Official Unity plan pricing and packaging updates

You HAVE to believe. There is no other option.

 

It's been a couple of days - where is the updated statement?

 

Ugh, thank you.
You can get close to const correctness with read-only interfaces / properties that return read-only interfaces but it'll never be airtight.

 

They're likely watching the reaction to the 4% rumour to see what the reception is.

Honestly, if that was what they suggested going forward I'd be 100% ok with a revenue cap of 4%.
The devil is in the details though.

At this point I'm not sure how I feel about being forced to advertise the Unity logo like a badge of shame unless I pay $2000 after the gaming community has started calling Unity spyware and malware.

I'm not sure how I feel about a revenue share model AND a seat license model, double dipping.
For me it's not a big deal, I'm happy to pay $2000 if I ever reach $200,000 in revenue, a drop in the ocean.
However for bigger studios having to pay that per seat for 20+ developers it's a much larger cost to then get hit with the revenue share % aswell.

Not to mention they don't seem to have backtracked on using install numbers as a metric in some regard, which I think just leaves the door open for such a system, which is invasive and unworkable.
After all if we accept install numbers with a 4% cap then down the road why won't we accept that being enforced with mandatory tracking software going out with our games?

This whole thing needs to get sent to the recycle bin and replaced with something that is developer and player friendly.

 

There is nothing in the details. Fee per install is a no go, no matter what. And then EULA-debacle.

 

I've been studying on Unreal since Sunday... and damn, it has a completely different logic from what is now my way of thinking after years in the Unity environment.

I can work fine on C++ too, but the unreal environment gives me a headache.

I hope that everything will be resolved and that I can go back to working on Unity, but I'm worried about the damage to the image.

After this example of bad management, if these people remain at the top of the company, no one ( Developer, Players, various partenerships ) will ever trust Unity Technologies again.

I even read the comments of some players, who if they just see the unity logo in a game they uninstall it because they think it controls their data.

 

Strike protest is normal in any kind of organization. And we already know the representative of staff and the one used to be. One only care about their stock benefits, another come to joke around about Elon. Some work normally like nothing happen. And almost all of them aren't having any opinions against it directly

We know well enough today, they don't care about us, or community, or developer ecosystem. And I bet the people who care are mostly already being laid off, being replaced with IronSource's employee

Or could you PROOF that?
My accusations was proven by silence. They not exist. We can't see or heard about them. Or are they some kind of God?

 

You're probably right. The cost is one part, but unless they get rid of their opaque metric of "somehow we know how often stuff gets installed" completely, they won't lay the foundation to regain the trust the have lost with this stunt. At best, they'll buy themselves some time.

 

Once they get you acclimated to the installation fees they remove the cap.

 

Dude, sadly I don't know Thailand, only vaguely. I don't know what are the employment regulations there, but in the US (well, at least here in California) it is "at will employment" which means the employer can kick you out any second with no reason (there are some exceptions, like strike, etc). Which means there is no excessive "rebellion". Obviously usually you can make your opinion heard, but often not, depending on company culture.
Stop blaming working people for the F*** up of the upper management.

 

Yeah, same here. Well, for me it was Saturday and Sunday. Some things I tried work really nicely, other stuff is just so different that it will take some time.

Luckily the way we work is that we all have a main project but then also a side project that is meant for testing and learning. For us, those side projects are now Unreal or Godot. We're too far down the road to switch existing projects now but since we can't rely on our "partner" Unity, we have no choice than to diversify in the future. I'm not saying we won't release more work on Unity, but we are 100% done being a one-engine team.

 

Exactly, the top managements remain the same... therefore same mentality.

It's only a matter of time, and God knows what else these "brilliant" minds come up with.
I wonder if they even thought for a minute about the consequences of this idea of theirs.

 

One thing to realize is that no engine change will be a breeze. Switching programs always, always, always feels clunky. I switched my main 3D program twice now. Learned C4D at university. Switched to modo afterwards then when 2.8 hit I made the switch to Blender. I knew I wanted to learn each program. But man did I frequently switch back to my former program in the beginning. And man did I curse the new program and thought vital features were missing. In fact (often more than) half of the features were there I just didn't know where. the other half was that programs work differently and you should never try to fight the new program to do what you know from your old program. Embrace what makes the new program unique and find it's strengths.

The only thing you can do is muscle through a few easy tasks at first, force yourself to stick with it and look up everything you don't know. It will be painfully slow. It will be exhausting. But man ... when you hit that sweet, sweet point where the new program finally starts clicking and pieces fall into place is always fantastic.

The brain is lazy as f*ck. Not yours specifically - human brains in general (I highly recomment reading "thinking fast and slow" by Daniel Kahneman). When there is an easy way then your brain will beg you to take it. Staying with what you learned is the easy way. Every company who has a succesful and established program on the market knows that. Companies bet on your brain's unwillingness to change.

Ultimately I never regretted learning something new though. Even the programs I didn't follow through with. And the ones I did learn feel even better.

 

I think that I'll adopting the same method.
Somehow I am forced to continue on Unity my latest project that I have been developing for over 2 years (I feel like crying just at the thought of starting from scratch on another engine where I can't even rotate a cube), but in parallel I'll gradually dedicated myself to the study of other engines.

 

Isn't that obvious? They learned from Twitter, Reddit, ... that the community hates pain and won't easily switch. So they've accepted that they will see their stock price tumble for a while (hence the sales) but long-term the revenues will go up.

 

Stock seems to be making up some ground today. Around 2% up now.

 

i know -.-

 

That only reflect how much they care about this event. As I said this could be company-wide protest BECAUSE this event is threatening the existence of their company in the same level of them lose their job. So why no protest?

Because they don't think it is!

They are not ally of us. They are ally themselves to the higher up and here is a prove

https://forum.unity.com/threads/uni...ckaging-updates.1482750/page-260#post-9342287

 

I think they are even less allied to management.

But in any case, they should be allowed to be allied to themselves so that they can figure out how they want to deal with this.

 

the Y up vs Z up is a serious brainfart time, cos Im so used to Y is up.

For me the blueprint stuff isnt how i think, code is how i think and sure, i could learn blueprint, in fact the tutorial i followed i would hear the goal and have made it before they'd almost finished the explaination, but, firing up c++, sure, im reasonably (well was once, out of practice but its in there somewhere) capable so im ok with most of the c++ stuff, except the recompile times.. even with livecode in use, dear god, i thought unity used to sit on its backside and play with its toes, but, to make a new class.. sure, ditch out of unreal, hit compile.. first one took an hour, and barfed. I hadnt done a thing other than say to it make an empty class, and my class hadnt clashed so it wasnt that, some code in the kit that a tutorial said to use didnt compile.. so.. now unreal wouldnt open, and all it basically said was F U.. Sure, unity could kill itself and corrupt things, but not normally on such a simple and well used premise and how in the name of sanity did unreal let me use uncompilable code in the first place without so much as a warning.

because i make 100% free webgl no ads no iap, no nothing, not even a donate to the pizza fund button, for now, i can stay with unity. However, eggs in one basket, i feel the need to at least understand the competition but ive not seen a good webgl competitor.. (please feel free to post me some good ones)

but even i see this effecting me, just indirectly. why? cos well the bigger companies leave, or at least start to, and the money unity claims it needs (stop buying random tat then??) is going to have to come from somewhere, or, the project is non viable. So either they hit smaller people, and then smaller people, and then smaller people until im paying 2k a year to make a game of tictactoe for 8 people with no revenue, and even then, they arent making money.. or if they decide sooner, the death only comes quicker..

 

I remember Teila. Now all we need is Gar and Kiwasi and it'll be like 2015 all over again.

 

Yes, unfortunately when whales enter a company listed on the stock exchange it becomes an investment to be manipulated for the gain of a few jackals, causing it to collapse at will.

 

Also another thing

Unity is worldwide company you know? And many office location is based in EU not USA

EU has the best employment law. Where is protest there?

 

My biggest surprise in all of this is that Unity isn't stopping the bleeding.

Perhaps they are waiting so they don't dig themselves into an even bigger hole - and that might be the right call.

Still, from here, it looks like they need to stop the bleeding. The longer they wait, the more devs are going to have ported over to other platforms - both technically and psychologically. I think it would be better for them to jump in and stop the bleeding.

 

Posting some things from Twitter that I think accurately describe what developers think:

"It's good to see more engagement with this stuff but personally I think the message the dev community should be sending is that only a full revocation of the terms is acceptable - this is about trust, not disagreements over implementation"

- Paul Kilduff-Taylor

https://x.com/mode7games/status/1703506439438827674?s=20

'I think there are still a lot of people at Unity who think that this is a comms issue, rather than a ‘breaking the TOS in a way that utterly dismantles trust and also demonstrates a total misunderstanding of the games industry, again’ issue.'

- Mike Bithell

https://x.com/mikeBithell/status/1703910962531536942?s=20

"Unity leaking their 'improved offer' is laughable. Nothing has changed. The company whose software you used to make your games, wants a cut of your revenue. Not even profit...revenue. Guess what, you used an office chair, electricity, a keyboard, a PC and an internet connection to make your game too. How many big corporations are going to knock on your door asking for their cut of your revenue?

Its ridiculous that any company would be so psychopathic as to demand this from their customers. You made your game. You already pay for unity, every ****ing month.

Everyone should be laughing in their faces, while switching to Godot or coding their own engine. Only people with severe stockholm syndrome can be even considering using unity."

- Cliff Harris

https://x.com/cliffski/status/1703881447902240879?s=20

"Unity is effectively pivoting to a 4% rev share over 1 million. This is obviously where they should have started.

It also fails to recognize the core issue here. It appears to still retroactively apply to all past products made with Unity.

Download Godot"

- Noah Rayburn

https://x.com/NoahRayburnXR/status/1703900104657375633?s=20

"As long as Unity thinks it's fine to retroactively change the licensing agreement on past games, which they appear to not be rolling back on, they don't get it. Being able to predict cost is key, and you can't do that with shady business partners like Unity is being."

- Jason Booth

https://x.com/slipster216/status/1703826683042681131?s=20

'I just had someone use "I don't want them to pull a Unity on me" in a consultancy call about a contract so that's how well things are going in this unprecedented cluster**** becoming a phrase that'll probably linger for a decade'

- Rami Ismail

https://x.com/tha_rami/status/1703728699055485411?s=20

 

The difference is those services are free. People don't pay money to use them

 

If someone from Unity is watching this thread, even cursorily - I just want to let you know that the longer you are being silent the greater the damage. This is really weird to have your users so deep in neglect.

 

You are not missing something. That's why the announcement was so ambiguous and complete bullshit.

 

The creator of Caves of Qud posted yesterday I think it was that he ported most of the game over only 14 hours to Godot. Godot is pretty darn easy so far.

 

This is a good blog article describing the position Unity has put the developers into.

https://www.pentadact.com/2023-09-16-unitys-trap/

 

Another article rehashing the Bloomberg one. No new info:

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023...based-fee-caps-self-reported-install-numbers/

 

Actually, I think this is what is going on.

1. Unity, internally keeps saying they are not profitable
2. Announces bs runtime fee, employees get pissed
3. But as the dust settles, and a retraction is projected
4. Now, the employees start to think, "how else will we make profit?"
5. Surely they will sack some of us.
6. Then the "thought" of "hey maybe this is not so bad" just flashes in their minds.

I mean I don't blame them. But, in every possible scenario, they want to put the burden on someone else, the devs initially, now the employee, but in all honesty, we all did our part.

See.

• Us devs paid the agreed subscription fee.
• Employees worked for salary.

But, the executives failed to turn profit, while getting hundreds of millions of dollars while the company is not making enough money. But yes, the devs, the employees are there to take the hit, not the executives.

 

This is a very articulate and well-worded commentary on the situation. Thanks for sharing it.

 

Yes, exactly! You need to get back to talking with the community - not just talking about talking.

 

I'm also on the Affinity suite, just so I can stick it to Adobe just like Blender and Autodesk. lol. Though exporting PSDs instead of saving them has been a slight pain point, but acceptable. I'm sad to say that after I'm done with my Unity project, I may have to switch to Godot and continue the said sticking.

 

Isnt GEnshin Impact company hiring Engine devs? XD XD

 

Is hard to say after many years of use Unity but now the only way for that Unty does not scam you is migrate to other engine.

 

I'd hope not... that conclusion doesn't even make sense. It's gotta be coming from the "tracking install counts" angle of this policy, but correlating that to "controlling data" is a stretch.

I don't think the overwhelming majority of gamers really care about this in a tangible way that will prevent game sales. People keep buying EA games en masse, despite EA repeatedly taking a figurative dump on everything they value; by making games shameless buggy copies with almost no changes from the last season (or even less features) and making most of their games pay to win.

So if that doesn't stop most gamers from buying EA games, I don't see how this change to Unity will make them refuse to buy games that pique their interest, made with Unity or not.

I think what gamers most care about in regard to this policy change is how it affects their favorite developers, and the future of those developer's games. They will be mad if those devs measurably suffer due to this. But without that, I don't see them wanting to hurt their favorite developers who didn't leave Unity, just to give Unity the middle finger.

 

Just reminds of the time I was learning Unity after C4, C4 after Torque, Blender after Maya, Maya after 3DS Max, 3DS Max after 3DSR4. It gets tiresome, yeah, but it also feels adventurous. It's like, yeah I've got this big project invested in the current tech, but in the meantime, I'll spend a few minutes/hours here and there, to learn this other thing, and eventually a last last last straw is pulled, and finally the transition happens.

 

Looks like they already did:
https://www.roadtovr.com/epic-unreal-engine-support-apple-vision-pro/
Apple and Epic Games had quiet some problems and still this happens? Unity is a dead man walking at this point. A good techno-feudalist will carefully watch this fire and when it's not too hot anymore, buy what's left.

I'll run with that one.

Short term. Any further than that I cant wait until all the great artists from your community offer your services elsewhere, less restrictive, where buying them would make sense to me.

To voice a spicy opinion: Not many not using C# for games want to get C# near their solution. Also you are wrong.

https://trademarks.justia.com/861/28/unity-86128413.html
There are still bits about being an engine.

Dude...you guys need to READ THE ROOM. Got a good laugh out of it, but are you serious about treating your base that way?

Is this an imperial units people thing to not know kilopond? Don't have any degree and my question would be what you use over there doing math stuff?

Unity splash screen has been a meme in gaming for years. You know it will be a bit wonky on the technical side, but you also know that most good artists not at unreal are at unity. It's a good trade off.

Thanks for the link, got lot of brain hurts trying to understand from googling already

Being silent for longer periods of time is part of the plan. Think trench warfare and prepare for artillery. That post about melon musk? Putting a helmet on a stick and holding it up.

 

New Asset Store Notifications

You Have New Notifications:

—Unity Fee for your games V.2.0.: with this version every time your games are installed 1000 times you'll have to send a bottle of brandy and some caviar to the Unity Staff. For 10000 times installed a box of champagne. Enjoy your fee!

 

If you look at the way Unity is handling questions from the Unity community and compare it with the way Godot are handling questions from the Unity community - it's night and day.

It's no wonder so many people are turning away from the dark side.

 

Man, I'm jealous. I'm around 16 hours in and don't even have something that compiles...

 

Can everyone just take a timeout for a minute so I can have some lunch?
All I've been doing in the last week has been doomscrolling this one thread.

 

Me too. Does it have a fee included?

 

Have you looked at PlayCanvas?

 

Me too...damned

 

nope - but will now

 

Sure they can and I am not forcing them to allied with us. I just state the fact that they are not and we should not care about them too. Be is stock crash or anything. We should encourage to have unity being destroyed without any concern to people working in it, or trying to sympathized with non existence employee who care about us

I will repeat. Their next year paycheck will come from US paying FEE as they PLANned. So they will not allied with us

And what we can do is only make sure that they will got ZERO if they let this continue

 

Best I can do is 20 cents per page refresh.