” and “No” for trading, Netherlands becomes restricted.
I’m confused by this as well. I checked some of the most popular games with lootboxes and they were all purchasable in Belgium. Seeing how these big games have decided against using the PolicyService, I don’t see the necessity for me to adopt it. Surely these top developers have evaluated the risks as well.
Dutch laws are mainly in effect for items that are transferable outside the game, such as with Steam inventory items. Items that can be traded in the game they are obtained are considered fine. Roblox rules also state virtual in-experience items may not be traded outside the experience.
Belgium laws, on the other hand, outright bans the use of lootboxes in general.
EDIT: As a Dutchman myself, I noticed that I am indeed not allowed to trade paid items. This sounds like a too strict rule of Roblox to put on players in the Netherlands, given there are plenty of other games available with lootboxes where the rewards can be traded with other players. Just as long as those rewards can only be traded and used within the game, such that they do not have any real market value.
EDIT 2: I’ve looked at what the Kansspelauthoriteit said about this, and it seems to be in violation if the paid item in question is received through random chance with barely any influence by the player and the item is transferable. This does not state whether the trade is limited to in-game only, thus any transfer applies here. Transferability alone is sufficient to give items a (real) market value.
IMO IsPaidItemTradingAllowed is not sufficient to catch this in the Netherlands given this only counts if the paid item is through random chance. Trading items through direct purchase seems to be fine given Steam marketplace, and even Roblox limiteds market, remains available in the Netherlands. I think Roblox just sets this to false to play it safe.
This is a good update, however, what about smaller experiences? Will there be anything implemented to make those smaller games/experiences compliant? If not, what steps are Roblox taking to ensure it is fairly balanced across all experiences?
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