Unity loosing field in universities

Well long story short:
my University used to use Unity, they just bought the Unity 4 license when unity updated for 5, they tried to get the licences of 5 with no success, now the university is using Unreal 4 for my despair (I really feel home with Unity).

I study in an private university(Fumec University), but it isn't exactly a company, it hasn't profit goals(its a Foundation).

That said the point is that they haven't many resources, and here in Brazil game development is just becoming a thing now. The way Unity licences works since my entire university makes more then certain amount of profit my course is supposed to pay the pro license for each of the 30 chairs.(as was told by them by the Brazil revenue representative).

It isn't my business the way Unity makes business but: Unity is just loosing 100 potential developers per semester in a city of about 2kk inhabitants that has its game business skyrocketing 600% annually while most of its economy is shrinking . My opinion is that educational side of unity marketing strategy isn't taking in account half of the story.

Yesterday we had an event of epic in our University, Epic evangeliser came to our university, showed the engine, its features demoed how to make a infinite runner live during the speech Now everybody is just talking about Unreal. =/ the fact is, we are students, the tool we are learning now will be probably the ones we will bring in our hearths for now on.

But where are the Unity evangelisers here in Belo Horizonte, Brazil? What is the effort Unity is making to be in the Universities around here? Seriously I am not seeing... events in São Paulo, Teresina? Students just haven't money to travel that far. Brazil is huge! Unreal is coming at us, why Unity isn't?Its weird I being the one who advocates for unity with my teachers and colleagues, I don't even know why I am doing that. I tried of all means to advocate for keeping Unity as engine over here. I sent emails and stuff. Talked with everybody I could. But the fact is Unreal is here now. Will be Unity doing anything at all? Or it is just a hopeless cause?

Any other students here? How is the situation with you guys?

 

I don't want to assume positively or negatively on the resources available to Brazilian students in your area, but is it possible for students to download the personal version to their own computers and the school just teach on it (1 pro license for the instructor)?

I am not a lawyer, but briefly skimming the EULA, it seems like this situation would be ok. Though I understand prevalent access to computers may be limited. It's unfortunate that the revenue distinction (ie only revenue directly made from the use of the software) that exists for individual users isn't available for schools.

As for evangelization, your point that Brazil is huge kind of answers your question. The world is even bigger and as big of a company as Unity is, it's still not feasible to get everywhere. The closest Unity event for me is still ~10 hours away. Even Sao Paulo is closer to you than that.

 

Sure, but if is feasible for Epic to came here why not for Unity? Well not all student has/can/want bring their own laptops for classes. We have Unity licenses by the way, all the machines has Unity 4.7 installed on them, but fell so wrong teach on departed versions of the engine. And apparently Unreal solved the problem having a much more permissive politic and updated solution. The whole point is: why Unity is paying so little attention on the academics over here?(I am assuming this is local problem, waiting more feedback from other folks)

 

3dsmax only became so popular because in early days they had free version for students. Autodesk killed it for few years and realized it was total F***up and now again offers free student version

Maybe there is some inertia but I really hope Unity would be more supportive for educational establishments for licensing terms.

 

I feel like the whole situation is a result of Unreal needing attention to grow whereas Unity is already popular.

 

And neither of them have come to my hometown! What gives?!

 

Don't see why you would be hang up over it, look at this way they are just tools, when you really get down to it most the work is art/animation/sound and logic code.. its all relatively transferable between game engines.

I mean Unity doesn't really have a lot of things to learn most the tools built in are basic at best. If anything your university teaching Unreal is much better for everyone, its more complex and powerful engine to learn. Unity is pretty easy to teach yourself and make your own games with. Can't say the same for Unreal its much more complicated beast, and you could really benefit from having a teacher more familiar with it to learn from, not to mention more students to do projects with. I mean maybe if your university spent a crap ton extra on Unity assets to improve Unity they might have some more things to teach students, but why waste the money when another engine doesn't have such licensing nonsense for a University to deal with, talk about stupid I guess. Not to mention they'd have to buy more assets for Unity to have the same level of features as the other engine to teach. It frees up there own funds to spend on I dunno better computer hardware for the classes.

And wouldn't you rather learn c++ than c#, the later being a lot easier to learn in your own time, the other really helps having a teacher and curriculum..

Back in my college days they ditched 3dsmax and got maya licenses the year I joined. I had used 3dsmax before and had that attachment to it... a month into the course though I got my taste of maya, and never looked back to using 3dsmax again. Once exposed to more things you can make your own decision on what works best. Sadly Autowreck bought Alias and now its under the same moronic management. If only bnlender was half as good as maya in its usability.

Anyway it seems Epic have been beating Unity at just about everything, well apart from there silly visual coding blueprints fetish and lack of c# support I'd be other there already.

 

It does seem a little odd that lots of paid software tools offer free versions to educational establishments, but Unity has a free version that is not allowed to be used by educational establishments.

Unity came to the university where I work last year (although it happened the morning after the biggest deadlines of the year, therefore many students were recovering), so they do go to universities. I think the chances of Unity visiting are at least partly due to the university/college/school. It isn't feasible for Unity to arrange a room in a university and contact all the students to let them know about the visit, plus all the other details that need to be in place.

 

5 has a new educational license that's different. They should check it out. https://store.unity3d.com/education

 

Unity is totally dominant in the local game dev scene. But we get reps from both engines visit on a frequent basis.

Word on the street is Unity is looking to hire a local evangelist.

So what you are seeing doesn't represent the world over, just your segment of the market.

 

You going to apply?

 

I considered it. I spend enough time with Unity as it is. It's mainly a sales job, and I have zero sales experience.

 

Sounds to me like you're perfect for it, then. Nothing worse than a pitch for technical products where the salesman has no technical knowledge or experience.

 

Imagine this:
You are at home, doorbell rings, you open your door and see two nicely dressed people. They say: "Would you like to talk with us about unity engine?"...

 

Fixed that for you. Anyone else remember this sweater?

 

Noooo! I had worked so hard to forget!

 

Yeah, I am studying Unreal in my free time, the problem is that it is too heavy... my MBPr 2015 barely runs the basic scenes. For the kind of games I am interested its an overkill. But what concerns me more is that unlike for you guys, the game dev culture is becoming a thing here just now. So my concerns are that the tools used in the Unis will become the local market standards. I have some familiarity with Unity, I wouldn't like to see the market going to the opposite direction. By the way I am doing my last Game Engines module this term(Using Unity 4.7). But the freshman are leaning C++ instead of c# and the folks who are doing Game Engines I are entering right on Unreal.

 

Do you really need Unity guys ? This is professor job to teach and promote Unity ( you have thousand of tutorials over internet to learn the engine without needing someone to come in your country to only make a show ).

I also don' t get the point about the price, you can use Personnal edition that has all features to make a game.

 

I'm not sure why you even care.

Loyalty to any single engine(or a product in general) may end up hurting your first. The best idea, usually, is to use whatever is the most suitable for the job, instead of trying to use the same thing everywhere. So it makes sense to be familiar with both engines.

You qualify for unity personal edition, and you could use that on your home notebook/home pc, then maybe make something in it and show off to your professor.

 

@zenGarden @neginfinity Im not sure if you guys got my Point, I do have the Pro license, it is not about me. Its about the Unity strategy of charging schools for using unity and the recent move of unreal to take this market. And by the way isn't professor job promote Unity he is teaching us engines, not Unity or Unreal. And because of Unity policies they are opting for Unreal.

 

"I wouldn't like to see the market going to the opposite direction?"

How is it the opposite direction, both are game engines... and both get used for fields outside of games like archvis.. ok maybe not unity, ain't nobody interested in lightbaking can do baking and rendering stuff without even touching a game engine.

"But the freshman are leaning C++ instead of c# and the folks who are doing Game Engines I are entering right on Unreal."

Good, far better for them.

Honestly you are looking at this all the wrong way. Learn and use unreal at university, learn unity at home if that is what works better on your pc... why care what everyone else is doing, I mean unless you plan on hiring people in your local area to make games with, and you'd prefer them to be useful with unity? I really don't why'd you care its not like unity are going to give you anything for your concern.

"And because of Unity policies they are opting for Unreal."

Whos' fault is that.. Unity probably has your university on the accounts and sat on it all year, without calling them up and telling them of any license changes for future versions, like I dunno unity5 being free for education centers (no idea if it is actually).. so your uni found a better deal, unity out unreal in lol

 

There is so much documentation, any professor could teach Unity. Students can use the personnal version ? i don't see where is the problem as Personnal edition is as complete as Pro without additionnal services.

 

I think what he is trying to say is:

"Look Unity, you are loosing users due to bad policy, not my business, I should not care of anyone else business, just saying"

What is so wrong on thinking about someone else?

"unity out unreal in lol"

And Unity fellas maybe should be aware of that. Feedback is there for a reason and any system without feedback loop can not learn.

 

Perhaps they don't care.

 

I don't see anything new there. Can you point out the change please?

 

No, I just know that they're open to offers possibly free with the right kind of deal in place, who knows? it's always a mutually beneficial situation in business. I don't know of anyone in software not open to negotiation.

Honestly? no idea.

 

http://unity3d.com/events/unity-roadshow-vr-belo-horizonte

Would ya look at that

EDIT: *Clicks heels* I wish Unity were at my home. I wish Unity were at my home. I wish Unity were at my home.