MPS
A fast-paced multiplayer soccer game with 50+ real life teams.
August 2021 — December 2023
View GameTech Stack
Lua
JavaScript
JSON
RBLX Studio
Entrepreneurship
Problem
There was a lack of fast-paced soccer games with realistic mechanics on Roblox at the time, and I wanted to create a fun and competitive soccer experience for players on the platform. I also wanted to build a community around the game where players could connect and compete with each other.
Key Features
Challenges
Scaling for High Player Counts
This was a small project I worked on in Sophomore year in high school, it unexpectedly gained attention from the soccer community and turned into a fan favorite. This also meant I had to optimize the game further, making it smoother for long-term gaming.
Nature of Sports Games: Limited Updates
Sports games often have limited opportunities for new content and updates, which can make it challenging to keep players engaged over time. This required careful planning and creativity to introduce meaningful updates that kept the game fresh and exciting.
Staff Employment
There was a need to grow the administration team when the player count grew and moderations for reports by users were needed. Initially, close friends accompanied me to help deal with moderations, but I eventually built it into a stable work enviornment.
Tradeoffs
Solo Development vs Team
The game started as a solo project, and I continued to develop it mostly on my own. While this allowed for a consistent vision and faster decision-making, it also meant that the development process was more time-consuming and limited in terms of expertise. As the game grew, I had to bring on staff to help with moderation and community management, but the core development remained solo.
Monetization vs Player Experience
I chose to monetize the game through various methods, such as microtransactions. While this generated significant revenue, I had to be careful to balance monetization with player experience to avoid making the game feel pay-to-win or alienating players who didn't want to spend money. I focused on creating a fair and enjoyable experience for all players while still offering optional purchases for those who wanted to support the game.
Performance vs Visuals
Soccer is played on a large field with many players, which can lead to performance issues, especially on lower-end devices. I had to make tradeoffs between visual fidelity and performance to ensure the game ran smoothly for a wide range of players. This involved optimizing assets, simplifying certain visual effects, and making design choices that prioritized gameplay performance while still maintaining an engaging visual style.
Outcome
MPS has reached great heights, at times hitting around 500,000 monthly players and a few thousand concurrent users at peak hours. The revenue from it ended up paying for my university tuition, which is something I'm still grateful for. What mattered just as much was the community that formed around it. MPS became a starting point for a lot of the soccer titles that came after on Roblox, and seeing other developers build on the genre of soccer games was honestly one of the coolest parts of the whole experience. Working on the game taught me a lot, everything from gameplay design and scaling servers to handling feedback and managing a large player base. It was my first real exposure to building and maintaining a product that people around the world actually used, and it shaped a lot of how I approach projects today.
— Montasir