Posted on 09/28/2023 2:01:35 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Software company Unity's plan to charge game developers is met with a bitter backlash, which insiders say will severely harm the firm's reputation.
Their language was salty and the message was clear: Game developers believed their livelihoods were under threat and they were not going to accept it.
Unity, a US company whose software is used to create and run thousands of games including smash hits like Pokemon GO and Genshin Impact, announced on Sep 12 new fees for developers. The firm was going to charge 20 cents every time a Unity-backed game was installed on any device, a move that analysts warned could collapse studios and nix new releases.
Ten days later, after a spirited and often vulgarity-laden fightback from studios and developers, Unity rowed back some of the changes. But for many developers, the damage may be irreparable.
(Excerpt) Read more at channelnewsasia.com ...
This was almost as big a gaffe as the Bud Light fiasco, just one that effected a smaller group and not the general public. Unity really messed up.
I actually started working on a little Unity project as a hobby a couple months ago, and after this happened I am glad I was only a little ways into development because it will be simple to rebuild it on another engine.
They might have gotten away with a penny per purchase, and still made a ton of money.
The problem is that they want to keep charging people for something they already bought.
I actually can see their view, but they certainly messed up on the implementation.
In order to continue to fix bug, make new features, etc.. they need to be able to employ people.
Yeah, sure, I don’t think anyone objects to them saying “we need to make more money to keep our operations going”.
They are objecting to “we can only think of one way to make money and we don’t care if it could be abused to bankrupt our customers (developers)”.
Good to see, far too many kids getting caught up in that crap.
They didn’t buy anything.
Unity is free for the first $100,000 in sales.
Steam store takes 30% per game sale, so on a $60 sale that is $18, but developers complain about $.20 per game.
The original US Federal Income tax was originally one half of one percent of people making over 1 million dollars a year.
In early 1900’s that was about a dozen people.
Look where we are now.
It may only be 20 cents, but that’s just the foot in the door.
I am not against them trying to figure out a new revenue stream- I am a software engineer for a living and I get it. I’m not even against this 20 cents.
But once you’ve built a product and it has achieved market saturation there is no where else to go but down. Unless you find a way to keep charging people for stuff you’ve already sold them.
This is why Mickeysoft is now a SUBSCRIPTION service for Microsoft Office.
20c per device.
So you could have sold a game ages ago… and the get a bill for downloads made once someone upgrades a phone/tablet etc.
Unity walked that back. Fee now only applies to newer game engine versions.
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