Roblox Taps Kodansha and Others for Massive New Licensing Push—Anime IPs Now Coming to Creators

Roblox is stepping up its game—not by building new worlds, but by making it easier for others to build with officially licensed IPs. The platform has just launched a new licensing system, and one of its headline partners is Kodansha, publisher of some of the most influential manga and anime titles in the world.

Alongside Netflix, Lionsgate, and SEGA, Kodansha is one of four launch collaborators for this new system, which aims to make IP licensing faster, broader, and far more accessible for independent game creators.

From Months to Hours

The centerpiece of this move is the Roblox License Manager and its accompanying Licenses Catalog. Instead of negotiating complex IP deals behind closed doors, rights holders can now define terms and publish licenses directly through Roblox, allowing verified creators to secure those rights in hours instead of months.

Creators will get access to licensed IPs, while publishers like Kodansha will automatically track usage, manage revenue splits, and customize conditions like maturity levels and allowed content types.

This isn’t just a quality-of-life update—it’s a structural change that could make licensed content far more common across Roblox games.

Blue Lock and Slime Are Just the Beginning

For now, Blue Lock and That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime are Kodansha’s first contributions to the Roblox license catalog. The announcement didn’t confirm a date, but both titles are listed as “coming soon.”

Kodansha CEO Yoshinobu Noma said the partnership gives creators new tools to explore Kodansha’s stories in interactive ways and helps the publisher build deeper connections with fans globally. He framed it as part of their larger mission to “inspire impossible stories.”

A Bigger Bet on Roblox

Kodansha’s involvement in Roblox has been steadily growing. Last year, it backed a $1.5 million Attack on Titan game dev contest with support from GeekOut, and earlier this month, it announced the launch of ROBMIX—a label formed with Dentsu and GeekOut to develop new IPs on the platform and nurture next-gen creators.

This isn’t a one-off licensing experiment—it’s part of a larger strategy.

The Future of Fan-Built Worlds?

Roblox already has a large number of anime-inspired titles made by fans, often without official approval. Games based on Naruto, Jujutsu Kaisen, and One Piece have drawn millions of players. But now, licensed content is becoming more feasible—and more profitable—for everyone involved.

Official anime tie-ins aren’t unheard of either. My Hero Academia Battlegrounds was built with support from Crunchyroll and Toho, and One Piece Grand Arena brought more legitimacy to the platform. Meanwhile, Toei Animation has been trying similar moves with its CG film HYPERGALACTIC via licensing firm Spaceport, targeting both Roblox and Fortnite.

This latest rollout from Roblox, which now averages 97.8 million daily users, signals a bigger shift: not just playing in anime worlds—but being allowed to build them, too.

_{Source: Roblox Newsroom}