It’s been almost a full week since Unity announced its controversial Runtime Fee, and the developer backlash continues.
Studios around the world have expressed concerns that the new fee – charging them every time their game is installed after January 1, 2024, providing they meet certain thresholds – threatens to jeopardise the health, or even existence, of their business. And despite subsequent statements from Unity, it’s still not entirely apparent how badly these businesses will be affected.
“The most ridiculous part of this fiasco is that the full effects of Unity’s decision on the business aren’t even clear,” says Ustwo Games chief creative officer Danny Gray. “We’re left astounded that an operation of that size can move forward with such ill-thought-out plans and are now scrambling to make amendments.”
this is a wake-up call to this industry and any other industry enjoying a glut of “free” (as in beer) proprietary tools owned entirely by private (or worse: public!) organizations.
this will always be the result. every single time. if you think you and your industry are immune to getting bait & switched, you are very wrong.
chaining your livelihood to a for-profit organization is begging to eventually be extorted in this manner. greed is inevitable.
Ok so firstly it’s not free, people pay for it, and secondly you act like there’s an alternative. You use the products that are available, if there isn’t a free product available or the free product that is available isn’t very good you don’t have a choice.
For a long time Unity was basically the only game in town other the Source but that was very old no one really used it.
I’m more in favor of Godot, but Unreal/UDK has been a thing for a long while, so it’s not true that Unity was ‘the only game in town’ for a long time.