Turns out that specific “oof” belongs to a sound designer who originally created the noise for the noughties game Messiah. Now, the Roblox Corporation plan on charging for the noise. Oof.
As reported by VentureBeat, the CEO of Intellivision, Tommy Tallarico only discovered last year that this “oof” was something he made. Rather than giving them some sort of cease and desist, he instead went into talks with Roblox. Now, they’ve settled the dispute, and everyone’s a winner! … Except for the players, who’ll need to pay 100 Robux (which is equivalent to about a $1) to license it. To clarify, not every player who wants to make that noise upon their timely demise will have to pay for it. Roblox is as much a development tool as it is a game, allowing players to actually make their own games within it. These developers are the ones that will have to buy the sound to use in their creations. To get a better idea of how vast Roblox is, Alex Wiltshire wrote about the various games you can play inside it - from CS:GO clones to fashion shows. Does this not sit well with anyone else? Or is it just me? I don’t like that Roblox Corp aren’t just paying to have the sound effect in the game, instead they’re putting it on individual creators (a lot of whom, I gather, are kids). What a wild turn of events. Just this morning I watched an Unus Annus video (a YouTube channel run by Markiplier and CrankGameplays) that used this sound clip multiple times. I knew it had to come from somewhere, but Roblox (or not, apparently)? Who’da thought? I suppose now content creators like them would have to pay for the sound effect, too? (Not that it actually matters anymore for Unus Annus, because they’re deleting their entire channel on Saturday - but that’s a whole other thing.)
