Game developers aren't happy with a new policy from Unity that will cost developers a small fee every time someone installs a game built on Unity's game engine.

The Unity Runtime Fee is scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2024, and it’s been universally panned by developers on social media since its announcement earlier today.

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For instance, if a free-to-play game has made $200,0000 in the last 12 months but has millions of people installing it, the developer could end up owing Unity more than the profit earned from in-game purchases.

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Others are worried this could lead some smaller developers who built their games on Unity to pull titles from digital storefronts to prevent more people from racking up downloads.

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“I bet Steam, Epic, Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft will love having waves of developers pulling their games,” writes Forest from Among Us developer Innersloth Games. “Innersloth has always paid Unity appropriately for licenses and services we use. I’m not a discourse guy, but this is undue and will force my hand.”

Other developers are actually asking people online to not install their game built in Unity, with Paper Trail developer Huenry Hueffman writing, “if you buy our Unity game, please don’t install it… demos also count, dont install this demo, you’ll literally bankrupt me”.

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Unity also clarified that the fee will not apply to charity games or charity bundles. Unity defended the pricing model, saying it’s designed to only charge developers who have already found financial success.

We only succeed when you succeed. Our 5% royalty model only kicks in after your first $1M in gross revenue, meaning that if you make $1,000,001 you owe us 5 cents. And this is per title!
Also, revenue generated from the Epic Games Store will be excluded from that 5% royalty.

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Unity has been under pressure lately, laying off hundreds of employees in the first half of 2023. Riccitiello also came under fire in 2022 for referring to developers who don’t focus on microtransactions as the “biggest f*cking idiots” before apologizing. Featured in everything from Cuphead to Beat Saber to Pokemon Go, it has been lauded for ease of use. However, trust in the platform has been declining over the years, leading many developers to look to alternatives.

  • enkers@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    95·
    2 years ago

    Riccitiello also came under fire in 2022 for referring to developers who don’t focus on microtransactions as the “biggest f*cking idiots” before apologizing.

    Classic CEO brainrot. There’s more to life than just maximizing profit.

      • dylanTheDeveloper@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        2 years ago

        Also if theirs a engine bug you can crack it open and fix it yourself, handy if you’re not a AAA studio who has epic Devs on speed dial. Though I believe you do have to share any code alterations with epic if it’s hosted on a private repo

    • Dawn@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      2 years ago

      I can see why you would think that, but there’s alot of stuff unreal just isn’t that good at, things like 2d games are a massive struggle to work with in unreal, so it’ll gain more popularity, but mainly from devs making 3d games with a focus on high graphics

  • Saledovil@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    13·
    2 years ago

    I’m confused. I’ve never licensed a game engine, but I figure you’d write what charges you pay into the contract, and as far as I know, you can’t just add additional charges in later without renegotiating the contract. At least, you’d have no way to enforce those. So I’m sort of at a loss how this is even supposed to work.

    • Mandarbmax@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      2 years ago

      The game engine is licensed as a subscription. When January 1st rolls around and the dev’s meed to renew their subscription it will have these new terms. Their options are to accept this or to never update their games again.

      • Saledovil@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        4·
        2 years ago

        Makes sense. I hope the unity guys come to their senses. This whole thing seems rather self-destructive on the company’s part. Unity is far from being a monopoly, with one competitor being free and open source (Godot). And pulling stunts like these, even if you walk them back later, does not engender trust.

        • Mandarbmax@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          2 years ago

          For sure. Proprietary software, and especially subscription licensed proprietary software, is a blight.

  • ott@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    9·
    2 years ago

    Can someone explain to me why they might have gone with this strange pricing model instead of the very simple revenue sharing model that Epic uses?

    • English Mobster@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      2 years ago

      Because a lot of mobile games are made in Unity, and mobile has a higher rate of people who install and then uninstall without really playing the game. People also install things by mistake on mobile, thinking they’re something else.

      So by charging based on installs, they’re able to squeeze developers a lot more (especially mobile game developers). Competitor engines like Unreal don’t run very well on mobile.

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      2·
      2 years ago

      Something something $$$.

      But yeah, revenue sharing makes a ton more sense. Maybe have a per-seat option up to $X in revenue, and a revenue percent above that amount.

  • HidingCat@kbin.social
    7·
    2 years ago

    Just read some details, it’s a monthly fee too? Wouldn’t that really screw over single-player games which don’t do recurring revenue?

  • geosoco@kbin.socialOP
    7·
    2 years ago

    This article has some new quotes and details. I know we have the other thread going, but this would get buried over there.