DS has started playing Roblox, is it safe??

[paulinesmithson]

My son (8) has recently enjoyed using his iPad screen time to play this game called Roblox. I have heard of it before and I thought it looked like a fun game, but I'm not too keen on the idea of him being able to interact with lots of other people online as he's still quite young.
Any other parents had any experience with this game? Is it ok for an 8 year old?

Apparently there’s a way of fixing settings so only friends can chat.. my friends daughter was playing recently and the chat was rolling and someone asked “what are you wearing “ urg!! I know this because her mum was braiding her hair at the time.. and read it herself

Denise from Loose Women was saying how you can turn the social part of the app off. She said that her son had people messaging him on the app telling him to go into her purse to get her bank card.

I'm scared he will accept friend requests from random people, is this chat feature just for his real-life friends?

Oh gosh! I'm scared of that happening. I'll find a way to stop him from getting messages on there.

Plenty of other good games without these risks. It's a no from me.

www.commonsensemedia.org/website-reviews/roblox

Common Sense Media is always helpful.

On the main page go into settings and you can block the chat and friend requests.

You still need to keep an eye on what he's playing though. My dd was playing one of the Roblox games where you spray paint on a wall and then other players rate your 'art' One person drew a dick and another wrote cunt 🤨

This is how my year two class started playing Squid Games in the playground. They had played on Roblox. As the games are created by the users you do have to keep an eye on what they are doing. It's not like a game that you buy.

Oh that's horrible some of the people on these kind of apps shock me. I don't want ds repeating any of the things he hears on there because he thinks it's funny

My DH set it up as a child account for our ds, it's linked to an app on his phone as parent account so he can see friend requests etc and he has chat turned off

However, the content is not well filtered and although we have some sort of security on it (ds moans he can't play some games because it's not allowed somehow) there are sometimes games which other users make that are not appropriately themed and get through censor

My son plays it on Xbox

I hate it but it's so popular, I only let him play Roblox if I am in the room too just in case

Bee simulator is quite harmless, and he plays one about mixing potions

Same boat, OP - DS8 has been trying to arrange to meet classmates on Roblox, which he sometimes plays on my mum's Kindle. I tried to help him find them as I was worried about randoms, and something about it instinctively makes me uncomfortable. I think deleting it might be the way to go.

There are lots of settings that can help make it safer, like restricting who can chat or join games. Some games are more suitable than others, so checking what your child is playing is a good idea. I follow Roblox Insider for updates on safety features and new games—it's useful for knowing what's going on. Keeping an open conversation with your child about their experiences helps a lot too.