One of the most surprising trends in gaming during the COVID-19 pandemic has been the popularity of virtual concerts, from Epic's Fortnite debuting massive in-game concerts from the likes of Travis Scott, Anderson .Paak, and Marshmello, to the likes of Japanese MMOs hosting idol concerts like Phantasy Star Online 2's Hatsune Miku performance. While this is nothing new for MMO games, Roblox has jumped in on the trend hosting a concert from American rapper/songwriter Lil Nas X.
Montero Lamar Hill, or Lil Nas X, is a hip-hop artist who first grew to popularity in 2019 when his track "Old Town Road" became a viral sensation. The track inspired a collaborative remix between the rapper and famous country singer Billy Ray Cyrus, which went on to achieve diamond certification from the Recording Industry Association of America in October 19th after spending 19 weeks at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 music charts.
Lil Nas X's performance comes after a huge surge in popularity for Roblox due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this year, the player-base for Roblox grew to over 150 million monthly users, with some of the game's servers such as the mini-game Adopt Me! jumping to over 1.6 million concurrent players, with over 10 billion visits.
Lil Nas X's performance opens with the artist welcoming the event in the form of a standard Roblox avatar, before opening with "Old Town Road (Remix)," transforming the stage into a set inspired by the song's music video and becoming a fully animated character. Following this is a performance of Rodeo with another stage inspired by the track's music video, which transitions into "Panini," also from Lil Nas X's 2019 7 EP album. Finally, the concert ends with a performance of the artist's newest song "Holiday," which changes the stage into a huge open arena, full of treadmills traversing the players around the stage. Each of the songs were censored due to the game's E10+ ESRB rating.
The Lil Nas X Roblox concert first took place on Saturday November 14th, followed by two on Sunday November 15th. Players who attended the concert were rewarded with Lil Nas X branded in-game items. Given that over 27 million players participated in Fortnite's Travis Scott performances over this summer, it's likely that these performances were largely successful for Roblox, meaning fans should look forward to more in-game concerts in the coming weeks and months.
Recently Roblox also revealed that its iconic "Oof" sound effect will now be a microtransaction, as the sound's original composer, Tommy Tallarico of Earthworm Jim and Video Games Live fame, originally composed the sound for the 2000 game Messiah and won a copyright dispute with Roblox Corporation. The sound now costs $1 and has been replaced by a new death sound in the game.
Roblox is available on Android, PC, iOS, macOS, and Xbox One.