Unity has changed its pricing model, and game developers are pissed off (www.theverge.com)
from DigitalJacobin@lemmy.ml to technology@lemmy.ml on 13 Sep 2023 19:47
https://lemmy.ml/post/4867308

cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/4975490

Unity has changed its pricing model, and game developers are pissed off

Unity has announced that starting on January 1st, 2024, it will implement a new pricing model that will charge developers based on how many times a game was installed.

#technology

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autotldr@lemmings.world on 13 Sep 2023 19:50 next collapse

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Popular video game engine Unity is making big changes to its pricing structure that’s causing confusion and anger among developers.

“We are introducing a Unity Runtime Fee that is based upon each time a qualifying game is downloaded by an end user,” the company shared on its blog.

Also we believe that an initial install-based fee allows creators to keep the ongoing financial gains from player engagement, unlike a revenue share.”

Additionally, there’s the concern that malicious actors could use this information to run up charges by continuously downloading and redownloading games as a form of protest or griefing.

All those fears were seemingly confirmed when Stephen Totilo of Axios tweeted that Unity stated it would indeed charge a developer each time a game was redownloaded or downloaded to different devices.

An additional tweet from Totilo stated that Unity would implement fraud detection tools and allow developers to report potential cases of abuse.

The original article contains 989 words, the summary contains 153 words. Saved 85%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

willybe@lemmy.ca on 13 Sep 2023 20:48 next collapse

Pikachu shocked face. Godot keeps getting better.

zwerdlds@lemmy.ml on 13 Sep 2023 22:35 collapse

Seriously. WTH did people expect?

SkyeStarfall@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 14 Sep 2023 15:55 collapse

I guess people expected our commercial world to work at least decently well

But the more time goes on the more that illusion is shattering.

Tischkante@discuss.tchncs.de on 13 Sep 2023 21:05 next collapse

They altered the deal, they will alter the deal further.

cypher_greyhat@lemmy.world on 13 Sep 2023 21:23 next collapse

Godot and Blender. /thread

shapesandstuff@feddit.de on 13 Sep 2023 22:09 next collapse

The more I read about it the more fucked up it gets.

Premium subscriptions don’t include the new fee.
Their system to detect installs is unknown, as are their anti-tamper measures.
All they said about those is that they’ll cannibalize code from their ad-system.

pezhore@lemmy.ml on 14 Sep 2023 13:30 collapse

they’ll cannibalize code from their ad-systems

Imagine if their phone home system for tracking installs could be defeated by something as simple as Pihole DNS Ad block.

shapesandstuff@feddit.de on 14 Sep 2023 17:02 collapse

Haha nice but unlikely. The ad stuff was only brought up in the context of fraud detection

Lowbird@beehaw.org on 14 Sep 2023 00:41 next collapse

It’s like they looked at Wizards of the Coast’s fuck-up with the D&D license and decided to copy it. What the hell?

HughJanus@lemmy.ml on 14 Sep 2023 01:09 collapse

The world continues to enshittify and rest assured no one will put their foot down to stop this.

semperverus@lemmy.world on 15 Sep 2023 00:19 collapse

This is why I try to use libre open source software whenever I can (preferably GPL license, but MIT is fine as long as it has reproducible builds)