Unity will introduce a fee for each game installation

Although the Unity engine is not generally used for the largest AAA games, it is still a popular choice for developers of small games or mobile games. But in society as such, things are not very good. For example, last year it bought a company that had a history of developing malware, and this year there were two large waves of layoffs (first 300 and then 600 employees). However, new news about the cost of using the engine was the last straw for some creators.

Indeed, as of January 1, 2024, Unity will introduce a developer fee per game install after exceeding $200,000 in sales and 200,000 downloads, with this rule also applying retrospectively to games already released. Amounts vary depending on which version of Unity the creator pays for, with a maximum fee of $0.20 per installation.

But the problem is that this system can be easily abused and lead to bankruptcy of any company releasing a game created in Unity. Installations also include re-installations on other devices. Another huge problem is subscription services like Game Pass, where millions of players can install games for free, but developers will have to pay for it. And the strangest thing in all this is that, apparently, the total amount will also include vampire copies, from which the developers will not really see a single dollar, but on the contrary, they will lose a lot of them.

It is clear that Unity users do not like the changes at all. India studio Agro Crab released a statement saying it would strongly consider switching to a different engine if those plans were not scrapped.

Developer Dan Marshall told Eurogamer that Unity’s decision was an absolute disaster: “It’s all just terrible and they need to bring it back now or tomorrow every developer I know will be gone.”

Some creators have already explicitly mentioned that they prefer to switch to the Unreal Engine, which is often used in the development of AAA games, or to the increasingly popular open source Godot engine, which received a major update in the form of version 4.0 a few months later. back. Let’s see if Unity responds to the criticism.