Unity's Newly Announced Install Fee Policy Already Causing Disharmony Amongst Devs

I really don't understand what the hell Unity was thinking with this move.

Well i guess that unity is probably going to be dropped by devs. To be honest i've never been a massive fan of the engine and i always felt that games like the golf club series always suffered because the engine just seems to be rigid and not very flexible. I'm not a developer or a programmer so i can only speak from a gamers perspective but whenever i see that unity logo i always sigh.

What I can’t believe is that it applies to all games currently out (not just new games yet to be released), it also applies to demos if they have the option to carry over to a full game, and for every recurring install (so if you delete and then reinstall later it’s a new fee, if you install on multiple devices it’s a new install). It’s just a scummy move. I see a lot of devs moving away from them.

[Edit: they since rolled this back to be only the first install (but still per device)]

Also of note is that the people at the top of the company have been selling their shares off for years, presumably seeing the way the wind is blowing, with nobody internal buying shares in the company at all.

They will backtrack by the end of the week I bet.

This is going to kill so many studios that used this since it'll take them time to learn new engines.

100% are going to backtrack and just make a smaller fee or something but oh boy, they sure lost the confidence of so many developers for sure.

Edit, what the actual f*** do they mean by "demos mostly won't trigger fees"? Like wtf??
Now even less demos will be released ffs, I can't believe they aren't even thinking.

I'm getting Wizard of the Coast OGL flashbacks all over again.

Less bloatware? … fishing for the potential upside to this.

Love the bit where John Riccitiello sells a bunch of shares not long before the news was announced. You couldn't make it up.

@Northern_munkey this is actually sad because there are very good games made in unity but people don't know the engine because devs actually pay for the best licence to have the right to take the splash screen out of their games. But games like Sea of Stars, Tails of Iron, The Messenger and Hollow Knight were made in Unity, you aren't wrong tho a lot of games that don't pay to take the unity screen out of their games are kind of not great.

This is bad in so many levels, devs will not only have to pay for demos, if people share their games is money, if people re install their games is money, if people pirate their games is money, if some mother f***kers don't like a game is exclusive they can buy the game install and uninstall and cost money. And not only that, Unity hasn't clarified if services are included that would really hurt in the indie department of PS+, Sea of Stars is made in Unity and is the best day one game in the short history of Extra.

I think this is a nasty trick from their ex EA ceo who called devs idiots if they weren't making current diablo like *****, to then backtrack and only establish revenue share like Unreal, trying to be the "good guys".

Personally I have always wanted to make an rpg since I started college and Unity was the tool that I was using but they just aren't a company to trust anymore, I will start to learn Godot this weekend.

@number1024 to be honest I don't know that much about Unreal because 2d has always been my area of interest and Unreal is kind of famous for being too convoluted for 2d, obviously is not bad at all just more difficult to use because of how massive the engine is but you are right about the pricing, the share and how big the engine is right now.

I think a lot of devs before this decided to use Unity instead of Unreal because of the amount of resources out there to learn Unity, the number is absurd in comparison with Unreal. So basically the community has been giving a lot of value to the engine that as you said hasn't evolved at Epic levels and now the company is spitting on the face of that community. That really really sucks.

Tell me you want customers to switch to the competition, without telling me you want customers to switch to the competition.

@GymratAmarillo how would they make money off of people pirating a unity game? (Nvm it's answered)

@Cherip-the-Ripper It tracks how many times a game gets installed that's how.

@Cherip-the-Ripper Because Unity are going to use their "proprietary data model" (god knows what that means) to track the number of times a game has been installed. They claim to have fraud detection policies which they are going to use as a starting point to eliminate pirated installs, but since they fail to disclose how that works, or how their "proprietary data model" works for that matter, we absolutely can't rely on their tracking being accurate and safe in any way.

So in essence, on top of a pirated copy being missed revenue for a developer, it's likely that it will now mean an extra (possibly repeated) cost for them as well. Just let that sink in.

@IAmAshCohen17 Probably; but by that point the damage will be done. If they are willing to try this once, what makes you (the general you) think they are not willing to try something similar next time? And the time after that? This will hopefully be an eye opener for those using Unity, and a considerable number will likely abandon ship even if everything is rolled back, because they fear something similar happening again. Fool me once and all that.

@Ainu20 ah man that sucks, I thought this could be a potential gateway to 'stopping' pirating (in whatever sense it is possible), but if it goes through fully or in a limited sense I feel it might make something like denuvo or even worse more prevalent again...
Thx for the reply G

Such a massively stupid idea by Unity.

Unity has been in decline for a while now. I guess they just wanted to hasten its demise and make as much as they can before it does. The CEO used to be the CEO of EA, so no surprise on the greed.

Yes,though there can be some poorer examples of Unity hames out there,there can be some nice ones too...as others have noted,it certainly was the preference for 2D games in particular!😕

Would hate to see devs feel compelled to yank older games off digital store shelves if Unity management continues the madness.

Wait so I can't install a game over and over until I bankrupt a publisher? Lame.

Now I feel guilty for the times I install a game (from PS+ or a F2P) and then never play it.