Unity is Killing Its Controversial Runtime Fee (gamedeveloper.com) 29
Unity is canceling the Runtime Fee and reverting back to its existing seat-based subscription model, albeit with a price increase for Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise users. From a report: The engine maker introduced the controversial levy around a year ago. Initially, the Runtime Fee sought to charge developers a per install tariff once projects had passed certain milestones. It was a decision that left many users reeling, resulting in a colossal backlash that ultimately forced the company to rework-but not ditch-the policy.
The fallout, however, was enormous. A number of high-profile creators lambasted Unity and threatened to ditch the engine over what they felt was a huge betrayal of trust. Unity's inability to quickly resolve the issue and communicate effectively with customers only added fuel to that fire. Two weeks after the debacle, Unity CEO and president John Riccitiello departed the company. Unity Create boss Marc Whitten eventually followed suit. Unity is now attempting to course correct under the leadership of new CEO Matthew Bromberg, who hopes canceling the Runtime can reestablish a partnership "built on trust."
The fallout, however, was enormous. A number of high-profile creators lambasted Unity and threatened to ditch the engine over what they felt was a huge betrayal of trust. Unity's inability to quickly resolve the issue and communicate effectively with customers only added fuel to that fire. Two weeks after the debacle, Unity CEO and president John Riccitiello departed the company. Unity Create boss Marc Whitten eventually followed suit. Unity is now attempting to course correct under the leadership of new CEO Matthew Bromberg, who hopes canceling the Runtime can reestablish a partnership "built on trust."
A behind the scenes would be interesting (Score:2)
Re:A behind the scenes would be interesting (Score:4, Informative)
I don't think there's any question it was John Riccittelo. He was a terrible CEO at EA and drove numerous game franchises in to the ground there. He is not well known for being able to read the room or make rational decisions. He's known for making user hostile decisions at the expense of short term profits. This is not the first time he's done something like this.
Battlefield 3,4 had in-browser (chrome, firefox) server browsers, which were awful the original idea was that they were going to sell ad space in the browser. He bragged about this at their annual investors conference at the time.
This should have been done (Score:4, Insightful)
This should have been done immediately after the fallout. Waiting a year to see if the dust settles and acceptance of the runtime fee eventually happens just sowed the mistrust further.
Re: (Score:2)
They had to sell this to the board of directors, and everyone had to make it look like a rational, weighted decision, and not a knee jerk one.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It would have been rational to change course immediately instead of doubling down, then having to apologize, then much much later finally addressing the issue like they should have done to begin with.
In fact this move actually makes them look dumber and weaker than if they had done it immediately, because it makes them seem mentally deficient.
"Controversial runtime fee is killing Unity." (Score:2)
The damage is already done (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks a lot for sending many devs to Godot and increasing its fundrising!
Re:The damage is already done (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
> they are not getting those devs back.
Tru dat. Nobody chooses to spend time converting to a new system without a damn good reason. Once someone has found a satisfactory Unity alternative, Unity returning to the previous status quo will not be a good enough reason to go back even before assessing the risk that Unity will try and squeeze them again at some point.
So now there is a competitor that is boosted to near parity, and that's a lot more market share, with a lot more devs to become evangelical ab
Translation (Score:2)
What they said:
We want to deliver value at a fair price in the right way so that you will continue to feel comfortable building your business over the long term with Unity as your partner. And we're confident that if we're good partners and deliver great software and services, we've barely scratched the surface of what we can do together".
What they thought:
"We want to lock you in and make scandalous profits from you, but we moved far too fast and tipped our hand. We're hoping that if we backpedal, make nice, and pretend to be "partners" with you, we can re-build enough trust to keep your business. Then eventually we will try again to eat the hands that feed us again, but only one knuckle at a time so we have a better chance of getting away with it".
The time lag tells the story (Score:3)
OK, so Unity has conducted the ritual sacrifice. A couple of members of upper management walked the plank. But this "course correction" is a year late. The culture of greed and entitlement that led to the fee in the first place is still in place, no matter what colour lipstick Unity is now trying to put on the pig.
"Partnership built on trust"? LOL. They've shown you who they are. Believe it.
It'll be back (Score:2)
As a CEO the potential payoff for getting something like this to stick is billions and the worst it happens is you destroy the company and get a golden parachute and a new job at another company for you to wreck. The C-Suite has class solidarity in a way us wo
How to drive users to your competition (Unreal)... (Score:2)
... in one easy step.
The people behind the decision really should be... relieved.. of their duties. Epic Games (Unreal Engine) has had the occasional misstep, but they've found a great way to get adopters and still monetize their engine/tools without pissing everyone off. I wonder since the Unity debacle how many devs/companies have just said eff it and walked away from Unity completely.
Too late. (Score:3, Informative)
They will not recover from the epic type A PR disaster they did.
Unity was synonymous with indie 3D development, with a fair and square indie licence agreement. So much so that even viable FOSS competitors like the various web centric engines and Godot had trouble breaking the bond between unity and it's community, despite being up to snuff. It literally was a Unity, built with a very good product over a decade and more.
Then some greedy clueless dimwits took over and destroyed 90%+ of trust in an instant.
Godot will win, just like Blender won the 3D space. This is harsh, but no where does Marxism work. Except in the digital world. Any proprietary solution that has serious FOSS competitors and has greedy corp-types screw the pooch and destroy trust in it's brand only accelerates people transitioning to other solutions.
This is why I don't use non-FOSS for anything non-trivial and/or long term/mission critical. And I have yet to meet a true industry pro that doesn't think the same way.
Re: (Score:2)
Good comparison because Blender while great has not in any way shape or form "won the 3D space". Unity may have massively shed developers, but all that's happened is going from number 1 position in the indie development world, to number 1 position by a smaller margin. It's great to see Godot get some love, but let's not pretend here that Unity is dead.
And I have yet to meet a true industry pro that doesn't think the same way.
Did you check under their kilt to see if they are a true Scotsman? Industry in both 3D and game development is not remotely dominated by FOSS. Given this you'
Re: Too late. (Score:1)
This is not the solution (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
I kind of feel bad for them. The universal runtime fee was a stupid idea. But, from my (very limited) understanding, The goal was to get level the cost between free-to-play games (that make Billions (Genshin Impact, etc) from add-on fees) and traditional games that make money based on units sold;
That they make SOME %% from a 60$ game that sells 10million copies, but make almost nothing from a FTP gatcha game that brings in 3billion$.
They obviously didn't look at the full impact of the changes they made an
Unity is Untrustworthy (Score:2)
Please Restart the Blender Game Engine! (Score:2)
Re-establishing trust (Score:3)
now attempting to course correct under the leadership of new CEO Matthew Bromberg, who hopes canceling the Runtime can reestablish a partnership "built on trust."
That is Not how this works. That is not how Any of this works.
If you want to re-establish trust, then put out a new license that guarantees the right to use of all future versions under same costs and terms and to existing customers to purchase new seats under the same costs and terms structure. In other words: Eliminate the right to unilaterally modify the agreement for future updates or upgrades, and Give customers a contract that ensures a repeat cannot happen.
...but a moment isn't very long. (Score:2)
Prices are being jacked up (Score:2)
Just because the runtime fee and install fee are gone, doesn't mean it's all good news. Unity is using this news to hide the real truth - the Pro and Enterprise subscription prices are jumping up in price. Most devs still using Unity won't qualify for the Free tier anymore and got pushed onto Pro.
Pro is jumping up to $2200 per seat, an 8% increase.
Enterprise is jumping up 25%, and will be individually discussed with each company involved.
So the real news is being buried - prices are jumping up.
https://bsky. [bsky.app]
Having left Unity, I see no reason to return. (Score:1)
Having used Unity for years, I switched to Bevy, but I imagine those who switched to Godot are experiencing similar joys. All those stupid bugs that you'd have to play upgrade roulette to see if they're fixed for Unity, forget that. With these open source engines, you can just fix the stupid issue and send a pull request. It's been incredibly liberating to be using an open source game engine. I'm never going back to a closed source engine. Thanks for opening my eyes, Unity.
I have switched to unreal (Score:2)
I was experimenting in Unity for a couple of years, spend maybe 400-500 bucks on various assets over that time.
I switched to Unreal since this Unity scandal happened. Finding it interesting, and who knows, I may just end up creating an indie game in this later on.