The Story of Universal Roblox (ft. Dapale)
I am an Event Organiser for Roblox, and a developer that's experienced in many programming languages. I am known for my games such as MovieWorld and TM123 Studios.
hello everyone and welcome to today's
event today's event will be the story of
universal Roblox featuring theale and
today we're going to go over some
questions about the game and some
questions in general and we'll be
interviewing with Deale so if anyone has
any questions feel free to put them in
the Q&A Channel and we will answer them
um so I'm going to hand over to gelle
and he's going to talk a little bit
about what he does and yeah yeah hey
guys uh I am the co-founder SLC current
head developer of universal Roblox as
well as some other projects on
Roblox um I've been on the platform
since 2011 it's a long time now it
doesn't feel like it's been that long
but it has uh and I've worked on a
couple games from uh my early days in
horror games I I kind of started um
doing things like with the Slender and
stuff I don't even know if many people
even some people might not even know
what that is because it was so long ago
uh but I I joined doing horror games and
then I kind of transitioned into just
other General stuff I worked alongside
now do the Harlem Shake on the normal
elevator and then eventually I became
one of the main developers here at
Universe of Roblox and I think that was
yeah that was in 2016 so also it's also
been a very very long time just with
this project but I enjoy doing it um um
yeah perfect so yeah that's pretty much
a basic
overview oh that was great okay um let's
get stting into some of the questions
then I have a few and then I've copied
some from what people have asked um so
the first question I have for you is
what got you interested in Roblox and
how did you get started on the platform
as a
whole yeah so in
2011 I
it has like the weirdest connection
but I I I guess I can go pretty in depth
here but so at the time one of my dad's
high school friends was on the show The
Biggest Loser which is like a Extreme
Weight Loss kind of uh like game show
like they're trying to lose a bunch of
weight um well he he my Dad's
friend he won that Year's Biggest Loser
and we eventually we went to Oklahoma to
go see him we had never met him before
but we all wanted to like hey what's up
and meet them well his son the biggest
losers The Biggest Loser winner really
complicated way of saying that um his
son actually had a Roblox account and uh
he he showed me he's like oh I have a
YouTube channel and I was like oh okay
this is kind of cool um and so I was
like okay I'll look at it when I get get
home or something um but this entire
time I wanted to work on I was very I
was very much into Call of Duty and Call
of Duty zombies and I always liked how
um Halo reach the specific Halo game at
the time of this that I was interested
in people would make custom maps in Halo
Reach and they would make like these
zombie maps right yeah there's a lot I
know there's a lot of connections here
but I was like yeah I really want to
make my own zombies maps because that's
cool and then when I went to look at
this guy's YouTube channel he had like a
I saw a custom map that was replicating
in Call of Duty zombies and I was like
whoa that looks way better than Halo
Reach because it looked way more custom
it looked like you had more creative
freedom and I was like that looks cool
and so I went onto the platform and I I
I I tried to make the if anyone even
knows what this is It's the um what's it
called
is the Call of Duty the the moon map it
there was like a map on the moon it was
a Call of Duty zombies map yeah
I I don't really know how many people
know that but that was Black Ops 2 it
was a long time ago but it I made a
little map I thought it was a lot of fun
and eventually I started learning how to
code through the platform and yeah I got
interested just straight up because I
thought it was cool to create my own
little Maps um and then little did I
know that that would lead me to
like the whole coding atmosphere and all
that stuff that I ended up going
through fair enough okay so keeping on
that topic of Roblox itself what do you
personally enjoy the most about the
platform both as a Creator and your show
a
user what I enjoy most with the platform
um well okay I guess in a platform sense
but like before the community just the
platform sense um um I do enjoy
how uh people may may have different
arguments on this but I do find Roblox
to be a way easier way to Kickstart a
project compared to just like jumping on
steam or something because Roblox gives
you you know you have like an unlimited
number of servers that scale to your
your game that you make you have instant
multip like the server I guess that's
the same thing but you have scalability
you have a free to use engine
and there's a bunch of tools that they
give you and there's an audience that
already exists there um if you know what
the general audience likes you can
pretty much make whatever you want and
push it out as a game and there will
already be an audience that can get
FedEd if you understand a few things
about maybe the recommendation algorithm
which I understand that that's a debate
if that's even good but yeah that that
should be simplified in how well you can
can reach your audience but nonetheless
there is an audience and then they also
scale your servers which I very much
enjoy um it's really helpful as a
Creator uh in terms of the community um
there I think what one of the most cool
things about it and this was even on in
in early times of
Roblox um usually you were able to find
a pretty Niche group of people who like
things that you like just because they
played those certain games and so a lot
of communities have spawned out Roblox
such as maybe some people here are are
in the coaster team Discord for example
or or just even our own games Discord
you usually find these n groups of
people that were all interested in very
specific things and so you know I was
interested in uh physics and programming
and also theme parks and then there's a
lot of people who are in that coaster
Community who all who all grew up with
Roblox and they learned some of the
physics that that are behind coasters
they learned things about how coasters
and and theme parks actually operate all
just because we found each other through
these Niche games and I think maybe
maybe this is actually a good argument
for Roblox they always try to call
themselves like the metaverse I think it
was more of a metaverse before than it
is now but I I really much did enjoy
being able to to reach that kind of
Niche
audience definitely and over the last
couple years the platform has changed
massively oh yeah yeah for
sure okay um yeah cool okay so I think
we should probably start moving into
Universal Roblox itself um and I guess
the best place to start was how did you
join it where did you hear about it or
did you know Andrew originally or how
did you find out about the game yeah
so this is funny
because
I I I had seen the game and I played it
and I thought it was really cool but I
wasn't a part of the project when it
first opened and nor did I know I I
might have like known Andrew from his
other random projects like the City walk
and stuff that was made before um but I
didn't really have a close communication
with him uh and I think back in 2016 The
Wizarding World of Harry Potter opened
at Universal Studios Hollywood it was it
opened during at the time my spring
break April of
2016 and I got I really really liked it
I had seen the wisney world at Florida
but once having it like at home I was
like oh okay I came became more
accustomed to it and so I started making
my own build of that of that
actual like land and so I showed
Andrew that the progress I had made on
it which was a few of like the buildings
as you were going down the street and he
was like wow that it looks great would
you like to work on this for Universe of
Roblox would you like to put it in the
game and I was like sure and so
basically I focused on doing the wising
world project that did take about I
think it took two years from the day I
started there till the day we actually
released it um but it was it was a lot
of work and it was
fun uh but yeah I join through through
showing off my ability to to I guess
work on some out like wasn't necessarily
as to me but just like showing off my
cool work which that's exactly the kind
of way we look for people who are who if
we need to find someone who is super
creative in a certain kind of they're
good modeler they're good programmer we
usually look at their past work and if
they show off things that are cool we're
like hey you want to join question mark
so but yeah back back to the point um
although I was only FOC like initially
focused on the wiy world project I
kind
of started like just doing random things
like I made the first line system in the
Halloween event in 2016 because that
there was like a queing system they it
was basically just like everyone stood
in a line and hopefully everyone
followed the line it was very weird back
then old Roblox was a lot of fun it was
very weird but it was a lot of fun uh
and so I made the first little line
system and then I did at the time the
walking dead
attraction um that was like I don't know
I don't really know what made me do that
I don't know if I just like did it or if
I was asked to do it but we did that and
it was that was a lot of fun to do
because I hadn't worked on any Halloween
events or anything so it was my first
haunted house of of A Sort and so I I
thought it was cool to do that so yeah
and then eventually I just started
getting more involved in programming the
event because uh one of our the time our
head programmer was kind of busy with
other things and so I started trying to
take over things so yeah that's that's
it took a little bit longer to get that
point across but yeah no fair enough The
Walking Dead game I remember playing it
in the very early days of the game yeah
very different from what it is now yeah
it was it yeah I think it came out in
early
2017 maybe maybe I think it yeah around
there yeah
okay um so moving on to the next
question it is what inspired you to take
Universal Studios from Andrew and
continue the legacy of the game
so I don't think like obviously like as
someone who isn't in like the internal
team we didn't I didn't like take it
from him or anything we were like pretty
much I guess co-owners at a point we
were both working work together on
things and still this day Andrew works a
lot on the project he helped a lot in
managing Halloween scare nights this
year so he's not like out of the picture
he just didn't want the responsibilities
of managing the overall project and so
he told me at one point hey I have a lot
of stuff going on in life um do you just
want to be like the figurehead and help
manage a little bit more of the other
you know end to end stuff just to um try
to get things going and I was like well
it sucks that you're handing it over to
me right when we have to do this IP
removal thing but yeah I'll do it just
because uh like you know I I feel like I
was pretty well accustomed I had wrote
at the time all the code in the game was
essentially my code besides a few little
pieces and so I felt like it it was just
a good position it made sense to do it
and so
yeah okay I think on the S of topic of
Ip removal is it worth maybe explaining
a little bit of why that change happened
for anyone that
yeah so it IP is intellectual property
which is
essentially like I guess characters
movies anything that's made of made in a
creative way uh that's not owned or it's
owned by some like the Creator right so
if for example you know the new wild
robot movie Wild robot and that movie is
considered intellectual property of
universal SL NBC NBC unal um and so
without a license if if if we didn't
have a license to use wild robot if we
put wild robot in our game and and try
to do anything with wild robot that
would be illegal without a license is
their intellectual property and you
can't use it um just out of the blue so
in the earlier days of of Roblox it
there wasn't really a like you didn't
just make money off the game it was kind
of just making things for fun and making
things to show off I don't know just
that you were involved in that community
and you just kind of wanted a place for
people to have fun uh but warbox changed
and it became way more of a like game
development distribution
platform and they started cracking down
on the use of intellectual property
without licenses uh which is rightfully
so I understand it um and our game did
start making money so we were like okay
we we do need to remove this
intellectual property and even if we
weren't making money it's still against
the law to use intellectual property
without licensing um and so it took us a
while to do it but there is the the
thing that like mainly made us make that
decision and like go ahead with it
is um I believe at the time our clothing
designer got like 50 of his items taken
down automatically by some AI uh
IP detection bot they made and so we're
like okay well if the C going to start
doing this what's going to end up
happening is a lot of our audio because
a lot of our audio at the time was also
intellectual property it wasn't owned by
us they run automatic audio IP detection
and so a lot of our audios were getting
deleted uh and basically what would have
ended up happening in the long run if we
didn't do this IP removal is the entire
game would have probably lost like the
majority of sounds you wouldn't hear
anything in the game The Sounds would be
deleted um maybe some of the textures or
images would be deleted and even the
game itself could have gotten taken down
because we didn't have proper licensing
to use if any of the IP
owners filed a dmca takedown request
because we were using their intellectual
property without a license so obviously
we would love to have the intellectual
property in our
game but it's it's extreme hard to you
can't do that without a license and
people always are always asking this why
don't you get the licenses while
licenses are extremely expensive and the
scale of this game doesn't
have there's
no yeah the game doesn't make enough
money to to even get like a single large
license like if we wanted to put the
entire
game's profits into a license we could
maybe get one big movie like one you
know and the game used to have like I
don't know 30 Properties or something
something there was a lot of properties
that were used before so yeah
unfortunately it's it's just a hard
problem at the scale of the game and I
mean even a lot of Roblox games they
don't usually have more than one
property or one promotion event at a
time it's just it's it's just not doable
unless we somehow got into a contract
deal or got bought by NBC Universal who
has the rights to potentially fix this
and make licensing agreements that would
include our game so I don't expect that
to happen but yeah it's a difficult
problem and yeah it's unfortunate and we
made us change a lot of things
especially some we had to do quicker
than others and some things still
haven't recovered from that time like
the Forbidden Adventure ride in the
wiing Village area that that ride still
not done right and like that closed
initially because of the IP removal
situation so although unfortunate it was
necessary to keep the game active alive
and prevent it from being
closed definitely and although it was a
big change I think it works out quite
well because we had the best Halloween
event I think we've ever had this year
as well yeah I I like the Halloween
event I'm sure we'll it'll probably get
some questions there yep uh but yeah I
love the Halloween event
okay so moving on to a slightly
different topic about Universal um lots
of the questions follow the same line of
what was your greatest accomplishment
out of the whole
game
o greatest accomplishment out of the
whole
game huh so okay the weird thing about
universeal Roblox I'm going to give you
some quick context and why this is
difficult for me to answer I wouldn't I
would say um
the difficult the reason it's difficult
to ask this question is sorry wow I am
not I don't know why to it's difficult
to answer this question because I
although a lot of the things in
Universal Roblox are there there are
some pretty cool things I I don't think
anything I've done specifically in
Universal was like groundbreaking
technology or like programming
techniques that I discovered with
universal uh it was like main like oh I
I did some complex things in my own
personal projects and then that allowed
me to come back to Universal and work on
things that I've done in my own personal
time there are certain things that I I
think we did a great job on um it's not
my work but the Epic twin that's his
username he has a really really good
ride system slash coaster
animation kind of like Tool uh that we
use on all of our attractions uh and we
like set up triggers and things just
that trigger effects like you kind of
would do in real life with sensors and
things uh so he did a great job with
that that's not my greatest
accomplishment obviously because that's
his work uh but I I we did an update in
gosh was it actually two years ago now
was it July 22 or July 23 I think it was
22 wow it's been three years with the
new stuff wow
okay yeah so in July of 2022 we did a
huge like I basically recoded the entire
game um all the UI we replaced all the
interface
[Music]
we uh everything all the code was new
and that made things so much cleaner and
it made us it made it so much easier to
add new content to the game in much
quicker way right um although things
still take a long time for us to develop
what's actually crazy is I feel like our
our develop time schedule is the exact
same it's been in the past but we'
actually we actually have less time than
we've ever had before but I think we're
still developing at the same right
because of all the changes made in the
framework had I not made all those
changes we'd probably get even slower
updates or slower content releases so I
think it was very helpful that we did
that because pretty much everyone on the
project right now has full-time jobs
uh like the main development team so
yeah it's hard to get things in but yeah
I think my greatest accomplishment was
this General framework that I redid for
the entire game because it's really
clean uh everything works together
pretty well and it's easy to maintain an
update in a quick way so I like that the
most okay um on the flip side to that
question what would you say was the most
difficult thing to add in the game or
create the most difficult thing to add
um well I
mean Halloween scare nights this year
provided a lot of problems not
necessarily with just like the code that
was needed for them but there was we had
to leverage so many decisions to even
get this game working and to to like
make sure all the variables were
considered and we still made mistakes
because it it was such a hard problem to
answer um although that that was
complicated that
wasn't most of it wasn't a complicated
like coding or
implementation uh I think the thing it
took the longest amount of time to
actually do in
Universal was the alien attack gun
system I was confident I I I knew how to
do it and I knew what I was going to do
but I had to make sure on day one that
it worked for
uh controllers touch screens and
keyboard and mouse so it had to work on
all the platforms on day
one and there's a lot of moving Parts
well like literally the the ride
Vehicles move and so there's a lot of
moving parts
to the the laser guns and all that stuff
and yeah it it was a little complicated
but I knew what I was I needed to do and
like I don't think there was ever a a
giant pause where I was like I don't
know how to solve this problem there
were bugs and things they got solved but
it took the most amount of time of any
of our projects probably just because it
needed that whole gun shooting framework
thing to
it okay awesome I yeah alien attack is
one of my favorite rides and that leads
on to our next question of what is your
favorite rid in
Universal
oh
um
huh well I
typically like if I'm just like playing
the game just randomly by myself or or
just checking something out or if I'm
like trying to show someone the quality
of it I usually do go to alien attack or
web
Adventures
I I also like to ride Jurassic coaster
but I think alien attack and web
Adventures really show off the quality
of the kind of work that can be done by
our team and by other
teams uh ah maybe alien attack because
alien attack has the whole pre-show
element and then it has a pretty fun
like Easter RS and things you can see
through the queue so may I'll go with
alien attack I do really like web
Adventures as like the ride itself but I
feel like alien Tas has so much going on
in it and I like it a lot fair enough
yeah both of them are really good as
well so match well done to the team on
those Rags yeah they did a great
job um so what advice would you give to
an aspiring Roblox developer that you've
learned since making
games um
so Roblox is a I think I mentioned it a
little bit earlier in that like yeah
there's an audience that exists in
Roblox and they have this recommendation
algorithm that will try to find that
audience for you when you release a game
um so when it comes to that although I
just said like oh it's great you like
there's an audience that already exists
and you can make games and
stuff I would two things I would do are
keep in mind when you're going to make a
game on Roblox or or develop on
Roblox um although you may really like a
certain idea there are very specific
things that don't really work on Roblox
um you can do a single player game you
can make a single player game on Roblox
it's very very likely it it might do
well for a small amount of time a little
bit of time but that typically Roblox
games Excel when they are social games
and they're are
multiplayer um and then they have some
sort of General gameplay Loop uh oh yeah
obviously I there was there is a few
times in before 2016 where I wanted to
make single player games uh I started
working on some and then I just realized
I even if this game got popular it
wouldn't stay popular because it just
does Roblox is a social platform it's
not if you want to make a single player
game unfortunately you probably have to
go out and do the extra amount of
research to go and make a game on a
different engine and publish it to steam
or epic games or or wherever um because
there are certain projects that I don't
think work on Roblox and then the second
thing this goes for any game developer
on any
platform make a game that you want to
make and that you want to play don't
make a game because I want dollars I
want money just make a game that you
would enjoy going into yourself and that
you want to play and typically there
will be other people who also want to
play the same type of game that you want
to
play and that's
typically a recipe for success when you
make a fun game for yourself you also
make fun games for other
people I would say that advice is
perfect for yeah anyone new who wants to
make
again okay um what are some of the
biggest lessons you've learned on your
uh what are some of the biggest lessons
you've learned from your Roblox
experience as a
whole
um well we just learned a pretty big one
with Halloween scare nights um
uh obviously when you're when you're
working on different projects you have
to make a ton of
assumptions
on and this is just this is outside the
game development too this this might
even go for like almost every job ever
if you're making anything for the
general
public
um you have to make assumptions based on
how people may or may not react to
different scenarios and hey if you're uh
your audience is going to like something
dislike something are they going to
understand this are people going to know
what to do in this case and I think what
a lot of Roblox games well the popular
games do well and the unpopular games
unfortunately don't do well is or I
think the most complicated thing that
people don't get to get to exactly as a
developer is they make assumptions that
like a player just knows how to play
your game game no matter how you make it
um there is a ton of work that should go
into I
guess like if I jumped in this game for
the first time and I saw nothing about
it what how would I react and see the
reason it's so hard for people and
developers to know or even understand
that is because you'll never be able to
step into someone's shoes and just not
know what your game's like like you've
been working on it for all this time you
know the ins and outs of how things are
you have to get the game into people's
hands maybe either through beta testing
or whatever to see how
they react to it with no bias right so
if you get people to go into your game
and then you see them get confused you
need you can ask them questions about
why they're confused but you shouldn't
tell them oh you press this press that
and then you go over here that is going
to get them to a point that they didn't
get to by themselves right so if you
learn a lot about how people interact
with your game either through like
direct play test where you watch what
they do or you you track statistics and
you see where players like go to with
the buttons they press and you figure
out how to make those better and make it
more seamless you typically will get
people more interested and more willing
to play your game longer uh and just get
people invested in your community as if
you don't just like make it super
complicated from the beginning and so
one question we always get asked is hey
why did you guys remove the menu from
Universal Roblox so what used to happen
is there was like a menu page and it had
a play button it had a all these
different buttons it's basically what
you see right now when you join the game
it's on the left side of the screen why
it used to be like a whole screen and
then you had to press play and then you
had to choose a place to start and it
was like the theme park the hotel or the
shopping center right uh and so the
problem with that is a lot of people had
like no idea what they they joined for
the first time and they were expecting
oh I'll see theme park but they see a
menu with a bunch of interfaces a bunch
of buttons and there's some people who
never even press the play button and
then press the theme park button right
they didn't even get to that point or
they pressed the play button and they
didn't press the theme park they went to
somewhere that wasn't the theme park but
they eventally played the game expecting
a theme park so there's all these things
that you can people can get stuck in and
you as a developer like well it looks
good I like it but why are why are
people not liking it or why people not
playing it it it's typically because
either they don't understand something
they don't see it the same way that you
saw it or you made an incorrect
assumption about how a player was going
to go about something right and so I
think trying to figure out when you can
make good assumptions when you shouldn't
make assumptions and like seeing how
people go through your development
process and and how people go through
what you present is a very smart way
to understand how to improve your
experiences your in your games um try to
remove all the bias from your head it's
not it's that's an impossible task but
try your very best to see things as a
new player would see them and typically
that will really help
you um
streamline the the the playing process
the game processor across any industry
honestly uh don't make too strong of
assumptions but also don't make things
suck because you don't add anything of
substance to the game because you don't
want people to get confused there like
the find Balancing
Act that's great advice and the menu a
lot of people do say oh I want the old
menu back but it is a very much
understandable reason for removing it
and it does help a lot of new players
yeah because yeah now you now you play
and you're immediately in the theme park
and the menu the tabs on there now are
just like additional pages of people
wanting to look at things news and all
that stuff more quickly yeah yeah okay
one of the questions we have coming in
on the Q&A panel is why did you get rid
of the City walk SL shopping area it
didn't have any
IP
so yes most of it didn't have IP I
actually I think yeah What mo like the
majority had been unpd already um the
reason we got rid of it um well it it
was just another part of the game we had
to maintain so if we ever made updates
to like oh how I don't know a small
piece worked right let's say for some
reason I wanted to change how the Fast
Travel worked um I would have to make
sure that oh if if it was I was moving
positions I was moving stuff in the game
I had to make sure all the Fast Travel
locations for all those shops still
worked right and then I oh if I had to
change something that the night lighting
or something something we something had
to change that means we had to update
all the night Lighting in the game
that's just another piece I have to
update
it it kind of the decision was more so
that we saw that a huge amount of people
didn't like most people ignored the area
but if they didn't ignore it uh there
were some players who would go through
that that Universal Plaza portal at the
very entrance of the game and they would
go through the shopping center and they
would leave because they don't see theme
park again it's the same problem as as
the menu um and so we we went through a
few designs when changing this we were
going to have like a very mini shopping
center right at the entrance but we also
realized that like that's still the same
problem where you're not seeing theme
park you're seeing shops you're seeing
like it's not people didn't play this to
go through the shopping center they went
to go to the theme park um and so our
eventual goal was to take all the shops
and things most of them maybe not all
but most of the content that was in
Universal Plaza and disperse the shops
into the park so there's more actual
things just around the park and so
there's still like three or four shops
that we want to add we kind of got
delayed on that um because there like a
shake up in in Avatar accessories and
what's going on there so we still want
to finish that and put more more stores
into the park but yeah having it as a
separate area that had to be maintained
in addition to the rest of the park was
just and and also it not being the most
popular place and kind of adding to that
whole uh oh it's on a theme park it's a
shopping center idea it was just it's
hard to justify keeping it there and up
dating it when it was so not it wasn't
used that
much yeah fair enough I did enjoy
shopping and I remember it when it first
came out but over time it did get
quieter but it was a good
addition yeah no it it was yeah the
initial version was very big um and at
some point we scaled it down a bit to
put it into the the the universal we
what to call it now the production
Central area which is like the backline
stuff with uh the Rip Ride what is it
called rocking coaster yeah uh so yeah
it yeah it unfortunately was just not
traveled well enough and it was hard to
maintain
so cool one of the other questions
coming in is if you had the opportunity
to bring back any old ride what ride
would you bring
back
o yeah I to bring back any old
ride let me
think see a lot a lot of the old rides
most of them were removed just because
either they weren't up quality or they
got replaced by a newer version right
there are like very select ones that
were just removed
because like I guess st's disco coaster
was removed because you removed all the
Simpsons intellectual property from the
game um people like SE coaster I
actually even though I was involved in
that project I still didn't understand I
guess I still don't understand why it
was so popular that one I just never
understood I know people liked it maybe
it was the music um
but I'm indifferent to STS and then we
had the fly dinosaur which was um kind
of back in the Jurassic Kingdom area it
was a B&M wing
coaster uh it was a good coaster but it
was also just an exposed steel barely
themed coaster and so the
reason uh we put Megalodon there is we
were able to wrap Megalodon more a bit
around the park I I don't know it
Megalodon was put in the game for hey
we're not ready for the River Adventure
ride here's a coaster in the meantime
because we can make coasters way more
easily and eventually when the River
Ride came we're like okay the co poter
that doesn't exist in real life at a
universal Park doesn't really make sense
in our park and also it's just an
exposed steel coaster let's try to
just that's let's remove it because we
have better things coming uh I I'm
trying to think of rides that I don't
think we removed anything that was like
I mean okay I guess I'll say if I had
the opportunity to add back the
Ghostbusters walk through haunted house
I would I think that was one of our best
haunted houses and it was a lot of fun
we put a lot of work into that house it
looked great but yeah we don't have the
licensing to use Ghostbusters so can't
use that house
anymore so yeah I'll go with that fair
enough I would say Stew was my favorite
one mainly because it was indoors and
then it would go outdoors and I don't
think there's any ride similar to that
on universal
today yes that would be true yeah I
think that's all for me that's what made
it unique know about other people as of
now as of now we we may have a project
that we've been slowly working on that
does go indoor and outdoor again but I
will keep that secret okay keep an eye
out for that update
then cool um we should move on to
Halloween screen uh Halloween field the
Halloween event in general I guess yeah
um so the main question which there are
quite a few few questions about it is
why was the event paid this
year yes so the event was paid this year
because well it was actually very
similar
to um our previous years so in our our
last big Halloween event was in 2020
when we did essentially what we did this
year um so in 2020 and the previous
years the event used to be within the
main game this is before age ratings
that's the primary reason we put it into
a separate game anyway because it has a
13 plus age rating and we didn't want to
restrict the universal Park game from
being accessed by everyone who's under
the age of 13 right so in 2020 and
before it used to be in the main game
and we would sell tickets there was day
tickets and there were like season
passes essentially right uh the day
tickets I think yeah the day tickets
were about 10 Robux per day and then the
season passes were like 150 Roo for the
for attending it for the duration of the
event so we wanted to get rid of the
idea of having the one- day tickets
because they it there's a lot of
complicated things that were involved
there people had to figure out which
days the event was open how long their
ticket was good for and we thought it
was complicated and that we could
improve this the whole ticketing system
and just say hey there's one price and
you buy and you have it for the whole
season and we want to make it cheaper
than it used to be so that you're not
spending 150 ORS like it you like that's
what it used to be it was 150 for the
season um but it's not 10 for a day so
we're like okay I think 50 is a pretty
good reasonable amount and that's only
four of the houses uh we we gave the
whole event and scare Zone stuff out for
free which it used to be behind the day
tickets and the season pass so they the
Scaris ones and stuff was never none of
that was free uh so we like okay let's
make it just have the haunted houses
cost Rob bucks um
however that was our we made an
incorrect assumption with this whole
thing and it was yes our audience
understood the ticketing system people
who played the our old Halloween events
knew what they to expect right when this
was in VIP previews it had like a 94 95
% approval rating and we're like okay
we're good we did a good job we're happy
but then we when we released it to the
public and the game started getting
recommended to new users that assumption
no longer held because these people had
no idea what the event was and so they
would join the game and they would see
oh my goodness I can't play it seemingly
looks like they can't play the game
right like they try to go into any of
these haunted houses and it requires
them to buy it so they feel like oh they
were misled into thinking this is
something big Halloween event it's like
no I have to pay for it and it Le it led
to a lot of people dis disliking the
game and it's a bad look I wish we had
not failed in that assumption what we
should have done is made the game paid
access or something like that right but
to kind of focus more on the general
question uh so sorry I I'll the paid
acces decision would be because it would
be an upfront it would show you hey this
game is 50 robo
and you're not unintentionally
misleading people into thinking it's
this big event that's completely free to
access right uh people don't a lot of
people don't read your description of
your game and all that stuff so you
can't you shouldn't assume that they'll
understand how it works and that was the
incorrect assumption we made this year
um but yeah back to the whole point why
is it even purchasable to begin with
like why is there a price tag on the
event at all well the event costs an
extra ex extraordinary amount to develop
both time and MoneyWise right um and so
and the event only lasts for a month is
right and so to even justify making the
event and not losing money on it we have
to kind of have some sort of paid access
and it's not like we we just reuse all
the content that we've made in previous
years this year we made all new haunted
houses and all new scare zones so
everything that was made in the event
was new we we haven't we didn't reuse
anything and and so the development cost
of doing that is high so we had to have
an access price to it to even justify or
even cover how much we spent to develop
it and the hours and stuff that we had
we that Andrew and I put in uh we don't
we don't pay ourselves through like
commission we pay ourselves uh a
percentage of the gains Revenue so even
though I may have put 250 hours in
Halloween scare nights I may have only
made like some small amount per hour if
you took it into hours because um yeah
that just we we commission people and
then we get and then Andrew and I just
get a percentage when everything's all
done so that all being
said yeah it's just to cover the cost of
development no fair enough and the event
this year I would say it's the best
event Universal has ever had it had so
much more detail and was much bigger
thing any of
them yeah and I mean I'm proud because
I'm proud that I think the team did a
great job um we had some really fun and
creative ideas uh we had been talking
about these house ideas and some of
these scaron ideas for two years we had
them in our like backlog of hey these
are cool things we could do and so I I
think we did a great job in some of like
the creative idea Department I guess you
could say I I I really like the
mannequins alive scare Zone I really
like um jigsaw junkyard and then of
course I I really enjoy lost riches and
the Bigfoot
houses um I I I personally wrote a lot
of like the Lost riches ideas like and
as well as the Bigfoot ideas I really I
liked the story lines we had and like
the ideas we had and I think the team
did a very good job executing on those
ideas
definitely and they did a great job for
the whole event it was great oh yeah
yeah I loved it it was I think we did I
I love I just love going through the
event too it's a lot of
fun okay what would you say your
favorite Halloween maze this year would
be and what is your favorite Maze of all
time in Universal
Roblox that's yes a hard question the
the maze question is hard because how
many have we had now like 30 there's a
lot we've done a lot of 100 houses now
um the pro okay I I I do really much I
do enjoy our Ghostbusters house we did I
thought that was very good um but I I
think it's a toss up between for me it's
a tossup
between lost
riches this year and
oh
man I'm like going through all our
different houses and
I'm there are a lot I I I also liked our
Halloween 2 house we did yeah I think it
was was that 2018 it was in 2018 yeah
2017 was the first one I think okay yeah
I I I enjoyed our Halloween 2 house I
put a lot of like my own ideas into it
and I I enjoyed that house a lot I
played it so many times um Halloween
2 lost
riches and I would probably say that I
also put a lot of work into that for
stranger things
house um did we do stranger things
before Universal did stranger things or
did we do it the exact same year I think
you g it the same year but you announced
it before they gigs yeah yeah so I cuz I
think we yeah so so I I I don't we did
hear Rumblings before that they were
going to do stranger things and we're
like dang we're doing it
too I mean I guess it's kind of cool we
were doing at the same time but yeah I
know we we made everything based like
that was our own original Maze
and I liked it I think our third version
of it was the best one um but yeah I
think it's between Halloween 2 and lost
riches I really like both of those
houses fair enough good choices L riches
this year was definitely my favorite one
yeah a great one it's it's really hard
to be it looks it's just visually it
looks
awesome sort of leads on to the next
question of how did you come up with
original names that weren't IP related
did you get any inspiration from other
IPS
or
honestly I mean I'm sure different
things influenced are like naming when
we were
randomly
um I guess like just like coming up with
ideas I'm sure there was random things
that popped in her head that were
influenced by maybe an intellectual
property but to be totally honest I
don't think I think a majority of these
names were just original ideas I don't
really know if there was too much
influenced by any real life one I mean
obviously graveyard Madness into the
catacombs is kind of graveyard Madness
is kind of inspired by graveyard
games although this this into the
catacombs one is doesn't exist it's an
original one it's kind of
taking um dead exposure and graveyard
games from real life and kind of making
its own little thing of it it's not
exactly the same but there's a there
kind of a connection between those
houses and
then um let's see big foot is just kind
of a typical crypted like story is that
how you say that um I think so Bigfoot
we knew we wanted to do Bigfoot and and
just like or just other things like
Bigfoot and although the ideas changed a
bit um the initial ideas of our Bigfoot
house was going to it wasn't a a
detective house like it was that kind of
morphed into that as we worked on it but
it was going to be just like actually
that's not true I think you always were
going to be a detective but it was going
to be a lot less obvious than it is now
because obviously you have like the
detective dialogue and all that stuff it
was initially going to
be like you just stumbled upon a car
that was parked at a rest stop that uh
was like I don't know it was just
running and its door was open and you
would pass by that and you would kind of
walk into the forest and they had
there's basically like a giant camera
crew and people who were trying to find
out who Bigfoot was and and like you
make it to their campsite and you find
that it's like all destroyed and then
the the camera crew had all been kind of
killed and like that's how you
eventually run into Bigfoot and so that
was the original concept I mean we I
think what we did is a little bit better
than that uh
but yeah a lot of the ideas just kind of
happened just naturally I think I there
Bard Tera might have been slightly
inspired by scarecrow scare The Reaping
and then car eval Carnage actually was
very heavily inspired by
um um what's the house called
uh oh my gosh Carnival graveyard I don't
know if that was the actual name of it
but there yeah so but yeah most of the
names and all that thing they were just
kind of we just came up with them I'm
sure there was influen like an unknown
bias that influenced us but like I
couldn't tell you off the top of my head
but they are
fair enough that was a great answer um
one of the other questions coming in is
will there be any haunted houses with
lights on for example the ones that were
in
backstage
so we haven't done any work it might
take a bit might not do it instantly but
I
think will'll
[Music]
maybe
um probably put the Bigfoot house in
backstage with lights on because that
house is like in one of the the the the
sprung tents or whatever that are
usually there so the Bigfoot house will
probably go there I don't know when but
we'll put it there sometime in the
future fair enough
okay cool if we step back from Halloween
a little bit then and go back to the
Roblox in general questions mhm what
inspires you to keep creating content on
Roblox as a
whole
so inspiration randomly comes and goes
right
obviously I okay we were very excited to
do I guess back to the Halloween event
we were very excited to do the Halloween
event because it had been since 2020
that we made new houses or anything like
that so we had tons of
inspiration and we were very excited to
do it and it was just like out of love
for the event and love of The Craft um
and
honestly I I think I think I've even
said this before when I've been kind of
asked about the inspiration part I don't
know if I'm normal when it comes to
inspiration in terms of like how my mind
burns out and how my mind keeps myself
motivated I I feel like a lot of people
have a lot more problems and a lot more
difficulty than I do getting myself
motivated to work on things
and I I I do take a long time sometimes
to do things but but I I I usually try
to get things done and I usually am
pretty okay with that but I think yeah I
think I answered this the last time I
was talk I talked about motivation
inspired and how not to get burned out I
don't know if I I can answer that well
because there's a lot of people who can
answer that question better and I feel
like I don't I don't really face too
much burn out
myself and yeah I don't think I could
provide a good answer to that that would
be helpful helpful uh for people but I
know there's people out there who have
answered that and um there's good tips
in uh that I've heard
so fair enough
okay so one another question from
someone is are there any other theme par
games on Roblox that you enjoy
playing
h i mean i growing into the platform
before univers un existed I really liked
Roblox Point uh it was like that was the
kind of the best park that before
Universal came around in my opinion
obviously um so I really liked Roblox
Point honestly I I I've seen a lot of
other Parks but I I haven't really
found many that like I always go back
to uh I don't know I I feel like
Universal even though I obviously have a
bias because I worked on universal
Roblox but I feel like it has a charm to
it that I haven't found in too many
theme park games
um
but yeah I mean there's like people have
made individual rides that are
Recreations off of your life that I like
I like checking out randomly
but I would yeah I wouldn't say I would
I don't go out of my way to just go to a
theme park game on Roblox anymore unless
I I like replaying Universal just to
like see what's in the game and how
people react to stuff which again it's a
probably just because of a bias that I
work on this
game fair enough yeah definitely her
Universal is one of my alltime favorite
games it's very unique as you say from
other games on the platform as well yeah
I I really enjoy it and I we we strive
to keep the quality up um obviously it
was made in
2016 and you know we have to keep
updating it to make sure it stays up to
modernish standards
so but yeah I enjoy it a lot fair enough
okay we're almost done there's only a
couple more questions to go um one
question I have for you is was Universal
Roblox your first ever theme park
project you worked on on the
platform
o uh I mean
yeah yes any like public oh no that's
not true
I had to think about it for a second um
before I did Universal
Roblox I made a haunted mansion holiday
ride um it's not public and you can't
even access it anymore because it it
broke and the sound got deleted that's
like what would have happened with our
this game too if we didn't update it but
yeah I made like a Haun Mansion holiday
I played around if anyone remembers
these I played around in the uh oh my
gosh what were they called oh no
remember like remember those servers
that you used to be able to build with
like the stamp tool and
things do do you remember the name of
what they used to call those things
welcome to Roblox builds in was the main
one it had like the build tool the it's
just Builders tools I guess
uhhuh remember when they introduced the
voxal terrain for the first time yep
they kind of looked like m c yeah the
blocky sort of feing yeah do you
remember they had servers specifically
for building in those worlds oh I can't
remember so long ago I'm trying to
remember the but basically I what I used
to do is I would take that that terrain
tool and water used to have like a
direction and a magnitude you could
apply to it so you could have like the
water flow in a certain direction I used
to make boat rides with that right and
so I build a whole boat all the Stamper
tool models attached to like some
anchored object and then delete a part
that like connected it to the anchored
object and then you'd have the whole
boat it could flow in the water and so
I'd make these boat rides that had like
sensors and triggers and it was all
through the Roblox tools right and so
I'd make boat rides I go down drops and
things and they would have block
sections and stuff so it wouldn't like
pass a certain part if it didn't reach
the sensor it it was fun but yeah I know
you're not going to see that publicly
and the water doesn't have a direction
or any of that stuff anymore so you
can't really do that
but I mean public facing that you could
still play right now yeah it's my only
one but yeah I did like internal small
things before they weren't great but
they were just like fun projects at the
time fair enough okay I have three more
questions and then that'll be all of
them um one of the questions is from
someone in the public on the Q&A and it
says is there ever a thought to have
more than one hotel in the
game
so I mean we were thinking about it and
we even had uh if you if you've seen the
hotel in real life the Adventura Hotel
uh people call it the fidget spinner
Hotel because it looks like the shape of
a fidget spinner from the sky uh but we
actually had a lot of the evur done uh
but I think we came to the conclusion
that it wouldn't really make sense to
add multiple hotels but instead we
should probably just make like a good
hotel and I'll make the argument now I
don't think sum summer Bay right now is
what we want it to be it's very Bare
Bones it's not there's not much to it
and so I think we want to go back at
some point I don't know when it's really
it's like a weird priority because
everyone wants us to make rides
obviously and Halloween events right and
people aren like oh make the hotel like
most people don't care about that but at
some point I'd like to make the hotel
way more modern maybe even have the
ability to I guess it I don't know if it
be called a hotel or like Apartments but
you it would be able to like modify the
rooms maybe have like parties or
something and I wanted to do more than
just having to be a
hotel and or and if it is just a hotel I
want it to be better than it is now and
we just we've been talking about that
for like three or four years now we just
haven't gotten around to it
so I don't know if we will have multiple
hotels
unless uh we REM we make these
apartments or whatever and we have a
bunch of different style or different
places you can have your apartments then
maybe will that there's multiple of
those but I don't know if they'll have
multiple hotels just dispersed like
Summer Bay or
whatever fair enough okay so so the
final two questions I have for you is
how do you manage a project timeline for
Universal Roblox how do you sort of plan
how you do a
rid so in terms of deadlines we pretty
much don't put a deadline on anything
except for the things that are seasonal
like the Halloween event obviously has
to have a deadline we can't really do
much about that we have to give it
enough time to where it lasts before
Halloween and it has enough time to make
the money back um and then obviously the
the holiday I guess like event has to
start at a certain day in the exact same
way the Halloween one needs to as well
um but uh for most of our projects we
don't put deadlines on things because
that typically just like that will
eventually just lead to rushed projects
and lower quality builds
and yeah I mean that might be why we
have long Windows between attractions
like yeah it do it I know that
obviously it takes a long time for us to
release things but I think we we the
majority of the time we were very
focused on the quality we want to
deliver with our rides right we don't
want to release a we we Half Bake and
just ruin because we went we tried to
rush it too much right um so we we try
very hard to not do that um um but when
it comes like if you're talking about
the actual like project timeline like
how how a project looks and how it goes
through its development cycle what
typically happens
is it starts as just writing we write
some stuff maybe draw a few random
pictures on a really really really bad
pictures like you go into paint and you
scribble a bit um we draw a few things
we're like hey what do you think about
this idea or what do you think about
this or we pull out some old patents
that haven't been used and got killed or
or have expired and we're like hey look
at these patents that this they that
could have existed in real life but
never would take they never took
advantage of or were like hey what about
this and so I think although you haven't
really seen many of the things I'm
saying right now because we've just
gotten around to starting new rides like
web Adventures finished and now a lot of
what we're doing now is original rides
that you can't find find anywhere in
real life um obviously forbidden
Adventure is pretty much the last one I
think now that is somewhat focused on
the real life ride we're still trying to
make a bunch of changes to make it our
own and make it better than the real
life one but yeah we're pretty focused
on making new rides but anyway back to
the point
um yeah so we come up with ideas we come
up with some text or whatever and we
come up like okay here's like a
potential story line for a ride what do
you think
yes no bad good whatever right and then
eventually that gets ironed out and we
then start making very rough placeholder
like objects like where things are going
to go where we think certain things will
work right and then it depends on the
type of ride it is if it's a coaster
then we make the track and we start
getting all that assembled so that we
can put the track in as soon as possible
so that senior can start being developed
around the track and modeled and we
already know where things need to go
right uh if it's a tracked ride same
thing goes right you usually want to
have the whole track layout before you
make any of the stuff and so we'll
typically have all the modelers make
that stuff they'll start developing and
then what usually happens in the
development cycle is all the scenery
like the what you see in the background
and all that gets
finished and the track is done but
nothing no it doesn't run there's no
code it's just here's the visual models
and here it it's done and then I will
eventually get to it so yeah so they the
modeling team finishes and then it gets
passed over into to me and what I do
along with the Epic twin is we install
his ride system onto it and we perfect
the animation the way we want it to look
and then once it's all animated and it
looks nice then I start adding triggers
to it and then I start making those
triggers do effects in it and that that
that sounds simple but the effects take
a lot of work right you have to depends
on what you're doing if you're doing
rigs you to make the rigs and you to
make the animations for the rigs you add
sounds lighting and it takes a lot of
time and so that part usually
takes two months once I get handed a
finished
ride
um just because like yeah I work a
full-time job outside of this so takes
me to about two months to eventually
finish a ride at the Quality I want it
um and so yeah once the effects are in
and all that starts running then
obviously you have a running ride and
then for example if you have alien
attack it has a very specific thing that
needs to be added which is the whole gun
shooting system so that was the good
thing about alien attack although it was
quote coming soon for five years what
actually happened is
Andrew and the team working on the
modeling they worked on it while I
started working on the shooting system
because I knew what like had to be done
I just needed to do it and so they were
working on modeling I was working on the
shooting system and then we kind of
finished those things at the same time
and then I jumped into the ride vehicle
system and then while we were working on
the ride system I kind of threw together
the I threw in the laser shooting system
into it and eventually we had the whole
shooting system in and the whole ride
vehicle moving but with no effects and
then I was just like shooting walls and
stuff when we were testing so yeah and
then eventually that once we finish the
effects and it's nearing completion
about 90 to
95% I typically will go and that's when
we start making all like the thumbnails
the graphics and we start writing out
the announcements that are going to be
for the that project how we're going to
announce it with dates and we come up
with everything and like if you saw the
giant development plan we had for
Halloween scare kns you guys would be
like what I think it's
like three pages long of just days we
were going to announce things and what
each announcement was
for it yeah we had all the days lined up
so that's that's what's so funny is
people were like speculating when things
would happen I think yeah before we made
a single announcement every single date
for all those announcements was planned
before we even started fa
y so yeah okay so the final question I
have for you and sort of the M drop big
question if you had the opportunity to
start this journey all over again what
would you do
different
huh that's a great
question honestly I'm pretty happy with
what we've done so far far and I like
where the game is Right obviously we're
here right now because the game has done
some somewhat well right it's a good
theme park I enjoy it we still work on
it um I think two things I probably
would
have who knows where they would have
ended up if we changed them but I I
don't really want to change much except
for two
things one I wish we had already a
better job slash fun like role playing
thing in the game uh there's a lot of
work that I I don't know how I'm going
to get to like when I'm going to
prioritize it but I wish the jobs were
better I wish there
was I
guess I I don't want to like swell a
huge update that I have like written
down but I want to make the jobs a lot
better right but then the second thing
I'd like to
change is there's not a gameplay loop at
all to our game right if if you go and
ride the rides the only reason you
really want to come back is either you
really really like the park right which
there's a good amount of people who do
but if you're a casual fan you're not
going to come back until we add a new
ride and that makes it really difficult
for this game to like fund accurately
because it doesn't make very much money
unless we do ride releases and each of
those ride releases cost money to do
and so if we had I I we have been trying
to answer this question for like I swear
five six years now what gameplay Loop
can we do and like how do we get people
to I I don't even know if it's possible
in a theme park game it's a social
environment I think we've almost done
everything we can do without ruining the
game I don't want to like introduce
something that completely changes what
the idea of the game is because it's ENT
it's supposed to be theme park and I
don't really know how else we can go
about trying to monetize the game more
than we already have without ruining it
or changing its genre so maybe I don't
actually want to change that but
nonetheless I'd like to have better jobs
but then like the whole idea then comes
like okay if I have better jobs why
would I work those jobs if there
something I can spend my uni for right
and so it's still it's this huge giant
question we always have like why work on
the jobs when we don't have a good
uniu like like a really good thing to
spend uniu on obviously we like the the
the buddies and like the the trails and
stuff but there still we're still feel
like we're missing something that you
could do with uni buug that you could
earn with better jobs but which do we
work on first do we work on that then
not have a good way to earn it or do we
make a good way to earn it and then add
it it's just like they're not going to
happen at the same time because they're
too much work there's too much work
involved but yeah I if I had to changeed
something it be figure that question out
and have it done already but yeah
hindsight is
2020 okay that's all the questions I
have so I want to give a massive thank
you for your time and joining me on this
interview um and thank you to everyone
for listening we've had a ton of
questions come through um but with that
being said do you want to add anything
extra um well no think thanks for
listening to this I I I do enjoy talking
about how the game came to be and and
all the proc the development process CU
there's obviously tons of things that
happen in the background that a lot of
people don't know about and no I I enjoy
I enjoy talking about it because we
don't really get to talk about it to too
many people but it it's fun so um I hope
everyone enjoyed it and I hope everyone
keep sticking around we have some cool
cool things planned for the future um
yeah I'd love to just like tell
everybody but then that kind of defeats
the whole surprise aspect so I hope you
guys stick around we have some cool
stuff on the on the
horizon cool okay so thank you everyone
for joining us on this Q&A and that's it
for the Q&A so don't forget to keep
looking on the event site and there may
be another one very soon so with that
being said thank you for joining us and
I'll see you all later bye thanks guys
byebye