The Roblox Algorithm Explained Like You're 5 Years Old transcript

Guys, this is going to be how the Roblox algorithm works, specifically the home recommendation algorithm, explained like you're 5 years old. So, I'm going to try to really simplify this for you, okay? This video might piss a lot of people off cuz there's a lot of debate for some reason on how this algorithm works, but I'm going to take a very objective perspective and just chop this up for you guys, so there's no longer ambiguity on why your game doesn't hit algo or why it dies, how much you should spend on ads, how often should you run ads?

All of those questions I'm going to answer to the best of my ability in this video. Also, thanks for the love on the previous videos. First things first, you have a game, right? You want to launch a game. Cool. Now, how do you actually get in the algo? The first thing you need is traffic to your game. What is traffic? Now, again, this might seem stupid simple, but what's the title of this video? Explain like you're 5 years old.

Okay. What is traffic? Most common one is people run Roblox ads, okay? Another one that you can do, if you have no money to run ads, is you can post short-form content, okay? You've seen clips all over TikTok talking about this new Roblox game XYZ allows you to do ABC, okay? YouTube shorts, there's also a method that you can use, which is free UGC. I don't know a [ __ ] about this one, but it's interesting. I might do some research and make a video on this one.

Comment below if you want to see some sauce on that cuz I need to learn that myself personally, okay? But, the TLDR is you want to launch a game, you have your game, the first thing you need is traffic, okay? So, what happens is you have a brand new game, okay? It has zero visits. Let's say, most common method, you run Roblox ads, okay? What happens when you start running Roblox ads? Well, this is from the official Roblox documentation, okay?

Nothing in this video is going to be just pulled out of my ass. It's going to be from Roblox official documentation, which some people don't trust, dude. I don't [ __ ] understand why. Okay? You guys need to understand, I'm going to go on a quick tangent, I'm going to wrap it back up. Is Roblox is a business that thrives on creator-made content. So, why would they ever gatekeep how their algorithm works? They want you to succeed.

They're looking for the next Steel of Brain Rot. They're looking for the next Grow a Garden, because that's what makes them money. So, they are radically transparent with how their algorithm works. Tangent over. Back to this. You launch ads, you get initial data. Okay? This is a screenshot from the official documentation. Okay? What Roblox is going to do is it's going to look at the initial data. Now, we're talking about I mean, all of the metrics.

Okay? We're talking about average play time. D1, okay? D7, like I don't even know why I'm typing these out. Like, you guys should know this [ __ ] Monetization, okay? So, average revenue per paying user. Okay? Conversion rate. All that [ __ ] They look at all of this [ __ ] from your initial players from ads. Okay? Now, here's something someone also never told me. Is Roblox just released this feature. And again, a lot of this video is just going over [ __ ] that's public on the internet, but people just don't do their own research.

So, I'm trying to consolidate it into a simple video for you guys. There's this feature called beta mode. Okay? What does beta mode do? From my understanding, what beta mode does is it will prevent Okay, it actually says it here. While in beta mode, your experience will not be shown in home recommendations. Okay? So, if you want to launch a game and get it in algo with the best stats possible, it might be worthwhile turning your game turning your game into beta mode.

That's what I'm doing with my current game here. Okay? Beta mode basically prevents the algo from showing your game in the home page. All right. Now, let's We're getting off topic. Let's go back to this. You launch ads, you get the initial data, Roblox is going to look at these following metrics. Okay? Just as like soft signals, just to kind of get a gauge like, "Hey, how well is this game doing?" Okay? It's pretty much the only time it will really pull data from your ads traffic for the most part, for my understanding.

Okay? Not always true. I'll get into it in a second. Okay? Then, what's going to happen is Roblox is going to be like, "Okay, we kind of now have a feel for what this game is, what genre it is, what kind of players play it, you know, based on the data they collected." Okay? Mind you, the players that come from ads are nowhere near the same as the players that come from home algo. Cuz home algo is players that are your specific audience.

They're more likely to engage, they spend more, higher D1, higher D7, higher play time. You guys have seen this, right? But don't be freaked out if you launch a game and you have low stats initially. It's because this is cold traffic. Cold traffic just basically means, and you have to think about how the ads actually work is Roblox ads optimize for the cheapest possible player to your game. Okay? This is not the most qualified player to your game.

This is the cheapest possible player to get to your game. That's why you guys see like you can get players to your game for fractions of cents. But they're not qualified. So, don't freak out if you launch a game and you see what looks like a bunch of bots just standing in the [ __ ] lobby. Like, dude, I've seen it. Okay? But what they'll do is they'll see out of all these players they're sending you, which ones are actually engaging?

Okay? And then, they'll start to use those signals, from my understanding, okay, to rank you against let's just say broadly the genre as a whole, okay? Now, what's interesting, and I'm going to call out some [ __ ] creators real quick, and I've seen this in a ton of Roblox videos, is people will look at their stats, and I want to show you guys something, okay? Can you see here where it says experiences with similar players?

Okay? I'll see a lot of YouTubers they'll go like this. They don't even explain it, okay? They'll just be like, yeah, this is my my game, look at the stats, you know, mostly green here, and uh yeah, we're crushing, but we only have 100 CCU, why is that? Okay, that's because this is how my game Farmer Die compares to the survival genre as a whole. It's It's not that terrible, right? But when I look at Farmer Die versus games that have players that are my exact target audience, you'll see all my stats go down, okay?

So, keep that in mind when you're watching YouTubers, take note of what they're actually selecting here, okay? Now, what they're going to do is first and foremost, they're going to rank you across the entire genre. This video might be longer than I expected, by the way, cuz I just want to get this out there, okay? Now, initially all your stats might be green, you're like, dude, we're [ __ ] crushing it, and this is what happened with Farmer Die.

Like, when we first launched, dude, most, if not all these stats, were green. We didn't have D7 retention yet, because the game had been out for like 2 days. So, we're like, oh, we're going to [ __ ] crush, right? But what starts to happen is after Roblox basically says, okay, we're going to now compare you to every game in the survival genre, they start to get even more data, okay? This is when the algo kicks in. Now, how long does it take for the algo to kick in?

Honestly, the faster you can feed it data at this stage, the faster you'll get into algo. This is why, in my opinion, you've seen games absolutely explode in like 2 or 3 days, cuz it's usually big studios that have deep pockets. They can spend like 10 grand in a day just to get pumped it with data. Now, before they even pump it with data, they've probably been What have they been doing? They've probably been testing in beta mode.

So, they are optimizing their game for better stats. Every single one of these stats, they make better and better and better and better. So, by the time they turn off beta mode and they they tell Roblox, "Hey, we are ready to go to algorithm." They've already optimized all these stats using ad traffic only. And then when they start getting ranked, dude, they explode cuz they've already optimized all their metrics. Okay?

So, what happens next? You get your initial data. They rank you against the genre as a whole. Okay? And then what they're going to do is they're going to have even more data now, so they're going to start to see, okay, people that are playing your game, they're also playing these other games. They're going to rank you against games that have your exact audience. Okay? And they make this [ __ ] cut and dry, dude. Like, let me show you guys this.

If I go to analytics acquisition, home recommendations, right? This is for Farmer Dyz. Benchmark experiences with similar players. Okay? This is exactly my competition. They make it so cut and dry. They're basically saying, "Hey Tizzy, how does your game stack up against other games that your players also play?" And they'll tell you, dude. And that's when your stats will probably start to take a [ __ ] Okay? [laughter] So, let me explain something to you guys cuz a lot of people are like, "Why does my game die?" Cuz it starts off good.

You know, Farmer Dyz, we even peaked at 2K CCU. And then it [ __ ] died, right? Cuz initially, dude, what happened with Farmer Dyz is like, we were crushing our competitors. And then came in other games with way better stats, and they stole our players. and that's just how it works. It's a winner-takes-all economy for the most part, okay? I want to break down the algo in a simple analogy like you're 5 years old. I want you guys to think of a farmers market.

Okay? What's a farmers market? Well, if you ever been to one, you know, they sell oranges, maybe pineapples, watermelons, whatever. Think of this as let's say the survival genre farmers market, okay? Who's at the first line? 99 Nights in the Forest, then you have Baker Die hovering around 30K CCU these days. 100 Days at Sea is around like 4K CCU. You have the simulation genre, right? Steal a Brain, Grow a Garden, you know, Kick a Lucky Block.

Those ones are, you know, also honorable mentions, but I just put some of the OGs in there for example's sake. So, what happens? Is Roblox has let's say, for example's sake, 10,000 players that are going to go to the survival genre market. Now, this specifically is the home algo survival genre market, okay? This is the entrance to the market, and if you guys know anything about, you know, business psychology or like placement of where your business is in terms of where people actually walk, whoever is at the front of the line usually gets the most eyeballs, okay?

So, Roblox is like, "Okay, we have 10,000 people coming to the survival genre farmers market today. Who do we want to show them first? Which game do we want them to see first?" It's obviously going to be something like 99 Nights in the Forest. Why? It has the best stats, high retention, good monetization. They know that thing makes them money, so they're keeping it in their farmers market. They also have Baker Die, which is second, and then, for example, 100 Days at Sea, which is third.

These are just examples, okay? So, this is the survival genre market. Now, what's interesting about the algo is it won't always be like the survival genre market won't just be games in the survival genre. It could be adjacent games like, you know, survive 99 days from robots that is mostly a survival game, but maybe it has some RPG elements, okay? So, what I mean by that is like these games aren't exact copies of Farmer Dairy.

You guys need to understand that. They just have similar game loops, similar mechanics, okay? Like Dead Meals Cook or Die, I have Farmer Dairy, Baker Dairy was on here for a while, okay? Even Alien Ranch was on here for a while, okay? Now, what you guys need to understand is if your game starts dying, just run more ads can be some of the worst advice, mostly, okay? And here's why. Remember this farmers market analogy.

When you're running ads, you're basically competing in a whole separate market, okay? Because Roblox, apart from the initial data collection, does not use data from your players ads to further push you in the home algo, for the most part. There's a caveat which I'm going to get into. Okay, so if your game's dying and someone's like, "Hey, just spend more money on ads." That's a bad advice. Why is that bad advice? Because you guys notice here, this is the home algo market, right?

Farmer Dairy is not on here. If I wanted to get Farmer Dairy on here and someone told me run more ads, I'm thinking, "Oh, I'll just run ads and I'll get Farmer Dairy on here, right?" Oh, boom, there's Farmer Dairy. Now I'm in the home algo cuz I'm running ads. That's not how it works. Why? Because these are two separate farmers markets, okay? This is the sponsored ads market. This is the home algo market. I can run ads and get in the sponsored ads market, but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to get in the home algo market.

Why? Because Roblox is always trying to determine should we put Farmer Die closer to the entrance in the home algo market so more people can see it? And when they're asking themselves that question, they're looking at your stats. Okay? So, if you start running ads and you haven't updated your game that improve any of your stats, and again, this might be self-explanatory to some of you experienced devs, but what's the title of this video?

Explain like you're 5 years old. Okay? If you do not make updates that improve your stats, it's not going to do anything if you run ads, dude. Okay? You need to make updates that make a meaningful improvement to your game. So, what I would do is don't just look here, bro. Okay? Don't just look at your overview. I can't tell you how crazy it is to me that this is a common misconception that these stats don't really mean [ __ ] when it comes to getting the algo.

You want to go to acquisition, home recommendations. Okay? Click this [ __ ] tab right here. Scroll down and they will tell you cut and dry, "Hey, this is how your QPTR looks in comparison to other games that have your player base. Deep play through rate, 7-day playtime per user, 7-day play days per user. The only reason I think Farmer Die is even still live is because we have a very high intentional co-play. The game was designed to be played co-op.

And you can see we're way above benchmark. Okay? We have low mono. I mean, all of our stats are low besides this. That's why I think it is barely surviving. So, if you want to get into algo, you simply need to improve your stats. Like dude, it's so self-explanatory. But this is kind of the process I would take. Is like I would again, this is long if you've already lost me, I don't know, it's your [ __ ] fault, dude. I'm giving you literally free information, so suck it.

So, this is what I would do, bro. Okay? To get my game improved. Run ads, okay? Then you're going to look at these stats. Okay? Then Roblox will start to hit algo. Then what are you going to do? You're again going to look at these stats, okay? Now what you're going to do though is look at your worst stat. Let's say it's D1 cuz we all have [ __ ] retention problems. Farmer Die has shitty retention. So let's say it's D1.

Okay, now just make an update, a meaningful update that's going to improve D1. Okay? Now that you've made that update that's going to improve D1, now it makes sense to run ads to get even more players. Okay? Run ads. Why? Why would I run ads again after I've already hit algo? Because I just made a meaningful update and I want to collect again more initial data so that way Roblox has more data and they can be like, "Wait, you know, Farmer Die, actually they improved their D1.

Maybe they do it deserve a spot here. Maybe we should give them some more [ __ ] eyeballs." And now I'm getting traffic and now I let's say I update play time. They're like, "Okay, cool. Play time's up, dude. Now you're beating this game." Oh, let's say I improve D7. They're like, "Okay, cool. Now you're in the second spot, right?" And then one day, boom. This is going to be me one day. I'm just [ __ ] trolling. But maybe I'm not.

Anyways, that's how the algo works from my understanding. If you disagree, let me know in the comments below. Let's have a [ __ ] argument about it. I don't give a [ __ ] dude. This is what I wish someone told me from the beginning. So, you can definitely run more ads, dude, but it only makes sense to run ads after you've made meaningful updates. And honestly, if you're already getting a ton of traffic from the algo, you don't have to keep starting and stopping and running ads because Roblox will keep using that new data.

They use a 7-day window of data, okay? So, if you push a huge update, don't freak out if your stats don't drastically improve the next day, okay? Or you don't all of a sudden get tons of new players the next day because they use a rolling 7-day window, which I can explain in a later video if you don't understand what that means. Just let me know in the comments below. But yeah, man. Yap sesh over. Um honestly, this just fired me up cuz I see this [ __ ] all over.

People are just like, "Yeah, I spend a [ __ ] thousand bucks a month on ads, and I'm still not on algo." And the reason is cuz you're not updating your game to improve the stats. So, TLDR is [ __ ] improve your game. That's it. Peace.