Unity to charge significantly more and possibly royalties for games with "gambling"?

Unity's first concern is avoiding legal troubles , as Mr Helgason was so kind to point out this is for real life gambling with real money .

If theirs some ultra rare bug in Unity that causes X to go wrong when you do Y, once in 100 times that's OK for normal gameplay . But when your dealing with money its different . Plus lets say Unity has to go beyond their normal support to help a customer get their gambling license , they have a right to charge more for that .

And as always , if you disagree with something Unity does your free to use something else . When all's said and done your still going to save money by going with unity .

 

Following that logic... any game with micro-transactions [what about paid or add-supported games] should be billed at the claimed 6 figures because it 'involves money'?

6 soon to be 7 apps on the market NOT using Unity says otherwise

 

Being a company, Unity has the right to expand itself any way it sees fit providing it stays within the Law. I am impressed that they have got behind the 'Occulus Rift' project and included 'Linux' in the supported platforms but supporting, getting behind and making money from the Gambling Industry is something else. The shining dollar must have blinded them. It has certainly changed my opinion of the company and I'm reassessing my association with Unity. Below is just one link to an article about the destructive power of Gambling Addiction..

http://seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2016026665_peirce28.html

 

Not all of us can have your mad skills . If this is what Unity feels it needs to do then so be it . I understand the logic since when your dealing with something like gambling things can get really complicated really REALLY fast .

 

Well, they either support it properly or they explicitly opt out. As a business I know which of those two I'd pick.

It's also worth pointing out that the developers don't have control over everything people do with Unity. They wanted to empower people to make stuff, and have never exercised control over what people are allowed to do with their tools. I might not like some of the stuff people make with it, but I don't want Unity to start actively controlling how people use the tools as a result. It's probably a necessity that some high-risk usages have special use cases in regards to licensing, but I think it'd suck big time if the license started telling me outright what I could and could not make, and I'm pretty sure it'd go against the Unity vision, too.

I'd personally prefer that they charged more for some people than started playing Big Brother.

What was the previous stance on gambling games?

 

As I said before,most gambling companies are NOT going to use Unity in that way. Do you think Adobe has gone out of their way to make Flash "gambling certified". Noops its the same old Flash as everyone else uses because the RNG isn't done in Flash. The legal issue is not an issue and what do you say to all companies that already has their gambling license, uses a certified platform and merely needs regular Unity to get better graphics. As the EULA is written they still have to pay more for services from UT that they in no way needs or gonna use. I know some people say "so what, pay up or get out" which is ofcourse true at the end of it all regardless of what issue you have with Unity

 

Gambling isn't exactly banned in the US. I worked on project involving online gambling, and though legal (and heavlily regulated), the biggest problem was making it worthwhile due to all the costs associated with fund transactions. (across state lines, rapid payment and small transactions). Once you combine the requires of US gaming laws with electronic transactions, it becomes challenging. In a brick world casino, its all cash which is easy. online, not so much.

 

Not really. There with in-game purchases/currency, there is an built in abstraction (sometimes many). For example take FarmVille. Anything you buy in game is a translated cost and (key point), has NO monetary value. Say you want to buy some special horsey in the game. You need to purchase FB "credits" with which you use those "credits" to buy FarmVille Bucks. Then you can use the FB to buy that sweet awesome horse. The FB Credits, FBs, and the horse have no monetary value. At no point along the path can you turn any of them back to cash. Additionally, you can't trade the horsey to your friends or transfer/trad FBucks or Credits, which prevents a secondary market (like in WoW).

You are actually purchasing an "upgrade" to the game. Once in the game, it is covered by the standard EULA. You could mis click and spend the bucks on something you didn't mean, lose them game of chance, have a random event take them, or lose them in a glitch. Commerce laws have no application once they enter the game, they are a game resource and subject only to the rules of the game.

If you buy $100 of in game currency and lose it to glitch or whatever, they are not legally bound to refund or compensate you. HOWEVER, almost all do, simply because it is the right thing to do, and they would eventually lose all their customers, for obvious reasons.

That is critical difference between "gambling" and games that rely on ongoing micro payments. With gambling, you put in $5, you need to be able to take $5 out without delay. Otherwise, it becomes a legal issue, not just a customer service issue.

 

This is gambling. It is highly regulated and you must have licence(s) to do so. If you are actually doing this, then you don't need to worry about you Unity licence, as you are probably breaking several state and federal laws, and will have to deal with first.

--

Breaks down to 3 simple cases:

1) You are running company that is a gambling site (or developing machines, etc.) that uses Unity, whose business is gambling (which of course you know because of all the regulatory paperwork you have filed) --- Contact Unity for more info.

2) You make games, people pay you (all at once or on going through micro transactions). You DO NOT pay money to the players. --- Not gambling, don't worry.

3) You makes games, people pay you, they gamble, you pay out, but aren't sure if you are gambling and/or don't have any gambling licences. --- Contact Unity after you get out federal prison.

 

Seems like quite an interesting challenge. Do you strip Unity to like a bare bones device/environment specific to reduce potential conflicts? Or something like a sandbox/overlord type process to catch things before they crash/fail? Just curious how you go about ensuring reliability on a complex environment and considering the actual games are written outside your control. Or is that part of additional license UT QA/Cert, or something like that?

 

Great... what about all the potential non-gambling situations where we're dealing with monetary value? So if I write a app that facilitates the sales of goods services I can expect a 6 figure cost at the next EULA change?

I have a problem of *trust* - I simply don't know what decision unity is going to make in the next 5 mins, and how that's going to impact me or my clients. In the past it's usually not affected the core product - e.g. failure to update GUI, Mono, Rendering [until recently] - but now their potentially taking away functionality that previously existed.

I'll state upfront that I've not developed a gambling game, though on occasion clients have sounded me out on it.

1) Why can't one separate 'pretty graphics' from 'game logic'? What's the problem?

2) Why the focus on specialised casino hardware in the rationale? You're not preventing embedded gambling apps, but *all* gambling apps.

Which is true for many possible uses of Unity - what are you materially doing differently that you didn't do before and is nessisary for all gambling apps - but isn't necessary for other apps dealing with monetary issues?

 

Well it works fine with Adobe Flash for Europes biggest online slotprovider. No legal problems there whatsoever. Cause as I've said the game isn't calculated in the flashclient. The flashclient is merely fed a message from the Gameserver (i.e Win:1$) and the flashclient visually represents this message. But thats Flash ofcourse, maybe Unity has some limitations preventing this from happening. Atleast I know Flash don't need to charge 6 figures for their license but unfortunatly is has limitions grahicswise that Unity don't have so pros and cons

 

Which would be fine, if that was the case - however to date all I've seen is the presumption this is the case - no evidence that it actually is.

There are both browser flash based clients out there - did those developers also pay an equivalent to the alleged six figures? If not, why not?

You don't have to have the answers, but it would be nice if *somebody* did.

 

THIS

Keep in mind if Gambling applications NEED source code you would have to buy a Unity source code license .
No one is trying to scam you that's just the way it is .

 

For lots of gambling implementations Unity WON'T be handling things that needs to be regulated under gambling laws so UT is in the clear from a legal standpoint (online casino not landbased machines). Many companies will NEVER EVER use Unity for their RNG or any other game related tasks that is regulated under Gambling laws, they have already got that in the clear With AAMS, AGCC, LGA or other jurisdictions where a certified RNG is key to get a gambling license and will implement any third party software (Like flash) so that it is totally independent from their gambling license. Unity or Flash is just a client.

- Are you saying that UT will be able to contain the RNG?
- For what jurisdictions/countries have you got the UT RNG Certified?
- Will UT be able to run other RNG (ie the Fortuna RNG) that is already used by most Casino Providers, or are we talking about a UT RNG built solely in UT?

I love Unity as a tool and have been lobbying for you guys about your software for years now but you just made that work a whole lot harder for us to use it in development now.

 

Then the question is whether or not you should care? If Filto's correct and U3D doesn't have to be heavily audited [e.g. source code access] if used as a thin client then what is U3D's justification for stepping in? Remembering that plenty of potential use-cases of Unity could be heavily audited, but only this one has a EULA against it. If the regulator decides that U3D has to be examined, then obviously you'd need to be contacted regardless of the EULA.

Edit: Took a look at the EULA - http://unity3d.com/company/legal/eula

Turns out that embedded devices are already restricted [why?] so that excuse for the gambling license is now extremely tedious. Also turns out that they restrict streaming content [ala onlive]. These appear to be new to Unity 4's EULA.

So my apologies, apparently Unity *is* starting to restrict what one can do - not just in the gambling field.

 

Unity 3.5 does not have any restriction.
Let work in Unity 3.5 then.

Till they will realise the 4.0 is too restrictive and/or a new competitor will permit gambling / streaming / embedding without the greedy clauses they imposed.

All the other "posts" of unity developers are pathetic: personalised team for source code inspection? It is like that to run a gaming machine now is necessary to show the source code of the kernel of Windows... and may be the source code of the firmware of the chip that is producing the sounds.

Greedy ! Start to call the things with the real name.

 

That's... uhm... tough.

 

perhaps, these people know that gambling usually generates the most earning and thus decides to up the royalty. Personally I don't think it's fair at all even though I don't have any intention to make one.

 

Fine Superpig, can you please tell me which country you are speaking about? Which authority? I have the feeling your assertion is very imprecise: generally is not but I am happy to be corrected. So please post some references to support what you are saying.

"All people working in gambling knows that the source code of Flash is not needed like the source code of the operating system etc." : this is my assertion! Confute it if you can. Anyhow U3D wants your money even without the source code request according with the EULA 4.x

Nothing wrong in asking money... business is business but I don't like the unclear message that the company is giving.

 

Wow! Point 4.1 of the Adobe EULA is rather impressive, scary, possibly evil, and it seems incredibly stupid for them (though I suppose it's not, but I don't get the point). I had no idea about that.

 

Since I only discovered the wider implications of the EULA after this thread had already become fairly large, and because of the wider impact, I've decided to create a new thread to cover them explicitly:

http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/161689-Unity4-Class-Warfare-New-EULA-restrictions

 

poker tournaments could be seen the same way as a gaming tournament or sports competition. Pay an entry fee into the tournament and then play. During the tournament you’re not actually gambling because you can’t cashout whenever you like. You’ve already paid the fee and only have a chance to win a prize at the end.

no different to sport. Most sports have team entry fees etc.

PS. Seems I’m way late to this thread and conversation has moved on. Ignore

 

Pretty sure above post is spam