Official Unity plan pricing and packaging updates

Go away boy!!! People here have 12, 10 years of unity and this is a backstab!! Just go look for better share/revenue models, free editor tools!!

 

"Per install" is totally problematic. We as dev literally have no control over it. Installs can be manipulated and we won't know it.
Me and many others indie dev probably won't reach the threshold, but it's like we forced to limit our dreams. Most of us still have those little hope to be really success selling our games, and now it's no longer interesting.

 

So you mean if I sell my Unity games not via the Steam platform, but from my own custom shop (where a "pirated" version of my own game is located) and provide some easy way to add the game to the Steam app, then I wouldn't have to pay to Unity per install?

 

If its above one million I’m fine with rev share

 

I began working with unity in 2006. I founded one of the largest indie f2p mobile game studios in the world from 2010 to 2018.

This new pricing system would have sunk us. My studio would not exist. My games would not exist. Here's a calculation for you: I would literally be $8M poorer. Careers have been destroyed with today's announcement.

Back in the day, even though Unreal had that gorgeous Epic Citadel iPad demo app, we chose the technically inferior Unity instead for its dev-friendly pricing at scale. Developers in our position today will similarly choose Godot over Unity.

I advise multiple game studios and lead educational outreach programs to teach game development. All were Unity centric. That ends today.

 

The terms around what constitutes an "Install" and how those are going to be tracked would need to be massively overhauled. If I've got a successful game, and am offered to put it in a charity bundle, what used to cost me $0 now would be a potentially enormous financial strain on me as all of those free installs would count towards my totals.

This model is overcomplicated, poorly defined, and anti-developer. In a time where Unity continues to fall behind its competition from both industry and open-source communities, Unity should be working with developers to find ways to align the goals of both sides. The company's revenue model should succeed when its developers are succeeding, thus incentivizing Unity to help its developers and build its tools to be the best they can be.

At this rate I've heard from folks all over the industry from indie to professional that this move has just further accelerated their moves to other engines. Heartbreaking as a long-time Unity user.

 

The FAQ also raises questions...





Once per download? Once per device?!?

So that means for a mobile game, with the average lifetime of a user >2 years, you will pay at least once for every new phone they have, plus once for every second devices?

What about Steam Library / Xbox / Family sharing? Do I as a player hurt my favourite developer by installing the game on all my devices over the years? (some games I have reinstalled dozens of times). Modders may install games hundreds of times.

And as a Developer, when your game gets reviewbombed, the mob can also decide to reinstall 10x to also give you a nice financial ping on top of it?

Also, how is this even tracked for this automated billing - the end user must opt-in to tracking before the install may even be legally tracked in all GDPR territories.

How can the Developer check whether Unity's reported installs are in line with the actual installs, and how can they appeal if they aren't? (e.g. through warez sizes, cloned APKs, etc.?)


What about Xbox game pass (including the free one you get with Discord Nitro), Steam Free Weekends, etc? These are all out of the question now - given they do not have nearly as high a retention as "proper" purchase installs?

 

I am replying here just to voice my actions going forward:

1. As a 8-year Unity user and a Lead with 10+ years experience working in billion-dollar public companies, I will be discouraging any in-house projects from trying Unity.

2. We don't need Unity employees here explaining this mess to us, Unity CEO and CTO can come take this honor instead.

3. You don't have what it takes to become a digital landlord, Unity.

 

Agree 100%

 

Hello Mike,

I'm sorry you had to deal alone with this on the forums, but also perplexed they don't have more staff on board to deal with this.

I have a major legal concern with this announcement. Besides the already mentioned risks of an unpredictable loss in revenue, the technical details on how Unity is planning to track installs really matter. We offer apps for kids on mobile platforms, and have to heavily restrict collection of personal information. You mentioned Unity won't charge for reinstalls, which would imply the engine has sufficient information to determine this. App stores are really rigid on the information you can collect for kids apps, and all of the ways I can think of (IP address, fingerprinting, etc) to pinpoint a reinstall would likely be rejected by Apple. You can see how much kids apps are limited by looking at discussions like these, where Apple was rejecting any apps calling Unity's analytics servers or having a reference to IDFA:
https://forum.unity.com/threads/uni...ics-for-kids-games.689143/page-2#post-9270399
https://forum.unity.com/threads/imp...kids-apps-action-needed-by-developers.838939/

The scenario I'm scared of at the moment is Apple rejecting all unity apps in the kids category. Whoever pushed for this change clearly didn't care for bad press and losing lots of devs if it meant more immediate revenue, so it seems quite likely that developers for kids are just ignored by Unity.

 

Okay, seriously. For new comers, turn and walk. Not joking, but don't invest your time and money on Unity. They have backstabbed us many times before...and this will only get worse.

Its not just about money and the quality of the game engine anymore...
This is studio's future and messing with one's daily life.
Walk away...

 

I think many are getting too hung up on the 200k limit. From what I understand if you notice you are getting near the 200k limit then you can simply upgrade your team to Unity Pro (2k / year / member) and that limit automatically bumps to 1 MILLION. Also notice the word in caps there is AND. You need the installs AND the downloads to pay the fee.



I don't mean to defend anything about this, it's a mess but it's also not as frightening as it seems at first sight. At least not if you don't make near 1 million / YEAR.

My primary concern would be privacy and GDPR / Apple. Not sure how compatible those will be with the "install tracking runtime player".

 

I think it is very silly to change the monthly fee based on the number of games installed instead of revenue. They should reconsider immediately, I think Unity is not facing the game developers.

 

DO NOT DO THIS!

( note - based on my limited understanding and reading of the changes so far )

While Unity may want you to do this for the new personal plan, based on previous experience and current experience with these latest changes i'd be amazed if there is not a nefarious reason for Unity to be doing this! Specifically it would not surprise me that this new account loses rights and protections that you may have had under the old account.

Maybe I'm being overly negative and even scare-mongering, but better to be cautious than not.
If you do, you must do due diligence on the changes to the license of the new account.

 

My company has spent tens of thousands of dollars on the Unity store over the years. This is the most ludicrist kick in the junk that Unity has pulled on indie devs, include the great EULA Fiasco of 2018 (or was it 2019?)

@Unity - Guys there are legal ramifications here. I spent multiple thousands engaging legal council during your idiotic EULA fiasco before the company came to its senses. All you are doing here is making a bigger case for unreal.

You call them "edge cases" which is BS. full stop. Who at Unity thought it would be fair to charge "install" fees when the developer gets income once... Not every install, ONCE.

I am done trying to fight the company I am helping finance with our team purchases over the years. Sick to my stomache at the work will will lose but Unity is showing here they have zero consideration for us as the indie developer community and the lack of fore thought on this issue is obvious.

You just don't give a crap.

Every heard the term biting the hand that feeds?

Excuse me while I have to go and make some team/project decisions. If someone has access to real legal council and is getting them to look at this I would be happy to be involved. Not interested in spending another $2K to have legal draft up communications on this if someone else is already footing the bill.

/disgusted

 

Damn, looks like Unity will just be a tool for me to verify PoC only. Real game will be made on a custom engine or open-source one.

 

Everything has already been said by everyone, but just want to add a +1 to the outrage in this thread.

The people responsible for this decision are completely out of touch with the video games industry and the economics of *any* video games. Letalone the hundreds of different business models that different game developers utilize to try and build a sustainable business, on different platforms, for different genres, in different regions etc.

Mike, even if your calculator spreadsheet proves that it's mutually beneficial for certain use cases, everyone here has already shown how this model is completely broken for dozens of other cases.

There's no need to wait. Retract the update now and go back to the drawing board. The longer you wait, the longer your dedicated, loyal customers will remain angry and insulted, and the more of them will abandon unity. You should consider yourselves incredibly lucky to keep the ones who do stay after this predatory, ignorant, bait-and-switch tactic.

 

I kinda confused with the term of Life time Install.

So, if by the end of December 2024 our game make $250.000, and our install counts are 300.000, it mean we must pay (Unity Personal):

(300.000 - 200.000) x $0.20 = 20.000 USD

Okay, not bad.

If we are paying 20k in January 2025 for December 2024 bill, so the next bill would be by the end of December 2025, if we reaching the threshold again, and the install count get reset, right?


I'm concerned about this life time install.
If in two years we got 1.000.000 installs and in the last 12 months we are reaching 250K USD revenue, this would be a disaster to all of us.

Imagine you have to pay this fee:

(1.000.000 - 200.000) x 0.2 USD = 160.000 USD

Our revenue now: 90.000 USD

It doesn't have to be two years, if by the end of the first year we already reaching 1.000.000 install with 250K USD revenue, we already get slapped by over than 60% payment to Unity...

Please tell me if I'm wrong and tell me the correct way to count this.

 

I'm completely appalled by this announcement. Not only am I now forced to accept retroactive changes to revenue agreements for all the games I've made previously, but I'm also supposed to trust that Unity will accurately track unique users for this system to not financially cripple me once I surpass 200k? I still have so many questions that there don't seem to be answers for.

My biggest concerns are this:

• How will Unity safeguard against pirated copies of games or multiple installs from the same users? I see that a rep has answered that you have systems to detect that but will it even take into account someone using a VPN to purposefully spike the install count? The mere possibility that a single user could maliciously bankrupt a company is absurd.
  
• How does Unity define "the game" when I have multiple releases with the same project? Is it tracked by Product Name, or is there some unique ID stored in my Editor project that is passed to the runtime player? Let's say I have a free mobile version in the future which is now going to be charged the same rate as a paid desktop version, and then I will essentially have desktop users subsidizing the cost of another release. What about demos? I could potentially have 1,000,000 people download/install a free demo and 200k of regular sales and then all of that revenue is forfeit because the cost per install would be 200k.
• Will Unity force the runtime to be always online or will it work offline? Could users run the game offline and never report their download information? It would mean that developers might start asking their users to do so which is an inconvenience for everyone involved. I noticed there's now an online requirement for the Editor too which is ridiculous; sometimes people using laptops are away from internet for a while and that would mean they just can't develop at all during that time (past 3 days)?

This revenue model assumes very specific things about the ways developers make money, namely that install count scales linearly with revenue, which just isn't true for all of us. If the systems work as desired and only real paying customers who download for the first time that aren't maliciously spiking your downloads are tracked (and only for releases of the game which are paid for), then I could see how this model might be sustainable for me in the future. But based on the current information I don't know how it's going to affect me if I reach the threshold.

I have spent the past 10 years supporting this community by answering questions, building free tools for the Unity Editor, and creating stories with my games. I've built up a workflow and suite of tools for Unity that I don't want to throw away, but I don't want the possibility of unknown download costs weighing down on me. Until this decision is reversed I will start seeking alternatives to Unity. I would much prefer a direct revenue percent past 200k since it would be far more stable and expected, or a requirement to purchase Pro like before since at that point it makes sense to want the extra support/features.

 

There are so many unanswered (and completely legitimate) questions here.
I wonder how much combined incompetence is needed to:


--> think up the probably most insane, stupid, evil and self-destructive (and probably illegal) business model of all time

--> do so while being absolutely unprepared for the most obvious and basic questions possible


We may or may not be stupid devs, but I can guarantee one thing and that's for sure: We definitely won't comply with that.

 

Where do I see how much revenue we have made the last 12 months according to Unity?

What will happen to Free-2-Play games that have reached both thresholds, and earn less money per install than the fee?

 

Guys, I have a brilliant plan! I will sell the game on Steam, get the revenue, but will not let the game run for 12 months. Then afterwards, I will let my players play the game! 12 months later! Win-win!

 

This goes beyond common business practices and they forget who is funding them and especially why!

 

I agree it's not super prohibtively expensive right away for small devs at least, but I feel the troubling thing is that we don't really own our games anymore. Unity owns them as the company can impose fees upon us which are a subject to change. We don't really own the editor either. Not since Unity 5, I think.

 

This is pretty awful. They better change this

 

The optics of this are absolutely terrible. It feels complicated and tedious. As a game developer, it feels like Unity wants me to immediately stop using Unity. I am guessing this mess will get updated a few more times to try to clarify some part of the confusion that it is causing.

On the flip side, this will probably help Unity investors. Stock investors absolutely love the thought of companies finding new revenue streams like this. So while this will probably make many game developers move to other products, this will probably help Unity's stock price in the short term.

 

I've been happily using unity for many years for personal projects and learning and getting better. Was thinking of getting serious with gamedev in the near future, but this here is making me think twice and seriously consider the alternatives. This seems immensely dumb

 

I know that @Mike-Geig is working on getting a calculator, but in the meantime someone else created a calculator/spreadsheet. Maybe someone from Unity could confirm whether or not this is accurate:

 

At this point, Unity is probably actively trying to drive away indies who don't bring in a lot of revenue, so that they can focus on AAA studios.

 

Awesome job Unity screwing your community of Developers over. You guys aren't working for Indies any more I see. From what I am hearing there are a lot of people talking about leaving Unity for the other engines around. Once again Awesome job.

 

Me, a developer working on a game for a year now, with at least another year of production to plan, sweating my butt reading this post ... And I'm not even in charge of the financial decision in my company ...

A lot of people already made great arguments against this decision, I won't repeat them again.

But it looks like Unity didn't even took the time to think before ... I really hope they get a nice S***storm and take all that back, and don't even consider another option.

I've invested so much time and resource in Unity, and I can say I'm an advanced user. It is sad to see Unity the company destroying such a nice tool like Unity the engine ...

 

As has been stated many times, prices per install are charged once, not monthly. They just did a bad job labelling the chart.

 

shortterm is all that shareholders/investors care about.

 

I'm not really sure what your role is in all of this, you sound like a really nice guy and you're trying to address these concerns.

The pricing on the chart is clearly intended to be a monthly fee.

 

Great, thanks for confirming that Unity plans to bankrupt indie studios with this policy!

My original post, for context:

 

I don't know what else I could add, but I'll just pile on that what little trust that was left in Unity is now completely squandered and I see no way our studio continues using Unity moving forward. What a shame, it didn't have to go this way.

 

So would it be possible for games to be 'install-bombed' by a 'hacker' or script-kiddie; writing an automatic install-uninstall-install loop tool to force install costs to a studio they don't like? Seems financially lethal.

 

Because of bad wording he calculated the prices wrongly. Here is the Mike's explanation.
Official - Unity plan pricing and packaging updates | Page 2 - Unity Forum

 

We are lacking in that information, along with most other information about this change

 

Hello Mike, this new fee is ridiculous. But if you guys really want it, then I suppose there is no other way around. But shouldn't there be ways for existing customers to cancel subscription without any penalties? I mean, this is not what we agreed to. Plus, the date is problematic (Jan 2024) because it says it will include the past 12 months. Which means we are already subject to the fee (which we were not informed before the 12 month as the date starts in 3 months) and which we did not agree to.

Or is the 12 month starting from January and upwards?

 

I dont want any clarification, I dont want any explanation, I dont want any fee cuts, I dont want some Mr Magoo exec come with a calculator explaining why the new system is better. I want this entire system bulldozed and a new management team

 

That would be brilliant, but I can't see it happening.

 

Yes, but don't forget.
1. We did not agree to this, but they are forcing it.
2. It already started, as the date is Jan 2024, but it looks back past 12 months.
3. We are all forced to upgrade to Pro, 400% more expensive.

It is not just a bad job labelling the chart. This is just scam, at best a massive paragraph of typos.

 

And everyone responsible for that decision fired with a ban on working in any videogame industry-related buisnesses.

 

The numbers are correct but it would not be cost/month but cost/download (one time)

 

Is there a converter from Unity to Godot?

 

This also means game prices will go up right?

 

Not going to lie. This plan is terrible.