Former Square Enix exec says viral Roblox hit Grow a Garden is "somewhat evil": "Do you wanna pay to grow this faster? Do you wanna pay to steal this from someone's garden?"

Roblox, in all its blocky dominance, can host games within games that sometimes attract more players than AAA publishers. One such example is Grow a Garden, an idle farming sim that once managed to attract a whopping 21 million concurrent players, but a former Square Enix executive thinks it's "somewhat evil" nonetheless.

Square Enix's ex-exec Jacob Navok recently sat down on The Game Business show to talk about the state of the industry, and one topic that came up was the over-monetization of recent games. You probably know what I mean - the shops and marketplaces that pop up the minute you open almost any big, free-to-play release.

"At least on Roblox, you're able to set price points," Novak says. "Like, Grow a Garden is somewhat evil. I went in and played it for several hours. It's, like, 'Do you wanna pay to grow this faster? Do you want to pay to steal from someone else's garden? Feel free to throw us money and we will let you win this game incredibly fast.'"

Novak continues to say that it's a business model "incredibly similar" to how some mobile games operate. "And, by the way, [that] edge is not dissimilar to gambling. If you look at a lot of these mobile games, that’s the way they look."

The problem is compounded by the fact that Roblox's user base is predominantly made up of kids who are likely being introduced to features that are only a couple of steps away from literal gambling, though it's not the first time Roblox has been criticized for its potential exploitation of children.

Roblox CEO tells concerned parents not to "let your kids be on Roblox" even if it "sounds a little counter-intuitive"