Roblox has video games once more | The Verge

Roblox is making a delicate however notable change. After swapping the phrase “game” for “experience” throughout its web site and cellular apps in 2021 whereas the Epic Games v. Apple trial was going down, Roblox is getting extra comfy with utilizing the time period “games” as soon as once more.

“Over time, we’ve learned that ‘experiences’ isn’t an intuitive term for many parents, older players, and game developers,” Roblox spokesperson Juliet Chaitin-Lefcourt tells The Verge. “‘Games’ is clearer and better reflects what Roblox is and where we’re going.”

One of the Epic v. Apple trial’s main factors was making an attempt to outline what a sport is. Roblox sits in a little bit of a center floor: whereas the app itself just isn’t a sport, it permits customers to create gamelike experiences that different customers can work together with. During the trial, an Apple government testified that Roblox shouldn’t be seen as a sport, which was really form of an enormous deal; if Roblox was seen as a sport by Apple, it could have needed to adhere to guidelines that will have made sustaining its iOS app prohibitively tough.

As the trial went on, although, Roblox shifted from utilizing the time period “games” to “experiences.” The distinction between the 2 was form of an enormous deal on the time; firms like Roblox and Epic had been making an attempt to characterize their platforms as metaverses, and Roblox informed The Verge that the time period “experiences” higher represents “the wide range of 3D immersive places” on the platform. It may additionally have been a transfer to attempt to guarantee that the app wouldn’t be seen as a sport by Apple.

Roblox hasn’t utterly moved on from the time period “experiences.” Its App Store description nonetheless primarily options the time period. But Roblox’s homepage is exhibiting me a piece for “standout games,” and a Roblox website for developers I discovered incorporates a bunch of cases of the phrase “games.”

It’s not the one notable language shift from Roblox as of late; the corporate renamed “friends” to “connections” in 2025, however now it’s switched back to friends, too.