Developers are irate after Unity introduces new per-game install fee

[Alfonso Maruccia]

WTF?! Unity is a cross-platform game engine launched in 2005 with the goal of "democratizing" game development, seeking to make it accessible to a broader range of developers. Nearly 20 years later, some of these developers are expressing their frustration and disappointment over Unity's newly revealed business model.

Unity recently unveiled a new "Unity Runtime Fee" that is set to take effect on January 1, 2024. Under this new model, game developers and studios will be required to pay a flat rate of $0.20 for each new "install" of their game. This royalty system will come into play once a game surpasses a certain revenue threshold.

The announcement has garnered substantial criticism, with very few developers viewing Unity's approach as a viable or sustainable business opportunity. Unity clarified that each time a game developed with the Unity Editor is downloaded, it results in the installation of a "Unity Runtime." Unity suggests that the initial install-based fee will enable game creators to retain ongoing financial benefits from player engagement.

The company has revised its FAQs to align with the modifications in its pricing structure. The Unity Runtime Fee will be imposed on games that have generated $200,000 or more in revenue over the past 12 months and have accumulated at least 200,000 lifetime installations. While subscription plans have been altered to provide "extra value" for developers, they have not been discontinued.

Consequently, the Unity Runtime Fee will be applicable to games created using both the Unity Personal and Unity Plus plans. It's worth noting that Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise plans have distinct, higher thresholds.

Unity's initial blog post had a significant impact on the game developer community, primarily because the company's explanation of how "game installs" are determined was quite unclear. As a result, Unity was compelled to provide further clarification on this matter, which only exacerbated the situation. The company has now stated that it will utilize its own "proprietary data model" to accurately calculate the distribution of Unity Runtime for a particular project.

Unity confirmed that when customers reinstall a game, redownload it, or change their hardware, the aforementioned proprietary data model will count these actions as additional game installations. Moreover, the new per-install fee will also apply to demos if developers choose to offer a way to "upgrade" the demo to a full game installation. Unity claims that it will have the capability to identify pirated game copies and avoid charging an additional fee because they already employ "fraud detection practices."

Follow up: Unity closes two offices over "credible death threat" amid runtime fee and insider trading controversies

Unity later attempted to clarify that the new royalty model would only impact a small subset of current Unity Editor users. It appears that charity games and bundles are exempt from the Runtime Fee. Nevertheless, game developers have been extremely outspoken, expressing strong opposition to Unity's new business plan.

The prevailing consensus is that the new plan is "utterly horrible" or "horrendous." Many developers view it as imposing an unsustainable additional cost burden, and they anticipate that many will switch to a different engine like Unreal as soon as possible. One developer remarked that the Unity Runtime Fee appears to have been devised by financial experts, and they implored Unity to reverse this decision immediately, asserting that "every dev I know is likely jumping ship tomorrow."

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/100137-unity-introduces-new-fee-game-installs-developers-irate.html

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Pure greed from a company that cant manage its own finances and wants developers to give them MORE money to continue burning.

 

[Dimitriid]

Retroactive changes are kind of the worst part: Since it will demand a big cut from big names like Microsoft I am positive that if they insist on going through with it they'll be sued: you can't change the terms of a license agreement to apply retroactively to before the new terms were introduced and potentially agreed to, should be pretty illegal to do and not something they'll be able to defend in court.

 

[m4a4]

Retroactive changes are kind of the worst part: Since it will demand a big cut from big names like Microsoft I am positive that if they insist on going through with it they'll be sued: you can't change the terms of a license agreement to apply retroactively to before the new terms were introduced and potentially agreed to, should be pretty illegal to do and not something they'll be able to defend in court.

The install numbers aren't retroactive. The installs after the threshold only apply after Jan 1st (as in, they don't owe anything from installs before then)......

Edit: Made the context more clear so I stop seeing out of context replies.

 

[m4a4]

It's like companies are vying for the most stupid f***ing decision they can make to kill their brand the fastest this year.
No serious game developers or publishers are going to ever use Unity again if they want it to be successful (and pitching a game to run on Unity is dead). They now have no trust, even if they come to their senses and walk this back.

I don't understand how they looked at the industry standard of revenue sharing and thought to themselves that they can come up with something better like this (without significant backlash)

and Unity Plus plans

They also more quietly announced that Plus plans (the more affordable one for small/indie studios) are being removed. Yet another middle finger to their customers.

 

[RudyBob]

Whatever it is it's terrible that the game model has come to this. Rock and Roll died in the 60's gaming died in the 90's

 

[Burty117]

What a dumb move, I can see Epic's UE5 about to get a load more developers on it!

 

[brucek]

Unity might as well add two huge banners to their web page and marketing materials: "Our solution is useless for high-volume distributions like Game Pass and Epic Game Store giveaways"; and "Our cut is unilaterally renegotiable by us at any time". (It's also pretty bad for games that offer multi-platform player clients like phone vs. tablet vs. PC, which is what Unity was supposed to be good at in the first place...)

Which is another way of saying they should just skip to the next step and put up a huge banner saying "Going out of business soon".

 

[toooooot]

I have read about it on another, well 2 websites.
The way it is implemented is the way to literally suck
as much as possible from developers.
And as if it was not paid already.
The guy who is in charge used to work for EA if I am not mistaken.
If so, it makes sense

 

[Gars]

Unity is great as free engine/platform
then comes companies like EA and UBi and exploit that free platform
so, in the end of the day, you should rethink the comments above
maybe they (unity) just want to survive

 

[Tom Yum]

Unity confirmed that when customers reinstall a game, redownload it, or change their hardware, the aforementioned proprietary data model will count these actions as additional game installations.

That is the most insane part of this debacle. How the hell does it makes sense for Unity to charge developers when a game user re-downloads the game or upgrade their hardware?

 

[Kotters]

>pirate game
>delete it and download it again 9 more times
>company loses $600

 

[kiwigraeme]

Unity run one of those click advert scams - to get money out of Google -

Buy qualifying cheap games when discounted and install repeatedly - hell just trigger start and canx d/l and repeat could make billions /s

Why would Steam want to do the admin for this - unless they get a cut

 

[m4a4]

Unity is great as free engine/platform
then comes companies like EA and UBi and exploit that free platform
so, in the end of the day, you should rethink the comments above
maybe they (unity) just want to survive

Unity is not free for big corporations. They have limits to who can use it with a free license.

And then, why wouldn't they just do something sane like a revenue share (which other engines do)?

You didn't think this comment through...

 

[human7]

They aren't retroactive. The installs only apply after Jan 1st......

It's retroactive in a very real sense, actually. Let's say you are a game developer. You spent time and effort making your game, you put it on sale, and it's been doing okay over the last year or so. Now, you did all this without having to pay any royalty or install fees, and that's probably one of the reasons you chose to use Unity in the first place.

But now, Unity changed their license. Unless you take your game down from stores, future installs of the Unity Runtime, which has to be installed for your game to run, will cost you money. You didn't sign up for this when you made or published your game. And the license doesn't care which version of Unity Runtime is bundled with your game. You're on the hook for it.

That is what's retroactive about this change.

It wouldn't surprise me to see this get challenged and thrown out in court, though, at least for games that were published before these changes were announced.

 

[m4a4]

It's retroactive in a very real sense, actually. Let's say you are a game developer. You spent time and effort making your game, you put it on sale, and it's been doing okay over the last year or so. Now, you did all this without having to pay any royalty or install fees, and that's probably one of the reasons you chose to use Unity in the first place.

But now, Unity changed their license. Unless you take your game down from stores, future installs of the Unity Runtime, which has to be installed for your game to run, will cost you money. You didn't sign up for this when you made or published your game. And the license doesn't care which version of Unity Runtime is bundled with your game. You're on the hook for it.

That is what's retroactive about this change.

It wouldn't surprise me to see this get challenged and thrown out in court, though, at least for games that were published before these changes were announced.

As was originally implied

Since it will demand a big cut.. ..you can't change the terms of a license agreement to apply retroactively to before the new terms were introduced and potentially agreed to

They won't demand a big cut retroactively, only on installs after Jan 1st.

That much Unity wasn't stupid enough to try and imply.

 

[human7]

As was originally implied

They won't demand a big cut retroactively, only on installs after Jan 1st.

That much Unity wasn't stupid enough to try and imply.

Sure, it doesn't apply to installs retroactively. That doesn't mean it doesn't change the conditions to which developers agreed to release their games under retroactively.

 

[arrowflash]

I've not been following this too closely, but Unity seems to have clarified (read: backpedaled) that they will only charge a one-time fee for first-time installs. Reinstalls and redownloads will not be charged. Unless they have backtracked on that.

 

[m4a4]

That doesn't mean it doesn't change the conditions to which developers agreed to release their games under retroactively.

What part of any of my comments are you replying to..?

 

[Eldritch]

Massive Monster, one of the most beloved developers is moving away from Unity and they have stated they will stop sale of Cult of the lamb from 01.January due to Unity fees.

Way to go unity, not only did you tried to charge unviable fees in a ridiculous model but your retrospective pricing also destroyed any semblance of trust and goodwill that could have been there. Even if they backtrack on pricing model, the retrospective pricing change ensures no one will ever release for unity, if they have choice.

 

[kinetix]

Doesn't Unity have a free version, without payment requirements? or did they eliminate that? I ask because for years I have been somewhat disconnected from the economic issue in game engines/sdk/frameworks, I only follow the technical aspects (maintaining my old relationships with computer graphics).

 

[kinetix]

>pirate game
>delete it and download it again 9 more times
>company loses $600

not "loss", but rather "do not win"

 

[BSim500]

>pirate game
>delete it and download it again 9 more times
>company loses $600

They didn't seem to think about GOG versions of games either:-

Unity : "We'll count and will charge for every reinstall"

Me : Downloads GOG offline installer once, disconnects Internet, then installs, uninstalls and reinstalls the game 100,000x over whilst laughing in DRM-Free...

 

[loki1944]

Retroactive changes are kind of the worst part: Since it will demand a big cut from big names like Microsoft I am positive that if they insist on going through with it they'll be sued: you can't change the terms of a license agreement to apply retroactively to before the new terms were introduced and potentially agreed to, should be pretty illegal to do and not something they'll be able to defend in court.

Wonder if they had fine print to allow this as a loophole in older agreements.

 

[Puiu]

As was originally implied

They won't demand a big cut retroactively, only on installs after Jan 1st.

That much Unity wasn't stupid enough to try and imply.

Retroactively as in it applies to games that were made before this change in the terms of service.

It's a stupid change which is hard to track and justify (how do I know if the number of installs is correct?) and if they don't backtrack they'll loose a lot of developers. I was currently testing some VR stuff with Unity, but I'm thinking of switching now.