Unity Unveils New Pricing Model - You OK, Ludeon??

[Morkonan]

Well...

https://unity.com/pricing-updates

https://gameworldobserver.com/2022/09/13/unity-announces-price-increases-to-reflect-the-value-of-its-products

So, yeah, like... You gonna be OK with that, Tynan?

I assume that Rimworld is locked into an older version and that this new change isn't retroactive to older licensing. But, there could be some new/other bits I'm not aware of. Maybe? Subscriptions? No more customer service help-desk hotline? :)

And, I just gotta say it...

"No discounts! No sales! We know what we've got!" - Unity

:)

UPDATE 9/22 - ♥♥♥ Culpa, New Plan, Fireside Chat:

Apology letter, here: https://blog.unity.com/news/open-letter-on-runtime-fee

New Plan, better than the old plan: https://unity.com/pricing-updates

Fireside Chat at 4pm, 9/22: youtube.com/watch?v=qyLcI5O9iUY

Summary: New pricing plan, capped at 2.5% of monthly revenue for applicable devs, individual use/installs still "tracked" but self-reported by devs, "initial engagments" is Newspeak for "first install from a distribution channel on a device." So, individual users and individual devices, now adding in unique distribution channels, are part of the Unity lexicon, now, and we might see their inclusion in more "agreements" in the future.

(All this is subject to change, as evidenced... even though Unity has "pledged" not to attempt retroactive policy changes in the future.)

<Older updates, below>

]UPDATED 9/15 : 'Cause stuff changes, yo?

Some updated discussion linkage-

https://blog.unity.com/news/plan-pricing-and-packaging-updates

https://massivelyop.com/2023/09/13/unity-begins-backtracking-on-new-runtime-fees-but-it-hasnt-addressed-indies/

https://www.axios.com/2023/09/13/unity-runtime-fee-policy-marc-whitten

Popcorn available at the Help Desk. Subscription Required, .20 monies per popped kernel, "Popped" subject to change and third-party arbitration, you owe me .20 monies for reading this.

Update (9/18) - Sorry/notsorry psuedo "stay tuned" ♥♥♥ culpa Twitted:

https://twitter.com/unity/status/1703547752205218265

(Expect changes)

On brighter news the Caves of Qud dev got it migrated to Godot in 14 hours and it's running fnie:

https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/16lphwe/caves_of_qud_dev_ports_his_game_from_unity_to/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Unity3D/comments/16lrem2/caves_of_qud_dev_migrated_game_core_out_of_unity/

U seein' this, Ludeon? ;)

[Twilight]

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

There is no "qualifying." Anyone can get Unity Industry.

https://blog.unity.com/industry/introducing-unity-industry

"Industry is identified as a non-games, non-entertainment customer. "

Sure sounds like there is qualifications on what type of customer you are.

[Astasia]

Publicado originalmente por Wild 7s:

Sadly, the most likely explanation is that this not a change made to benefit Unity as a company or adjust to new developments in the market

This change is literally coming with major improvements to the engine, including AI model support, an overhaul of the asset manager, and significantly improved support for team based remote development.

The rest of your post wasn't really relevant. Unity is a service, devs are free to cancel the service at any point. When gamepass increases in price people don't line up to sue them. The services Unity provides are constantly being improved and the price is constantly increasing. This time instead of a flat price increase like the last few times they are instead adding a buffer between tiers. If you are a tiny dev using the free version of Unity and their statistics determine you have made over $100k in revenue in the past year, you aren't instantly forced to pay for pro, you can stick with the free version and maybe pay $100-500 or whatever based on how far over expectations you go, and it's up to you now when it is worthwhile to upgrade to pro. This is on top of the threshold being increased to $200k from $100k, this is all a very good thing for most small devs.

Publicado originalmente por Twilight:

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

There is no "qualifying." Anyone can get Unity Industry.

https://blog.unity.com/industry/introducing-unity-industry

"Industry is identified as a non-games, non-entertainment customer. "

Sure sounds like there is qualifications on what type of customer you are.

That is talking about the "industry customer" term. The industry tier was originally aimed at industry customers.

The industry tier includes everything from Unity Pro and Enterprise, including all the game related features and support. Developers can upgrade and downgrade between industry tier and lower tiers. There is nothing that says somebody paying for the industry tier can't make and sell games.

[Steelfleece]

There sure are a lot of corporate law experts in this forum. I'm just gonna keep an eye on this thread for when the situation is clarified down the line so I know who's full of it.

[pierre]

well 2023 just became just a little worse

[Over9000Cats]

All you need to pay attention to is news from the game itself

[Twilight]

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

That is talking about the "industry customer" term. The industry tier was originally aimed at industry customers.

The industry tier includes everything from Unity Pro and Enterprise, including all the game related features and support. Developers can upgrade and downgrade between industry tier and lower tiers. There is nothing that says somebody paying for the industry tier can't make and sell games.

https://unity.com/legal/editor-terms-of-service/software/faq

Why are they distinguished from one another?

Specifically, we have distinguished Industry customers from educational, games, and entertainment customers as Unity Industry is a new bundled offering that is tailored to Industry customers, for whom specific terms will apply. Details and specific financial thresholds for Unity Industry are outlined below. These terms will not apply to Entertainment customers. Financial thresholds of Unity Plans for all other customers remain unchanged. There are also some general changes for all customers to align on updates to our business.

Still looks like you're wrong.

[hardy_conrad]

Based on what I've heard, it is illegal because by counting previous installs to calculate future fees they're retroactively changing the terms of an agreed to contract. Mind you rule of law is pretty much a fiction these days. Just hire the right lobbyists and even if a court finds against you the "penalty" is a fraction of the revenue you've generated so at worst a tiny cost of doing business. Only little people go to jail.

Long story short, something something darkest timeline something.

[Raymond]

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

Nobody is going to be hit hard by this fee because they can just upgrade to industry. Unity has 4 tiers, the free version is mostly meant for hobbyists and part-time devs, pro is meant for small devs trying to make a living from their games, enterprise is for small teams, industry is for larger teams making serious games. Industry has no install fee and costs barely twice as much as pro, almost every serious unity game release is going to be made with the industry version, chances are Ludeon is already running it.

bro, you can't even read mine and other people's comment properly when they were quoting straight from the unity announcement. I already pointed out that the fees is recurring charge for every download right after the game made $1 million USD in one year, someone already pointed out that all gaming development companies do not qualify for industrial version. Not even the replies comments made by developers from the Unity's X post that you quoted earlier to me even know how tf is their data model gonna charge the fees fairly.

Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise: The Unity Runtime Fee will apply to games made with Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise that have made $1,000,000 USD or more in the last 12 months AND have at least 1,000,000 installs.

I am not sure why you even quoting this when no where is this quote said anything about when they gonna stop charging fees per install after the game reach $1 million sale within one year. In case you are just wondering if Ludeon qualified for this fee, they only need to sell the next dlc to 52000 people, the subscriber number of an average major mod, before they start charging Ludeon. And here is the thing, Unity only mentioned the conditions this fees would apply to a game, they never ONCE said (I dare you to check everything in their announcement) anything about WHEN the the fees gonna stop applying to the game, or if it will ever stop charging at all. This means that even if the game is off the shelf, unity will still be charging developers for the pirate versions of their game.

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

To just assume everyone behind Unity is brainless and is going to break the law and get themselves in trouble is ridiculous, this is a multi-billion dollar company with teams of lawyers on their side, they know what they can do.

Except unity's CEO is ex-CEO of EA, the guy who ruined a major gaming series with all the worse microtransaction model that was so evil it caught EU's attention and made a law to ban it. This guy ain't afraid to ruin unity just to scrouged as much money as he can for his shareholders.

[Voldrath]

Darth Vader Unity: "I have altered the deal. Pray I do not alter it any further."

[Astasia]

Publicado originalmente por Twilight:

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

That is talking about the "industry customer" term. The industry tier was originally aimed at industry customers.

The industry tier includes everything from Unity Pro and Enterprise, including all the game related features and support. Developers can upgrade and downgrade between industry tier and lower tiers. There is nothing that says somebody paying for the industry tier can't make and sell games.

https://unity.com/legal/editor-terms-of-service/software/faq

Why are they distinguished from one another?

Specifically, we have distinguished Industry customers from educational, games, and entertainment customers as Unity Industry is a new bundled offering that is tailored to Industry customers, for whom specific terms will apply. Details and specific financial thresholds for Unity Industry are outlined below. These terms will not apply to Entertainment customers. Financial thresholds of Unity Plans for all other customers remain unchanged. There are also some general changes for all customers to align on updates to our business.

Still looks like you're wrong.

The "specific terms" is that "industry customers" that make over $1 million annually can only use the industry tier of unity and can't downgrade. Other uses can downgrade to pro or enterprise from industry if they want. That is why the customer types are different.

Publicado originalmente por YariMurai:

I am not sure why you even quoting this when no where is this quote said anything about when they gonna stop charging fees per install after the game reach $1 million sale within one year.

I even bolded the part you needed to read, but you ignored it. Why?

It's not 1 million within one year, it specifically says "in the last 12 months." If your game has not earned over $1 million in the last 12 months the fees do not apply, it doesn't matter if it earn $20 million 13 months ago, that is not "in the last 12 months." This is basic English and can not be interpreted any other way, the wording is specific. Every month they determine if a game is "eligible" for fees, if it hasn't earned revenue above the threshold within the past 12 months it is not eligible for fees for that month.

If it was a permanent thing that always applied after hitting a threshold they wouldn't add a time related qualifier to it, they would just say "if the game earned more than $1 million" and leave it at that. It says "in the last 12 months" because it only applies while a game is selling well and they aren't going to charge devs money for installs of old dead games.

It also looks like the FAQ was updated to squash most of the other concerns. They are only basing their estimates off one install per device. Reinstalls don't count. Effectively one charge per customer, which they should have just said as much from the start.

[Ann☆ﾟ.*･｡]

here's the thing. if the developers dont like the extra 20 cent cost for each installation on successful game they can just jump to unreal, oh wait, you have to rewrite entire code there and have to pay royalty fee for revenue? oh, how about those free to use engines that's behind in terms of technology because you don't donate, duh? or make your own game engine?

this topic is funny. if the teams ever ran out of fund to make awesome games they can start crowdfunding, do another projects, have side job, etc. while using free unity until they release it for one year.

[Blood]

This is a joke. Rimworld could easily get 200k downloads in a day.

[Chip]

Voldrath is right. They may change the agreement again in the future to charge more without notice.

[The Blind One]

Publicado originalmente por Astasia:

It also looks like the FAQ was updated to squash most of the other concerns. They are only basing their estimates off one install per device. Reinstalls don't count. Effectively one charge per customer, which they should have just said as much from the start.

That makes a lot more sense then and isn't unreasonable. Thanks for informing us Astasia

[AldouzTek]

Rimworld DLC
- Royalty
- Ideology
- Biotech
- Unreal