Unity 4 is too expensive

Actually, I think you'll find that the more realistic a game is the *harder* it is to maintain an immersive experience.

Seriously though, what are you complaining about now? You asked how to make money and I already told you!

 

You don't need to be trying to make "realistic" graphics to be hindered by pro. I can't properly maintain pixel density on some retro effects without being able to render to texture.

 

Not complaining at all cobber. Thanks for your opinion on how to make money with Free Unity. Discussing it here on this forum has confirmed that for what I want to achieve, realistic graphics are definitely necessary. Some people may be able to immerse themselves in a cartoony world but I find it difficult to take anthropomorphised creatures very seriously. The more realistic the better and my target audience will undoubtedly think the same.
I feel the same way about swords. A lot of Game makers seem to be stuck in the Middle Ages.

 

Then my last words of advice is start small and work up. I've been working on a MMO for the last 7 or so years - and yet haven't written a single line of code or design or story. Why? Because I know that first I need the skills, the clients, the games, the contacts, the investment etc to make it. In comparison, saving up $1500 for Unity Pro for shadows is *trivial*.

 

I don't think so. I had to pay full 3K to upgrade ios basic to ios pro,

 

Then you did it wrong (TM).

 

Um, if that happened I think you should probably contact Unity billing support and bring that up with them. It seems something went wrong with the purchase.

 

But what indie can afford to make competitive games in the realistic-looking arena?

How many iOS or Android games are "realistic looking"? Hell, how many indie games in general are "realistic looking"?

There are plenty of games which you can make with Unity's free version where the limitations are irrelevant, and there are many more where there are perfectly valid alternative approaches or workarounds.

 

A game doesn't have to be "realistic looking" to make use of real-time shadows.

 

I was ready to say it.

I first read boobs.

I don't really know what i would prefer in Indie version : the real time shadows or the profiler.

 

100% I would go with including a mobile profiler in the indie licenses for mobile.

 

Yes i never know if i'm close to the ceilling in terms of memory or cpu. In mobile environnement this is quite important. Does someone knows if there is an alternative for Indie ?

 

in my opinion this is the principal problem with the unity price, personally i like dynamic shadows but i will be not pay $1500 only for this, possibly someone need only the performance profiler but not will be pay $1500 for this, or c++ plugins access, etc, and if think that in many countries us$1500 are a lot of money for the P.I.B. in these countries Unity Pro not only is expensive, is really a inaccequible and unusable tool, I think that the competition in the game engines field will be make that unity will be have a fair license pricing in some years.

 

I find that insanely hard to believe, seeing as how an enormous percentage of the people I know working full time as game developers are using Unity. A significant chunk of them are using Unity for everything (2d and 3d games, moving away from Coscos2D and the like for their 2D games). It's probably true of the people who regularly post on these forums, but that is by no means an accurate cross section of the greater Unity community.

It's absolutely the general experience, and the sports analogy is pretty ridiculous in my opinion. You're trying to give the implication that buying Unity Pro is making it to the NBA which is ridiculous, it's more akin to making it onto your Elementary School basketball team. Anyone with any tangible talent and drive can do it, and have it paid for. I love that of everyone complaining about the price and continuing in their circular debate, none took the time to respond to my previous comments.

I stand by that. Show me a great game made with Unity that just needs Pro to push it over the edge and I'll show you a game I would absolutely love to run the Kickstarter campaign for in exchange for a percentage of the after-Unity-expenses profits from the campaign. Hell, if it's really solid I'll invest myself with the licenses in exchange for the profits.


The features in Unity Pro may prevent your great game from looking as strong in the market as it should; I'll absolutely concede that. However, there is not a single feature of Unity Pro that prevents you from getting insanely close to finishing that game. The entire "Pro" package is intelligently designed to allow you to build a great game without it, plan to use the features when you receive funding, and drop the pro features on top at the very end. Not having lightmapping and real time shadows isn't the kind of thing that has any large impact on your development process; drop in some blob shadows for now, make an awesome game, and come take my time and/or money. Please.

 

If that's what you want, fine, but your statement about "that's what gamers want" is not accurate.

Also, bit of a parallel: almost all famous comedians want to be up there in HBO, TV and Movies making people laugh. Almost all start much smaller, cracking a few jokes for little pay in some comedy club. It would be very wise to do similar, and start with much simpler looking game to make some money, and move on from there once you start having some profits.

This is not entirely accurate. You see, there is a point where cartoony graphics are obviously not real, but entirely immiscible. Someone can sit down and play "The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword" and entirely forget they are playing a game, because they are very immersed. And tops of it all: they will be able to do the same a decade from now, because their immersion is not dependent on the visual fidelity.

However, once you get to certain point in the "realistic" path, you are doomed. You must be able to challenge the realism of the most modern looking games out there, or you will simply look fake. It's like that old saying in The Karate Kid:

Just like that, in games, you either stay in the non-realistic but stylized side and you are OK. You spend millions in artists and shader programmers to come up with the most realistic graphics, and you will be OK. You do in the middle, and you get squished just like a grape.

 

I can survive without either. What I really want is Unity to redesign their in-game splash-screen logo. UDK's logo is edgy, a gamer sees it and they feel "oh this is serious gamer stuff!!!." Unity's default in-game logo is... bore. It feels like something that should be printed in a business card. They need to add edginess to it, a glow... some shiny and gradients... something.

It looks so plain I feel I MUST pay to get rid of the thing.

 

Having an option of a handful of Unity splash screens would be nice. Just have UT host a competition for splash screen alternatives, give the winners licenses or something, then let us choose the splash screen from a list of options.

 

oh yes, the Unity Free splash screen and watermark, are very "invasive" and the games look as "demos", at final this problem is resume in the illusion of the FREE and the high cost of the PRO and the wasted time that this can produce in a indie game developer, i would be like if Unity Free have a more accurate name and not a marketing name, possibly "Unity Demo" will be a better name for that the users know the limitations of this tool, in the practic Unity Free is a demo of Unity Pro.

 

I think a standard logo is essential. The contest to design a logo may be a tricky thing due to copyright law, but I bet Unity team has a legal department that will know better.

But all in all, we need a better looking Unity splash screen.

To be honest, I would LOVE to retain the logo even in Pro edition, IF it was cool looking enough. And that would be a good thing for Unity. Due to copyright reasons, though, I cant even make my own version of the Unity logo to use in my games if I wanted to promote the engine.

 

Plenty of triple A games show the logo of their engine at the start of the game.

 

yes, but not in a invasive way as Unity Free.

 

No, they're typically more invasive, with about 3 seconds of animation and 2-8 seconds of it just sitting there and sizzling. It's not invasive at all, just ugly.

 

the only way to know this is a serius comparison between Unity at this other engines, if someone know videos in youtube about the splash screens and watermarks in game engines please publish.

 

Or just download an Infinity Blade and look at how long the Unreal logo stays on screen. The logo on iOS devices stays only as long as your game's main screen takes to load. At that point, you actually have to code in the logo to stay any longer. Make an extremely simple scene as an in-between the launch logo and the menu, and you will minimize the time that logo stays on-screen.

In at least infinity blade (only Unreal game on my phone right now) the logo persists after the scene loads and gets animated into a transition to become the CHAIR logo.

 

And then, as is the case with very many games, the onslaught of middleware logos.

Of all the problems I have with what is included in Unity Free, the logo being "intrusive" (what?) is not even close to being on the list.

 

Yea, its' not about intrussiveness, just about it being boring/ugly.

 

Unity Technologies is a business. They are about making money and about enabling developers to make great games. IMO, they have already accomplished these goals 10 times over. In addition to the money they making from licensing, they are making a significant amount from their share of the sales from the asset store.

So why are they still charging so much for licenses?

Because they're not just a bunch of guys working out of their garage doing it for fun. Like us (well, depends on who you talk to), I'm sure they had a dream of developing something that will make a lot of money, so they and their families can live a comfortable life, have a nice house, have a nice car, and go on vacation once a year. If they can do that, I'm very happy for them. Why can't you be happy for them too?

If the licensing costs are too high for you, and you can't borrow that money from someone, put it on a credit card, or set aside money every month AND you don't think you'll ever make that money back from the revenue from your game AND recovering that expense is important to you, then you probably don't need Pro anyway.

In the big scheme of things, the cost of Unity licensing is nothing. It's peanuts. Stop complaining.

 

yes, the unity logo all time is not very bad, but if you joint all this little details (no shadows, no plugins, no large terrains, no LOD, no profiling, etc) in resume unity free is very limited and unity pro is expensive and in countries with low P.I.B (earnings of a person) is more expensive.

 

Yes, you are rigth, Unity is a commercial product and find money, for this is good a comparison and disscussions in this community, not all have + $1500 for pay the pro version, and the free version is very limited, this threads will be continue for long time because in this moment Unity Pro is too expensive, the licensing method of unity would be can fair if bill for the features that you need and not $1500 for all that you not need, really is not very complicate, for example, unity shadows $150, unity LOD $150, etc.

 

Price is not set by someone's opinion on whether something is expensive or not. Its set by supply and demand.

Obviously MANY think $1.5k is a bargain so why should Unity change their pricing? You keep bringing up how some people can't afford Pro. Unity doesn't owe anybody anything. If you can't afford it, that's your own problem. And as others have said, Unity Free is more then good enough. If you can't make $1500 with Unity free, then Pro will not help you one bit.

I also don't want to be charged per feature. Every time there's a new feature they will ask for another $150.

Only thing I would agree with is not making it a requirement to buy Unity Pro to the have access to iOS and Android Pro. It will have some issues, like access to the profiler, but come on, if we paid $3k, just give it to us.

 

you are rigth other time, unity can manage this prices by the demand, but i think that few indie game developers think that $1500 is a bargain (in my country is a lot of money), also think that in the future the demand of unity will be lower and the price too.

 

I think spending $3000 on Unity to export to iOS, PC and Mac is actually a fair price.

Paying an additional $1500 to then export to android, and then windows 8 phone. If your game is successful is not really a big deal. I mean if your game isn't successful on iOS, or whatever initial license you choose, you certainly have no reason to put it on Android and Windows Phone as well.

Really, if I make an iOS game that makes me 200k I have no problem bumping another 3 grand to Unity to get it to Android and Windows Phone 8, in fact I would almost want to give Unity a bit of a 'tip' to support it's future development.

In this way, for Indie or small studios, Unity's pricing is perfect I think. I do believe this is the target audience Unity imagined when they made their pricing structure, and I think it perfectly suits it.

 

Is this thread really still going on? Every angle of this issue can be exhaustively debated already. Unity even lowered the upgrade pricing in response to the community, that is unheard of anywhere else. Unity has the apex of reasonable pricing considering every other alternative.

You don't really need pro unless you are doing advanced stuff, then you should be established and funded somewhat so the pricing is not an issue. If 1500 is too expensive for you, you probably are not somebody who needs pro right now anyway. It has already been said, if you can't make money with free, you probably can't make money with pro.

If you're a hobbyist then free should suit your needs. If you want eye popping ultra graphics, pro helps but you would be better off with another engine, unity is not built around graphics, it's about workflow and I know of nothing that comes close.

Complaining about the logo on free? Are you serious? IT'S FREE! You don't get to complain.

 

FREE not mean GOOD, and the time that you take for learn development and for develop in unity really is very costly, if your time is free then really this isn´t important

 

It's one of the only legitimate complaints I've seen on this thread. It's not only hurting the free users, it's hurting Unity's public image.

 

So out of 1 million+ users you think the majority has made +$1500 as a direct result of using Unity? LOL.

You need to understand the analogy for it to make sense. No where in my statement did I compare buying Unity pro to anything. I compared NBA and A-list actors to Unity users who have successfully created popular and lucrative games.

In the future please read posts before responding to them.

 

I agree that 3k for iOS + PC + Mac is worth it, if you're interested in PC and Mac. All I'm saying is I don't care about PC / Mac / Linux, and I'd prefer not to have to pay for it. Otherwise, yeah 1.5k for each license I'm totally fine with.

 

well, i am one of the few that think that pay $1500 or $4500 and maybe take a year or more of work for publish a game that you not know if will be succesfull is crazy.

 

You have to spend money to make money. If you wanted to open a sandwich shop your investment and risk would be far greater. If are unsure if you can make money with unity, then you shouldn't invest in pro, pro is for pros. I went to college and paid nearly $80k and four years, I didn't get any guarantee the degree would pay for itself.

 

But see, this is exactly why you're argument is insanity to me. Not everyone who has picked up a basketball has the intent to become an NBA star. In fact, the vast majority of them do not. You seem to be having the conversation of what percentage of everyone who has ever downloaded the Unity engine for any purposes have made $1500 from it, which is a silly conversation to even have. That's like discussing how many people who buy a DSLR recover their costs as a professional photographer; it's simply not a valid way to discuss the viability of profiting from your photography. A far more valid discussion is how many people who have purchased a DSLR with the drive, talent, and knowledge required to run a successful photography business have recovered the cost of their equipment. The implication is also that they absolutely must have a Nikon D800 and that if they don't have one, and fail to become a successful professional photographer the failure can be blamed on their equipment. There's absolutely nothing wrong with getting your start with an entry level DSLR.

Unity Technologies happens to make an absolutely phenomenal entry level gaming engine... and they happen to offer it for free, it's called Unity.

I know plenty of people who have tried and failed to become professional game developers, but I don't know any of them who failed before bringing in at least $1500. The reality is that you need to bring in significantly more than that to pay rent and put food on the table.

You would be a fool to go out, buy a DSLR, and spend 100% of your time working on creating the types of photographs you want to have a career making 10 years from now. You need to eat crow and shoot some weddings and family pictures to establish yourself and build a revenue steam first. Buying a pro license of Unity and complaining that your first few first-party titles haven't been successful is the exact same thing; eat crow, do client work, pay your bills.

I absolutely stand by my assertion that there is not a single game out there being held back by the lack of a Unity pro license. Only a significant number of hobbyists who have an easier time blaming their inability to cross over into the professional world by their lack of a license, and not their lack of talent, time, dedication, or business savvy.

Make an awesome game and I'll help you drop some shadows in that baby if it's what's holding you back.

People fail all the time, in every profession. If you fail to make it as a full time indie game developer the cost of a Unity pro license will be absolutely negligible in the grand scheme of that failure.

 

LOL. I'll agree to that.

I also think that most people who down load Unity are interested in making a video game - and how is comparing people who "made it" in game dev with those in sports or acting insanity?

This was the original post I was responding to. Yes, you can make an awesome game with basic - but it is not an argument to support higher prices.

Maybe basketballs should be $1000 each because with a basketball - if you work hard and have the right balance of athletic skill, reflexes, and co-ordination - you could sign with the LA Lakers and make millions?

Software has to be the only thing that goes up in price with demand. How much does it cost to "make" another copy of Unity. Do dev costs go up exponentially the same way the user base has recently. I still see this as a cash grab at the end of the day. Do they have a right to do it? Absolutely. Do they owe me anything personally? Nope.

 

I just discovered a website for students (mostly. I don't think they really check) that is selling Unity pro licenses for £50, that is in the UK area, i don't know how much that is in dollars. Its a 95% discount and i will snatch it up the moment i am confident in my abilities with unity ('cause i'my only new). At the moment it's a "back to school" discount - thus the 95%, but a discount is a discount still!

just google studica it should be the first one!

 

Unity hasn't gone up in price.

Sounds fake, the regular student discount is 50% off for commercial license, and a little more then that for non commercial.

 

Not fake, that version is watermarked, 1 year license and can not be used for any commercial gain, hence the uber low price. It is only meant to learn the Unity Pro program. Pretty awesome deal if you are a student as if you work hard, the skills you got from that one year could easily land you a job.

 

Why do people feel so entitled I'm so confused.

 

No, you can get a student commercial license that can be used for commercial purposes AND without watermark.

 

Oh I don't think it's ridiculous, I think the part that's ridiculous is pretending that the cost of a professional stadium is at all relevant to how likely you are to play there one day is the part that's ridiculous. Most people who pick up a basketball are interested in playing basketball too, being interested in something doesn't equate to "I immediately plan to make this my full time career path."

Except again, that's an insane comparison. A more apt comparison is "Hey, we're going to give away basketballs completely free in hopes that hobbyists who have the talent to go pro will do so using our product and, when they do go pro, will be more likely to buy our professional level equipment since they're already familiar with our brand." Except it's much more difficult to learn a new game engine than it is to pick up a different brand basketball.

All of these comparisons hinge on the idea that pro is required to "make it" - which history clearly demonstrates is not the case.

It's not going up in price with demand, it's climbing in price with complexity. This is the only part of the discussion that is at all valid; what price point is most optimal for Unity Technologies to continue growing and providing excellent game development tools for developers like us. The reality is that none of us have access to the raw data that would allow us to give a compelling response to that; all we can do is assume that Unity knows more about what's best for them financially than we do.

We don't know, for example, what the average cost of a professional user is. If it's 0, and their data suggests they could sell 11x as many licenses if they were 1/10th the cost - they would drop the cost of the engine. Their data clearly doesn't support that strategy.

This entire conversation sounds like that high school kid talking about how he totally would have made the varsity team if he had a pair of Air Jordans instead of his crappy Reebok.

Unity is providing one of the greatest game development tools in the history of the industry for free, and continuing to make incredibly impressive progress on the professional side of their tool kit for an insanely reasonable price, and it's not enough for people.

I am a customer; $1500 doesn't even cover a weeks salary for your average developer - I trust Unity is doing what they need to do to continue to provide the best tools available to developers like me.


I stand by my assertion. If you have a quality game concept that needs Unity Pro to be successful, build it - people will be throwing themselves at your feet to support the project.

 

Stop talking so much sanity Kyle!! lol

It really seems like the people who have zero grasp of even basic economics are the ones arguing most that the price is too high. I'm really glad Unity doesn't take financial advice from this thread, they'd probably be out of business within the week.

Of course they go up. Do you really think it costs the same to support 1 user as it would to support a 1,000? Now add in all the technical advances. Unity is cheap like the budgie when you look at all it is capable of. And as many folks have said again and again in this thread, you can absolutely create and release a game using Unity Free.

 

They also sell a license that is 50% off for full time students with no watermark and commercial usage. It's only 1 activation instead of the usual 2, but there's no strong reason to need 2 computers activated for most people.

 

Yes, you can get a student commercial license, but you can also get an uber cheap license as I described, which was what AdrianC was responding too. Sorry should've quoted the original message as I didn't think I would confuse anyone.