Drazula wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 21:01:
Everyone is missing something key: Unreal takes 5% of revenue ABOVE 1 million. Unity is taking 4% IF YOU MAKE 1 million or more. So if a game makes $2 million, Unreal would take 50,000 for $1 million, Unity would take $80,000 for $2 million. You don't break between Unreal and Unity until you get to $5 million in revenue.

They haven't announced the details of their plan yet. The 4% number is from a Bloomberg reporter interpreting a recording from a company meeting. And it's a ceiling still based on the install threshold fuckery. If I'm understanding correctly, a $2M game charging $20 (100K copies sold), that has an average of 2 installs per copy sold (200K installs), using the free version of Unity ($0.20 per install), would be looking at $40,000 to Unity. That number goes up depending on installs per copy sold, and down for a higher game price, non-free versions of Unity and fast front-loaded sales (and also sales in emerging markets). Best case for a $60 price point and 1 install/sale, all in one month (ignoring emerging markets), is $333 off the $2M.

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 12:38:

Overon wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 06:26:

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 02:47:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 21:39:

Jobastion wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 20:15:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 19:31:
"Unity will limit fees to 4% of a game’s revenue for customers making over $1 million"

4% of... not profit, but GROSS REVENUE is still a MAJOR RIPOFF TAX. 4% of profits wouldn't had been a big deal, but still a pretty hefty tax, but on gross revenue? That's a very big slice of profits.

LOL, do they think developers are stupid?

Especially when you can transfer to Unreal Engine in record time.

It's 1% less than Epic asks for.

What you're missing is that it's on top of what Unity already asks...

It's not the total price, it's just an ADDED FEE.

No one's missing that. Unity has a free tier and two paid tiers with flat per-user annual fees. And regardless, no one's licensing their game engine by charging a percentage of profit instead of revenue.

Trust has been broken. Nobody can trust the party member that betrayed you.

Ya, that's clear. But 4% of revenue in and of itself isn't outrageous. The meltdown should be over whether anything they say is worth consideration, since apparently they can just unilaterally change the terms of their agreements.

Everyone is missing something key: Unreal takes 5% of revenue ABOVE 1 million. Unity is taking 4% IF YOU MAKE 1 million or more. So if a game makes $2 million, Unreal would take 50,000 for $1 million, Unity would take $80,000 for $2 million. You don't break between Unreal and Unity until you get to $5 million in revenue.

Mr. Tact wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 19:03:

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 18:55:
When the cable company raises your fees or imposes a surprise data cap there's not much you can do.

Thankfully, I no long have cable, but I can't imagine they would get very far if they tried to retro-actively add charges for services.

At least in my area, Time Warner didn't originally charge a modem rental fee for Internet service, but started doing so in 2012. Data caps from AT&T started popping up around the same time after being unlimited for the first decade or so. Costs for cable went up, too, from $50 to $80 between about 2010 to 2020. T-Mobile home Internet recently made their autopay payment discount cash/debit-only. None of those were mutually agreed-upon changes. They can't retroactively take your money for services already paid for, but they can change their terms going forward.

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 18:55:
When the cable company raises your fees or imposes a surprise data cap there's not much you can do.

Thankfully, I no long have cable, but I can't imagine they would get very far if they tried to retro-actively add charges for services.

Mr. Tact wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 18:02:
Hmm. So do the devs actually sign a contract of some kind to get the free version? That would make sense to me. Which returns me to my original confusion which I commented on in one of the other topics on this subject. How can the contract be so vague/broad to allow changes like that? Don't these guys hire lawyers to review documents for their businesses?

Edit: Was writing the above while Orogogus was posting his. It still seems weird to me, like it is an over reach. But maybe I'm not knowledgeable enough to understand it...

I'm pretty sure it's just an electronic agreement, at least for the free version. I think you can still download it now and start playing around with it. Even with the paid versions, I don't think it's much different from any other service -- you agree to pay what they're asking, or you don't use their product. When the cable company raises your fees or imposes a surprise data cap there's not much you can do. I think it would be difficult for them to retroactively go after revenue already made, but I'd be surprised if it were illegal for them to go after future revenue, especially in the US.

Really big companies using Unity would have actual contracts written to meet their requirements, they wouldn't just be abiding by the same terms of service that anyone can get by signing up online. But they'd probably also already be paying a hefty premium for that.

Hmm. So do the devs actually sign a contract of some kind to get the free version? That would make sense to me. Which returns me to my original confusion which I commented on in one of the other topics on this subject. How can the contract be so vague/broad to allow changes like that? Don't these guys hire lawyers to review documents for their businesses?

Edit: Was writing the above while Orogogus was posting his. It still seems weird to me, like it is an over reach. But maybe I'm not knowledgeable enough to understand it...

Mr. Tact wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 17:26:
So, I spent some time thinking about this.. I've seen references to a free version of the engine. Surely it isn't really free? I would have guessed there was something like, "Yes, it is free unless your product generates X income. Then you need to compensate us." Is that the core of this? Or are they really the jerks they have made themselves look like?

https://mobidictum.com/game-industry/unitys-pricing-changes-what-will-happen-now/

The free option was for developers with less than $100K annual revenue. $420/seat/year was available up to $200K annual revenue. And the last option was $1500/seat/year. Those were supposed to increase to $480/$1800, but I don't know if that's still the case.

Mr. Tact wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 17:26:
So, I spent some time thinking about this.. I've seen references to a free version of the engine. Surely it isn't really free? I would have guessed there was something like, "Yes, it is free unless your product generates X income. Then you need to compensate us." Is that the core of this? Or are they really the jerks they have made themselves look like?

Unreal operates the same way. I think you pay nothing until you're over a mil. This creates a community of users and lets people become familiar with the software with the only expense being time. As their skill grows and they join a mid-sized or larger software developer, then Unreal starts to make money back on that investment. Kind of like the pusher on the corner giving the first hit for free.

MeanJim wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 15:52:
The whole thing has me wondering why Unit and other software tools like it are even entitled to a portion of revenue generated by a product it was used to create. I can't think of any other industry where the tools used to make a product get a cut of the revenue generated by that product. Do the makers of cinema cameras get a chunk of revenue from movies it was used to shoot? What about the lens and film makers? Does John Deer get a cut of every farmer's revenue that uses their tractors. What about the makers of the wrenches and other tools used to build that tractor, do they get a cut of John Deer's revenue for the sale of the tractor. What about the worker that used those tools to build that tractor, should they get some of that pie too?

Camera sales or uses don't scale with sales the way engine instances do. But film makers absolutely get more money when sales increase. It's called residuals. The more sales of a movie or each time a TV show is broadcast, the more instances of that performance are accessed and the more money an actor makes. Just like a game engine.

And John Deere is in fact trying to do SaaS and makes a lot of profit that way. They aggressively prevent people from creating competing diagnostic software by filing dubious copyright lawsuits.

This comment was edited on Sep 19, 2023, 17:51.

So, I spent some time thinking about this.. I've seen references to a free version of the engine. Surely it isn't really free? I would have guessed there was something like, "Yes, it is free unless your product generates X income. Then you need to compensate us." Is that the core of this? Or are they really the jerks they have made themselves look like?

GinRummy wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 13:04:
I believe, and I didn't see this pointed out, but it's only a fee on gross income AFTER your million. It's not like when your revenue hits 1 million you suddenly owe them $40,000. You only owe 4% on money made after that point, which is mostly only AAA titles.

Lots of indie games make over a million. A million is barely enough to fund three or four developers for the time it takes to make a game.

The whole thing has me wondering why Unit and other software tools like it are even entitled to a portion of revenue generated by a product it was used to create. I can't think of any other industry where the tools used to make a product get a cut of the revenue generated by that product. Do the makers of cinema cameras get a chunk of revenue from movies it was used to shoot? What about the lens and film makers? Does John Deer get a cut of every farmer's revenue that uses their tractors. What about the makers of the wrenches and other tools used to build that tractor, do they get a cut of John Deer's revenue for the sale of the tractor. What about the worker that used those tools to build that tractor, should they get some of that pie too?

I believe, and I didn't see this pointed out, but it's only a fee on gross income AFTER your million. It's not like when your revenue hits 1 million you suddenly owe them $40,000. You only owe 4% on money made after that point, which is mostly only AAA titles.

Overon wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 06:26:

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 02:47:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 21:39:

Jobastion wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 20:15:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 19:31:
"Unity will limit fees to 4% of a game’s revenue for customers making over $1 million"

4% of... not profit, but GROSS REVENUE is still a MAJOR RIPOFF TAX. 4% of profits wouldn't had been a big deal, but still a pretty hefty tax, but on gross revenue? That's a very big slice of profits.

LOL, do they think developers are stupid?

Especially when you can transfer to Unreal Engine in record time.

It's 1% less than Epic asks for.

What you're missing is that it's on top of what Unity already asks...

It's not the total price, it's just an ADDED FEE.

No one's missing that. Unity has a free tier and two paid tiers with flat per-user annual fees. And regardless, no one's licensing their game engine by charging a percentage of profit instead of revenue.

Trust has been broken. Nobody can trust the party member that betrayed you.

Ya, that's clear. But 4% of revenue in and of itself isn't outrageous. The meltdown should be over whether anything they say is worth consideration, since apparently they can just unilaterally change the terms of their agreements.

How does Unity plan to collect their cut on platforms like Xbox and PlayStation, given the evolving nature of their payment models?

Orogogus wrote on Sep 19, 2023, 02:47:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 21:39:

Jobastion wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 20:15:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 19:31:
"Unity will limit fees to 4% of a game’s revenue for customers making over $1 million"

4% of... not profit, but GROSS REVENUE is still a MAJOR RIPOFF TAX. 4% of profits wouldn't had been a big deal, but still a pretty hefty tax, but on gross revenue? That's a very big slice of profits.

LOL, do they think developers are stupid?

Especially when you can transfer to Unreal Engine in record time.

It's 1% less than Epic asks for.

What you're missing is that it's on top of what Unity already asks...

It's not the total price, it's just an ADDED FEE.

No one's missing that. Unity has a free tier and two paid tiers with flat per-user annual fees. And regardless, no one's licensing their game engine by charging a percentage of profit instead of revenue.

Trust has been broken. Nobody can trust the party member that betrayed you.

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 21:39:

Jobastion wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 20:15:

Simon Says wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 19:31:
"Unity will limit fees to 4% of a game’s revenue for customers making over $1 million"

4% of... not profit, but GROSS REVENUE is still a MAJOR RIPOFF TAX. 4% of profits wouldn't had been a big deal, but still a pretty hefty tax, but on gross revenue? That's a very big slice of profits.

LOL, do they think developers are stupid?

Especially when you can transfer to Unreal Engine in record time.

It's 1% less than Epic asks for.

What you're missing is that it's on top of what Unity already asks...

It's not the total price, it's just an ADDED FEE.

No one's missing that. Unity has a free tier and two paid tiers with flat per-user annual fees. And regardless, no one's licensing their game engine by charging a percentage of profit instead of revenue.

yonder, your response feels like maybe you were part of that “all hands on deck” meeting.

There’s literally no reason to charge per install, other than to go after freemium game makers. They have no foolproof way to tell if someone is installing on a new device, a pirated copy, or an array of virtual machines. If they did, as the dev of a sex party game pointed out, they’d sell THAT tech. But they don’t. No one at Unity gave even three seconds of thought toward someone abusing the install counting mechanism, or how it could be countered. This is plainly obvious from their response to devs asking that exact question, which was a claim that “we know what installs are legit and which aren’t”, which was a blatant lie. Someone from PR let that zinger fly without checking with their engineers first, and it went over as well as anyone with a brain cell imagined it would.

Unity just looked desperate at the announcement of this whole debacle, but now they’re just trying to bail out a ship they ran into a very obvious iceberg.

It doesn’t matter what they do even if they roll back all their changes to more favourable terms from before this or even better ones, trust is broken and no one will trust using this engine/company again.

You can’t screw over your clients with this level of anxiety and expect to survive.

I also heard it said once any business that stops looking for growth and starts looking for nickels and dimming their customer is circling the drain. (Sorry if you work there I know it’s not your fault, it’s those stupid bosses).

Donkey_Punch wrote on Sep 18, 2023, 19:28:
Was it all a bluff just to make these new terms seem like a "win"?

Considering how many developers are ditching Unity if that was their plan then I'd say that it backfired massively.