Long time ROBLOX user Nexx recently launched ROBLOXReviews.com, a website that compiles and sorts user-based reviews of ROBLOX games.  Riffing off of ROBLOXHQ.com, a legacy ROBLOX game reviews site that is no longer running, ROBLOX Reviews features compiled lists of reviews from a wide range of users–each “reviewer” can earn “respect” points by submitting reviews that users find helpful.

The front page of ROBLOX Reviews is a compilation of popular games on ROBLOX–scrolling over each of the titles gives you the option to read user-submitted reviews about the game, or play the game itself (which transports you back to ROBLOX.com). The algorithm that generates what games populate the front page of ROBLOX Reviews is much different than ours–Nexx’s is based off of what people think is good, while ours is based off of what people are playing in that specific instance.

Creative Director John Shedletsky ran an experiment to see how Nexx’s sorting system differs from ours. What’d you find John?

Nexx gave me the top 100 places from ROBLOX Reviews (as of last Thursday). Over this past weekend, we ran an A/B test. Most players got the “A” version of the Games page, which is the same old Games page we’re all used to that sorts games based on “Relevance” to a user. A small percentage of players got the “B” version of the Games page, in which the games were sorted in the order they rank on ROBLOX Reviews.

I analyzed the behavior of the “B” players vs. the “A” players. The good news was that the “B” players were slightly more likely to return to ROBLOX the next day to play more games (presumably because the ROBLOX Reviews sort had slightly more fun games). Surprisingly, the “B” players also built slightly more – publishing 1.4% more places over the weekend than the “A” players. Maybe this is because the ROBLOX Reviews’ levels are slightly more inspirational than the “A” games. However, ROBLOX Reviews was not the clear winner. “B” players made fewer friends (-1%) and participated in the forum 12.1% less, which is a surprisingly high number. (Maybe they were too busy playing games?) 

Improving the game sort is extremely important to us, but it’s a huge project–ROBLOX and ROBLOX Reviews will continue to work on this moving forward. 

Games are judged in a very formal way. The “Overall Score” is a median of three factors: “Originality”, “Detail” and “Fun”. The reviews are also very concise if you choose to read them–they’re sorted into three sections aptly titled “The Good”, “The Bad” and “Overall”. The site borrows common tropes emerging websites, offering not just one opinion, but an open forum populated by multiple opinions, leaving spectators with a wide range of different perspectives. It’s interesting to see how divided the reviews are, though the review that matches the sentiment of most users is usually the one that gets Respect points.

The site also tracks how the games are being rated throughout different time periods–if you jump over to any given games’ page, you’ll see how the game has been scoring “This Month”, “This Week”, and you’ll also see an  “All Time” score, which is a compilation of every review ever submitted to the site. Each of these rankings are on a 1-100% scale.

Nexx also went out of his way to make logging in and participating simple–you can create an account using your ROBLOX user name (do NOT use your ROBLOX password for any website outside of ROBLOX). Once logged in, you can keep tabs on your ROBLOX Reviews profile, which documents the amount of reviews you’ve submitted, and the amount of respect that you’ve earned. The site will also automatically port your ROBLOX profile data–including the games you’ve made, and your avatar–to your ROBLOX Reviews profile.

“The idea is that anyone, whatever age, can write a review if they want to,” says Nexx in an interview. “We want this to be open to everyone, regardless of age. The people submitting these reviews are passionate users that really care about the quality of ROBLOX games.”

There are downsides involved in creating an open-submission system, and Nexx is well aware of that. That’s why ROBLOX Reviews has a moderation team that ensures that users aren’t making accounts in order to promote games they recently published on ROBLOX. The team also catches and removes “Spam Reviews”, where people create a review with a favorable headline, then use the page to promote their game or spam malicious links.

ROBLOX Reviews has been out for a little over a week, and already it’s gaining traction. The site is averaging 5,000 pageviews a day, already has over 1,000 registered users, and has posted 734 reviews at the time of this writing. Those are impressive numbers, especially considering that Nexx is a self-taught web designer.

“I loved looking at reviews of games that I put on ROBLOX,” recalls Nexx. “And I also liked learning more and more about web design. One day, the idea just clicked.”