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Unity will become paid for players and developers (Read 150704 times)

Started by Basara Lapis, September 13, 2023, 04:17:17 pm
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Basara Lapis

Unity will become paid for players and developers
#1  September 13, 2023, 04:17:17 pm
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You know Unity, the game developer who served as base for a lot of indie games and even for some big companies. Well, now won't be free and you as user or developer... you'll have to pay :tough:

The Verge said:
Popular video game engine Unity is making big changes to its pricing structure that’s causing confusion and anger among developers. On Tuesday, Unity announced that on January 1st, 2024, it would be implementing a pay-per-download pricing scheme that would charge developers a flat fee any time a game using Unity software is installed.

“We are introducing a Unity Runtime Fee that is based upon each time a qualifying game is downloaded by an end user,” the company shared on its blog. “We chose this because each time a game is downloaded, the Unity Runtime is also installed. Also we believe that an initial install-based fee allows creators to keep the ongoing financial gains from player engagement, unlike a revenue share.”


The changes will be effective on January 1st, 2024... and the indie developers are more than angry for that, most of them will stop to get their games on Steam, put their projects into dev hell until they find a better platform, boicot Unity... or all of them, just look the tendence on Twitter/X. This is a bad day for indie gaming, if you ask me...

https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/12/23870547/unit-price-change-game-development
https://www.eurogamer.net/unity-reveals-plans-to-charge-per-game-install-drawing-criticism-from-development-community
https://dev.to/godot/unity-new-pricing-in-2024-is-crazy-3hnn

Rest in peace, Toriyama-san...
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Trololo

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#2  September 13, 2023, 04:33:46 pm
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OK, I can get Unity starting to take the money like that for previously free users. It's sad, it's bad, but I can get that. I'm a little bit more baffled at this system being applied to Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise. I remind you, these are PAID bundles. Even if it's 15 cents per month at max, I find it a bit swinish to take money for something people not just have paid for, but CONTINUOUSLY paying for.
P.S.: Viva La Torrents, I guess. If they want to take money for downloads, then people are bound to find the ways to distribute the games (and to get paid for it) without said download control. It won't be comfortable and it might lead to problems with Unity holders, but it's internet.
Last Edit: September 13, 2023, 04:36:58 pm by Trololo

EgyLynx

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#3  September 13, 2023, 04:59:58 pm
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What the Vejita! Past it was not that like...
There are word what i think this.
Hey, can i help, or maybe i need help

Flowrellik

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#4  September 14, 2023, 01:12:43 am
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And just like that, Godot and Unreal sound a whole lot better to experiment with..
This is just getting stupid now. All of this feels like one big scam to me, because even if it's in the lower cent region, you could be at risk losing a lot of money, regardless of being a game dev or let alone an actual unity user for practice, casual hobby, even modding. I don't know what the hell they are thinking, but they better think twice before implementing something stupid like this, because this is how you lose a LOT of fans, consumers, and developers.
 Example: Say you decide to get something out as a game, even as early access, people buy it and install it, and you used Unity plus or basic for it.
For every person say 500,000 people download and install your project, you have to pay up .20 cents per install

500,000 X .20 cents (The monthly standard for Unity Plus/Basic)  = $100,000 out of YOUR pocket per install. And that's just the standard.

Add in the factor of the emerging market for say newly developed indie groups and you would be losing a hell of a lot more out of pocket PLUS Standard rates. Imagine getting about a million installs and having to lose $200,000 out of YOUR pocket. This will making the development of new upcoming indie companies be a hell of a lot harder, along with placing pressure on existing companies using this tool. It's like taking Blender 3D that's been FREE TO USE for life, and all of a sudden decide to start placing overexpensive subscription fees just to use the bare basics.

It is simply a cutthroat tactic at hindsight, and I can honestly see the backlash placed on this. This is what happens when you place a snake who was the EX-President of Electronic Arts as head CEO.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Riccitiello

My apologies if this rant can be nerve racking, but this is just too much to bottle up.

Macaulyn97

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#5  September 14, 2023, 01:26:44 am
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I'm quite worried about how they think they know how many times we install our games. Their response on Twitter when it comes to people abusing this to make small developers pay more than they earn with games (you know, by using bots to install and uninstall them over and over) was basically "Trust us, bro", which somehow doesn't reassure me. Like, if they can detect installations on our computers, that means they have spyware in the engine, right?

Flowrellik

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#6  September 14, 2023, 01:32:17 am
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Given the current CEO, I would not find that hard to believe at this point. All this because that guy sold 200,000 shares.
In the end it's all about the money..

Macaulyn97

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#7  September 14, 2023, 02:37:58 am
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I think the CEO will soon realize that even though his money is probably nearly endless, other people's isn't. I can see a bunch of developers dropping any plans for using Unity and those who used it in the past or are currently using it suing the company.

Basara Lapis

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#8  September 22, 2023, 04:50:05 am
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OK, Unity "listened" and they will change their runtime fee policy... but didn't assure their plans will be undone. However, there're some interesting news about this:
-Terraria developer Re-Logic is giving $100,000 to two open-source game engines amid Unity debacle, the game wasn't made under Unity, but they will help other engines (Godot and FNA) with donations just to keep free for developers
-Epic Announces Free ‘Unreal Fellowship: Animation' Course, basically Unreal Engine announced free courses to be downloadable on Epic Games site

Rest in peace, Toriyama-san...
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Flowrellik

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#9  September 22, 2023, 06:37:41 am
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As much as I would like to see a happy ending come out of Unity's end, I have a gut feeling Loot Box Johnny might screw us over again.

SquidlyPoli1

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#10  September 22, 2023, 06:47:37 am
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When Basara made his post about redigit offering $100k to open source game engines I thought it was a bounty for people who wanted to create completely new alternative game engines and not simply a donation/kind gesture toward Godot and FNA who already made alternative game engines. I have no idea if $100K would even be a feasible bounty for it given how much work would need to be put into creating such a thing.

Flowrellik said, September 22, 2023, 06:37:41 am
As much as I would like to see a happy ending come out of Unity's end, I have a gut feeling Loot Box Johnny might screw us over again.

I really do hope that doesn't happen because EA people have already cursed one game engine (RenderWare) and I wouldnt want something that catastrophic happening again.

Basara Lapis

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#11  September 29, 2023, 05:14:52 pm
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Well, after the gaming community backlash, especially threatening their employees, including the snake CEO John Riccitiello, Unity finally goes back and restored all the old stuff they made and won't charge developers or users with fees.

However the damage was done and probably a lot of developers will move on from Unity anyway, most of them moving to Unreal Engine and Godot since even when the change won't be done, the trust has been broken. A related case is BallisticNG, a WipEout-esque racing game that won't be ported to Switch thanks to Unity

Rest in peace, Toriyama-san...
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Flowrellik

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#12  September 29, 2023, 05:28:34 pm
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This is what happens when greed comes into play. If Unity ever wants to bounce back and earn people's trust, they must look back at this and maybe once and for all tell John Riccitiello to either shut up or step down (I seriously hope he disappears I'm sorry if I sound negative but this guy...this one I despise). Guess I'm gonna look into Godot, being that I feel like I wasted over a year and a half of my life learning unity.

Basara Lapis

Re: Unity will become paid for players and developers
#13  October 10, 2023, 11:56:30 pm
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Rest in peace, Toriyama-san...
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