mccSep 22, 2023

So here's what Unity says the new pricing policy is, today (assuming it doesn't change again next week, like it did last week, and the week before).

https://blog.unity.com/news/open-letter-on-runtime-fee

Critical thoughts:

1. The fact that the new fees *only apply to future versions* is the critical change here, and probably(?) avoids a lawsuit. This *will* have interesting ecosystem effects since many people will now want to stick on 2022.3 LTS indefinitely. Possibly, libraries will latch to 2022.3 and never update.

An open letter to our community | Unity Blog

An open letter from Marc Whitten to the Unity community in September 2023. 

Unity Blog
Show threadmccSep 22, 2023

2. The new policy is a bit confusing, though easier to understand than last week's. They now claim [over $1m revenue] they will charge *the lower of* 2.5% revshare, OR a charge per "number of new people engaging with your game" that they "calculate" based on your "self-reported data".

This "new installs" number is still untrustworthy gibberish. But now you can ignore it. The new "price" is 2.5% of revenue, possibly reduced arbitrarily.

Now the question is: Is this better or worse than Unreal?

Show threadmccSep 22, 2023

(2, continued) Unity's new 2.5% revshare is lower than Unreal's 5%. But *Unreal doesn't charge a per-seat fee*.

A per-seat fee *plus* a revshare is sour tasting. Per-seat fees are really inconvenient for small operations where some or all of your devs may only use Unity part time. And those per-seat fees are (by my math) 5x higher than they were in 2021.

Overall, New Unity *probably* costs less than Unreal, *usually*. But awkwardly, any cases Unity costs more will be at the lower revenue end.

Show threadmccSep 22, 2023
3. My gut is that if *this open letter's policies" were what Unity had announced to begin with, people would have been *annoyed*, as they were with the 2021 changes, but you wouldn't have seen a community collapse or mass exodus. However, I do not think this open letter will halt the mass exodus. The core problem is that *Unity can no longer be trusted*. You can consider the new 2024 prices acceptable. But now what you really have to worry about is how they will change in 2026.
Show threadmccSep 22, 2023

(This thread has been edited to correct confusion about Unity's version numbering scheme, as corrected by Jonbro; 2023 LTS will be released in 2024 and therefore the new fees will apply.

Possibly, I will post a version of this thread on Cohost later, just so that I can actually sit down and make a two-dimensional graph of at what combinations of developer count and revenue Unity now costs more than Unreal. I bet it's going to be a *fascinatingly* baffling graph.)

Show threadRaven Onthill
@mcc crossed @garius "trust Thermocline"
Sep 22, 2023 at 6:57pmWeb
Show threadRaven OnthillSep 22, 2023
@mcc If you're willing to read a Twitter thread, it's here: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1588115310124539904.html
Thread by @garius on Thread Reader App

@garius: One of the things I occasionally get paid to do by companies/execs is to tell them why everything seemed to SUDDENLY go wrong, and subs/readers dropped like a stone. So, with everything going on at Twitter...…