Official Unity plan pricing and packaging updates

In order for them to pay attention you'd to start a lawsuit with several billions at stake, or visit CEO in person unannounced with a dancing mariachi band and a horde of journalists behind you while livestreaming.

Bigger letters will only annoy other users and will not affect unity's attention in any way. If you ever tried to suggest anything on t hose forums, you should know by now.

 

Thinking about it this sort of reminds me of that weird transition phase between MySpace and Facebook when the MySpace UI was suddenly changed overnight into a ridiculous, unusable giant text front page search bar and it broke everyone's profiles. I always wondered if it was just bought by some competitor subsidiary and tanked intentionally. This totally careless pricing announcement is like a version of that that plays with people's livelihoods, you would be goofy to stay with Unity even if you were the most hardcore fanperson just for the trust breach alone, and the sheer audacity of it makes my mind wander into thoughts of collusion or something

 

The difference is that Unreal's terms have only ever gotten better over the years. And Epic makes actual games with its engine and seems to care about its developers.

For games that make $1 million or less — which probably covers most Indie devs — Unreal is free. It doesn't get any cheaper than that. And if and when you find success and start making millions, and this includes studios, the royalty is clear and predictable with the first million royalty-free. You can even negotiate a custom license at that point to reduce the royalty below 5% for profits above the first million.

Compare that to Unity, which has broken the trust of its users again and again, and is now adding an unpredictable system that could easily bankrupt many of its long-term developers. Charging per install is bananas. If Unity's current model is untenable for the company, then they would be better off adopting their own royalty structure instead. This is a corporate money grab, plain and simple.

 

Btw which sane business owner will depend their livelyhood on the other company that can make business / monetization changes on the whim for already released products?

Imagin, You make a game, you build a business plan for it considering the current monetization of the tools u use. Then after the game is released or ist close to release, monetization of the tools change drastically, puting ur project and company on the verge of bankrupcy or serious financial damage...So You hvae to reconsider further projects / investments etc.

This is not a good environment for making business, IF UNITY WANTED TO MAKE A CHANGE IT SHOULD BE FOR NEWLY STARTED / RELEASED PROJECTS not something that is already close to end of development or already released products...its effin stupid and immoral.

 

Yes.

Because with the Unity Pro license, you can be charged whatever John R feels like taking for any nonsense reason, with literally no limit.

With that 500k you're done paying. No wondering if John is eyeballing your wallet for this or that at any point in the future, keeping you up at night.

 

Don't just focus on steam PC games which has high per-install revenue. It has distorted your view.

For Ad-based indie mobile game, you can easily have 500k installs per month with around US$0.05 revenue per install.

This brings US25k revenue per month
according to Unity's pricing model you need to pay them: $0.15 * 100000 + $0.075 * 300000 = US37,500, which exceeds the revenue.

 

I'm at the point now where I'm just confused why Unity hasn't backed down yet. This literally can not happen. They don't know if someone installing the game purchased the game. A game can be released DRM free (or with DRM and cracked), purchased once and copied and shared any number of times and Unity literally has no way of knowing if an install is from a purchase or not.

They can't charge us money for pirated software installs. They need to find some engineers in the company that have half a brain that can tell them this so they can hurry up with the "oops, sorry". I've had enough. They don't have a magic legit install tracker and they never will. If they expect us to dispute the charge every month because every charge will be wrong then I will expect to pay $0 every month because as far as I know if any of it is wrong, it's all wrong.

 

Ok... you convinced me. It is 100% true. This forum is useless for that kind suggestions.

 

It also doesn't matter because Unreal can't be more expensive than Unknown. No other engine's license terms can.

 

Yeah, my thoughts on it exactly. Very succinct. They have shown what they want and are willing to do and this is not the direction any sane game company wants to go to.

 

The response today by Unity addressed none of my concerns. I'm not surprised, but I'm still disappointed.

My only concern at this point:
Unity needs to honor its prior covenant that would allow developers to stay on the TOS version associated with their game's respective LTS build, with no unilateral changes EVER. This is non-negotiable and is my right under the contract that YOU agreed to and wrote.

Other than that, I'm done with Unity so everything else is moot to me, but I do hope you decide to do right by anyone who is left/stuck with Unity after this. Monkey business with the TOS twice in less than five years is beyond the pale and will not be tolerated, and I am not in a position where I have to tolerate it.

 

You could just raise prices of Pro and force me to use that. Say that ”hey we need more money to fix our engine, money to not fire people and keep shareholders happy so that engine is usable now and in the future. can you guys help us”

I wouldnt be happy but would go with that.

now you say:

”we decided you pay $0.20 per install”
”we will try screw over only 10% of developers now so majority of you are fine”
”we promise that we know how to count installs”
”legally we can make this worse for you any day but dont worry”

 

sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeit

 

Your game need to have make 1M in the last 12 months for that to even be a possiblity. Just... Just read the damn announcement people.

I have my thought about the installs too but i swear to God 97.3% of people here still dont know how things are supposed to work as it stands. If it is such a deal breaker the least you can do is read the contract very, very thoroughly.

 

At this point seeing so many high profile indie dev's with the exact sort of revenue that Unity are targeting with these changes, talking about how bad this is, with many saying they are planning to switch engines for new titles not already in development etc. I wonder just how many of them have to stop using Unity before it affects the bottom line that Unity were planning to milk with the install tax, that will then force Unity in 12 months time to raise the fees, reduces the thresholds/tiers and make the install tax an even worse deal?

At which point of course the snowball is in full effect as more devs will leave, Unity earnings drop, so they raise fees again, over and over until there is no company left.

 

Re Re, it was said that Unity gave the possibility (before, in 2019) to not accept the ToS/Terms of Service;

Unity, (or does anyone know), are we allowed to not accept the new 2024 ToS to not have to be in the situation of being charged the per-install fee.

I'm talking for people who have been using Unity since the 2000s-2010s....and did not update to Unity 2023 or 2022...


but use older version of Unity, 2021 and before...and their license (Personal, Plus or Pro) dates back to several year ago (before the 2019 ToS).



Please, clarify this, because people that are on older licenses, would wish (some of them) to not go on the new ToS that will be in january 2024, and wish that choice ....and they are Ok with that, they accept that they will be locked-in to the 'old license' for perpetuity (no updates, no new things, no new engine - a trade-off they accept)...(so long as they don't have this new ToS/per-install fee upon them that they never agreed to) ---

they have using Unity since before 2019 and their license predates that (time)...

so, it's normal/(more than) understandable, that some would not want to go on this new ToS/license....in 2024. I know, you would not like this (I know (or, at least, can imagine) and can comprehend, you are trying to survive as a business (too), financially and need (more) paying users), but, clearly from 112 pages of comments and 500,000 views on this thread, I guess many people don't like this new change. (If being euphemistic, that is).

They, too, are trying to survive. I don't know if it's you, Unity, or Unreal who said: ''We win, when you win'', or ''We succeed, when you succeed.''; ''Your success, is our success.''. Although, I do remember you said: ''We believe that the world is a better place with more Creators in it''. Which (evidently) meant, also/really, more Unity users. In any case, from the comments, some will not win/succeed of it because their financial return will be less/(very) crippled. You do not want a world with less creators in it - because they fail (to succeed (financially), as creators), because of the ToS/financial monetizing of your engine, on the devs using it. You, may succeed, financially, but many devs won't. So, I don't know, it is good to sacrifice certain devs at the financial altar...but, like, I know I know that business is hard, and business have to do, what businnesses...have to do (to survive). Like, laying off staff...to reduce internal costs; or, increasing prices, like this new per-install fee. To recoup/ROI, on your side...

If you removed that ToS from GitHub, I mean, I don't know what to think; I understand you are updating things and so it changes fast in order to adapt to the evolving situation....probablly you will put it back there once things, are very official and (mostly/near) final.

Thus, I am just asking (to clarify,...and thank you for having clarified that re-installs are not happening, and only 1 install counts; I do hope this will be 'correct' and not abused by some people, and you err...and charge for installs that were repeated....but I will trust (for now) that you say that 're-installs will not be charged'; only, the first install. And, if they install on anotjher device, that's not install...but, at least, won'T be charged for several re-installs...on same device/hardware). I am just asking, to see, that older devs can decide to not 'accept the ToS' , to 'not agree to the January 2024 ToS', and Continue/Stay on the Old ToS Pre-2024...and way before even (like, some have agreed and have a license from pre-2019)..

so can they stay on that and if not, why not?

Thank you for your understanding (I know it's, probably, not what you want to hear, but, it's better said and 'cleared' (the air) and done...so now 'we know/is understood/we were told'..and we can move forward/deal with the decisions..and decide what do or not.)

 

Regrets are real. This is the dumbest business move I've seen in a while

 

Yes the unknowns are the big issue.

For starters, for games that aren't free to play, they could at least have separate terms where instead of per-install it was per-sale.

But, why over complicate it? Just make it similar to UE5 model, with a similar cap, and reduced revenue share so they remain the more competitive option.

 

The most messed up part is making the change for games already released. Like someone made an entire game using the engine and now unity decides you know what, I think I want you to owe me some money for your game now. It doesn't matter who it affects, its rotten at its principles.

 

Well. So long. Time to go to sleep, it's Unreal learning tomorrow.

 

Do you understand that if the game stopped selling after 1 year (for example) then still you will have to pay to Unity for that game? If you sold game in 2,000,000 copies and now you have monthly sale on a level of 100 copies than it is possible you will have to pay more for downloads than you have from a current sale. IS IT NORMAL?

 

lesser of two evils, using unity was a better option bcause it saved money, now its put itself in a position where people cannot trust it to not suddenly raise it's prices or once more change it's pricing model on a whim.

unreal charging 5% is still not good, but it's better than risking your dream with Unity if this is how they intend to act.

 

I'm starting a startup and only have $3k left in my pocket, I'm looking forward to the mobile game I'm about to launch.

I wish all of this was just a nightmare, when I wake up the greedy CEO will be fired and everything will go back to the way it was.

 

Publishers will go with the cheapest option. Nothing matter but money, don’t ever forget that. Even with the wildest calculations, the Unity model is far cheaper than the Unreal one.

 

You forgot to add to that the 10k per year you need to pay for the Unity pro license for your team of 5 people.

 

Unity purchased the Israeli company IronSource in 2022. IronSource developed the program installCore in 2010. "The program allowed those using it for distribution to include monetization by advertisements or charging for installation, and made its installations invisible to the user and its anti-virus software." Since 2015 the program has been classified as a Potentially Unwanted Program (PUP) by anti-malware software.

Now a year later they plan on "charging for installation" of the Unity Runtime. Sound familiar?

Will Unity developers now be unwitting distributors of malware or is this just a similarly hairbrained business scheme?

The fact this even needs to be asked shows that Unity leadership cannot be trusted to steer this company in the right direction.

 

This is absolutely insane. I have invested 2.5 years into developing my mobile app which is based on microtransactions, which work on similar economics to ad-based revenue.

So hypothetically, if I was highly successful and got 1,000,000 installs and maybe pulled $100,000 out of those installs in microtransactions, I would have considered myself highly successful.

Ie. The type of game I am developing is not expected to have a high per download income rate, but rather add up through massive scale and broad usage if I am successful.

Now, if I get 1,000,000 installs and $100,000 out of those million, I am actually going to be in debt to Unity and have zero dollars out of it.

This completely absolutely destroys the mobile market or any free to download game option where revenue may come from only a small percentage of users.

The entire reason I chose Unity as a development platform was because of its set flat fee subscription fees. I would have no problem paying higher subscription fees if they are flat fees.

But this is like playing Russian roulette now. Until you launch you have no idea how many downloads are going to convert into paying customers. If not enough convert, you are going to end up IN DEBT based on what would otherwise have been runaway success.

Ad-based and micro-transaction based games cannot function on this type of system.

I am now freaking out in disbelief as I try to research other engines that I can somehow convert my entire project to and thinking about how much time I have now lost.

The only people this system of fees is going to work for are studios charging $10-40+ per game with no free downloads. If you are charging NOTHING and hoping to convert some percent to minor fees or ad revenue (which is how most of the mobile market works), this is absolute death.

You may as well be pointing the gun at your own head and rolling the dice. Insane.

If they wanted more money why not just increase the flat rate subscription fees? At least then we could budget for it and know what we are getting into.

They are killing the entire Unity mobile market with this, which is where Unity has the most market dominance. Absolutely insane.

I absolutely cannot launch anything with Unity anymore given this. It is now far too dangerous. You can easily lose money on an otherwise successful game to Unity based on being too downloaded.

 

weird I don't see that tweet

 

Its not about money, its about stability of the business model. As I mentioned we all want Unity to make money to improve the engine, but the system they offer now is UNSTABLE and Unity as company is unreliable atm.

 

Yep. I'm not trusting these capitalist f'ers anymore. Open source is the only route I will invest from now on

 

Only if you're within the same financial threshold period. If one year passes then the threshold will have reset. It's the only positive part of the whole system.

 

Reinstalls do not count
You are not charged if your game has not grossed $1 million in the past 12 months

Your scenario fails to meet either of those criteria. So no, a “sudden wave of nostalgia” prompting people to reinstall their Steam library isn’t going to bankrupt you lol

 

No, because if you only earned $100,000 gross then you will not be at the $200k level that would require you to spend $2k per developer seat or the $1 million gross level which is where you would truly begin to pay installation costs.

 

In your scenario, it's only 2 cents for every $20, but there's a tiny little detail you miss here: More than 90% of us make free-to-play games and we definitely don't earn $20 per initial install.

So it can be 2 cents for every 3 cents, which means 66% royalty instead of Epic's 5%

Lol. It can even be more than 100% if you focus too much on making a perfect game and say "we'll tweak the monetization later"

 

Just woke up to this and I'm wondering what this means for my studio.

We are a small studio based in Paris, France. Right now we are on the Unity Pro license and our revenue for 2022 was $800k and 2023 projected is $1.1 - $1.2m. It is mobile game with some cosmetics IAP and has very small ARPU. Combine on iOS and Android we have monthly 500k downloads.

We need Pro plan because we are over 1M revenue and downloads for 2023. After removing platform cuts and paying salaries, currently we have no money left to re-invest. So if I calculate this right, does this mean that in the first month we will pay 100k * $0.15 + 400k * $0.075 = $45k ??????????????????? How is this possible??? Am I making some kind if mistake here?

After 2 months it will drop down to $10k and then stay there but that is still OVER $150k PAID TO UNITY!!!!!!!!!!!! just in one year.... I don't understand how we are supposede to pay this. Unity says they are "targeting" only a small group of developers and i dont understand why? but why are we being targeted? Please tell me I am making a mistake in my calculation, I am freaking out a bit here.

tk / renée

 

In theory they won't count but in practice we don't know if they will be able to correctly identify them outside of stores that track that information.

 

Okay, and if I am even more successful and hit those marks (as I hope to)? The precise numbers are irrelevant.

Many mobile games get tens of millions of downloads. If you scale up the income accordingly the same problem develops. You are punished for popularity and can easily end up in the hole.

YOU MAY END UP IN DEBT TO UNITY FOR HAVING MILLIONS OF DOWNLOADS where only a small percent are converting to income.

Imagine panicking as you go to sleep one night because you are about to hit another threshold and having to pull your game from the Android/Apple store because if you cross the line you will go bankrupt.

Or waking up to a "runaway success" as you have a viral hit millions download that then bankrupts you the very same day while you were sleeping.

This is insanity.

 

They have no way of accurately discriminating between fresh installs and reinstalls so taking them at their word on that seems silly, especially when it already contradicts their first statement made only the day before.

 

Yet its capitalism that moves innovation forward .

Anyways its important to diversify urself, so even if u use Godot now dont be a stranger to other tools engines, because crap can hit the fan everywehre so u will be forced to change again .

 

I completely agree, it's preposterous, I just want to make sure we are using the correct numbers here.

 

There’s a tiny detail you’re missing, Unity can evaluate F2P games on an individual level and will offer a variety of runtime fee credits for use of various Unity utilities, like Unity ads, which most mobile companies should already be using. You guys should read the actual documents for info, not Twitter or Reddit. That’s what a professional would do

 

As far as I know nothing has changed in the initial announcement. As for now reinstalls are counted. If there is an official announcement that reinstall doesn't count then we are back in a previous situation and that part is not a real problem any more.

 

Do you understand you are completely wrong?

Can someone else not whiteknighting for unity back me up on this one? Please yall, educate your fellow pitchfork bearers.

 

We don't have an actual document yet.

 

No, it won't drop down to $10k. The install count is per month so if you have 500k downloads/installs every month you will be paying the $45k every month. Every single month you will have to pay 15c for the first 100,000 installs and so on. Enjoy the new terms!!!

 

unity wasted 6 billion dollars for vfx and ironsorse you think this money from pro licenses ?

 

It's worse than you think. The tiered pricing resets each month. So every month, the first 100k installs that month is $0.15 per install.

 

Wow they offer company scrip we can spend in their store! I love working the mines.

 

Unity's official Twitter put this out today

How we define and count installs: Assuming the install and revenue thresholds are met, we will only count net new installs on any device starting Jan 1, 2024. Additionally, developers are not responsible for paying a runtime fee on: - Re-install charges - we are not going to charge a fee for re-installs. - Fraudulent installs charges - we are not going to charge a fee for fraudulent installs. We will work directly with you on cases where fraud or botnets are suspected of malicious intent. - Trials, partial play demos, and automation installs (devops) charges - we are not going to count these toward your install count. Early access games are not considered demos. - Web and streaming games - we are not going to count web and streaming games toward your install count either. - Charity-related installs - the pricing change and install count will not be applied to your charity bundles/initiatives.

 

Just proves that their model is unfair if they need to accommodate each studio 1 by 1 with different insider deals.

Just make it clear in your policy instead how you handle free to play. You can't make exception for everyone.