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Choose your licence

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Khyrid, Jun 18, 2012.

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Choose your Pro subscription

  1. I prefer unities standing pro licence agreement.

    54.2%
  2. I would gladly give unity about a 20% cut for free upgrades.

    22.0%
  3. I dislike both concepts and wish for yet another policy.

    23.7%
  1. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Let's pretend Unity offered a new licence option and you are ready to buy the pro licence, which one do you choose? Not to say that unity's currently standing pro licence system is unfair, but it's not for everybody. Some people develop slowly and want to develop with pro feature but not be rushed to make a finished game in a few years. I want to access if anybody other than me would be willing to give a cut in exchange for lower or no upgrade cost. If this third option existed would anybody use it?

    NOTE: I AM NOT SUGGESTING REPLACING THE PRO LICENCE, BUT ADDING ANOTHER OPTION.

    Update: Well as the discussion continued it was brought up that people could do the second option for free upgrades then at the last minute switch to a normal licence to dodge their royalty fees. So I guess the idea needs more work.

    The biggest alternative to the standard licence is the idea of a subscription, vote the third option if you want that. But still a user could subscribe for one month then get Pro for like 35 dollars.

    Current solution for second option:
    If the second option is to work, games made with that licence option would require some kind of un-removable code built in, maybe a special unity splash screen, with a subtle color difference so anyone playing the game would immediately know the licence used, this way users of this licence couldn't develop then switch to the other licence to avoid paying the royalties. Also it would have to be impossible for the project to be opened in any other licence version of unity.

    So the way the free version is light grey and pro is dark, this third version would be some other color and it would be it's own isolated version of unity to ensure no sneaky licence swapping. This puts pro unity in the hands of users who don't like to pay upgrade fees when they don't use unity fast enough for it to be worth it.


    Or this solution: HERE It is an idea about having version insurance for people who buy the pro license close to the release date of a new release. Instead of having a sharp cut off that kind of screws people, it could be spread out monthly.
     
    Last edited: Jun 19, 2012
  2. Lars-Steenhoff

    Lars-Steenhoff

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    I don't like to pay a cut and I don't like to pay huge upgrade fees, then middle ground would be subscription for about 25 or so per month.
     
  3. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    In a sense upgrades cost are subscription fees. You are paying for the privilege of having been allowed to use the software. The only difference is in the increments of how you pay.
     
  4. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    I'd like an a la carte system. If you need specific features that are in pro, but not free, you can pay to have them enabled. Of course, it'd be vastly less expensive to just buy a full Pro license than to buy all the extra features and there'd have to be some really careful pricing options so less-used pro features aren't overlooked, but it'd be helpful.
     
  5. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Yeah, I thought that system would be nice too, but I didn't explicitly include it as I think it would be a mess for unity to implement. It would be nice if there were special licencing options made available for users with different needs.
     
  6. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    A mess to implement? Absolutely. But the money they'd be able to make off of things like people being able to, say, go onto the asset store and just buy new features would probably pay for all the effort really quickly. Imagine if they also put a system in place that would determine the extra features needed by other people's asset store products and allowed you to add the missing features to your cart automatically.
     
  7. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Yeah, the result would be people who don't buy the Pro licence because of the cost would buy individual features, however it would also mean that people who bought the pro licence if given the option to only buy individual features may not have bought the pro licence. I'm curious what studies they did to determine that their way was the way to go.
     
  8. antenna-tree

    antenna-tree

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    An a la carte feature license would be a nightmare for us (both in development and sales). We'll take a page from Apple's playbook and keep our product line simple ;-)
     
  9. lmbarns

    lmbarns

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    I'd prefer the current system to most others.

    Look at Unigine,
    No thanks.

    Sure they should probably offer you a Pro + take 30% of what you make with it as another product in addition to current licensing. I'd still gladly take the current system over that.
     
  10. Morning

    Morning

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    A noncommercial free/cheap pro license would be great. Just something to use before you can afford pro.
     
  11. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Just because those backwards loons at Unigine have a crazy policy doesn't mean that Unity's comparably reasonable policy can't be improved. And I'm not asking for Unity to sacrifice anything, with my second option either A: I don't make any money and paid 1500 for pro and nothing for upgrades, unity made money and lost nothing, or B: I make money and unity made 1500 and 20% of profits, either way unity wins and I got to develop for as long as I want assured to have up to date Unity.
     
  12. Chaoss

    Chaoss

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    I would prefer a subscription, I guess it'd be pretty easy to implement where we pay monthly or quarterly a fixed price, say for example £30 a month, this would not only make Unity more accessible to people like me and others who cannot afford the hefty £1k+ price tag but would mean Unity would make more money. I would have a team license, pro and asset server if they were on subscription. This would also make it 'safer' for people like me to use Pro.

    Right now if I saved up the money for Pro, by the time I saved up £1k Unity 5 would get released. I simply do not have this kind of money right now (my financial situation may improve though who knows?) and this would be a huge benefit to me. This would also help curb piracy a bit.

    please PLEASE give us this option, I know I'd buy a subscription the minute I see it in the store.

    The royalty option would be a good idea, whoever it would be a bit of a nightmare for them to police.

    What ever happens though I would like to see further licensing options.

    Another option would be to have an unlimited trial... where you get all the options, bells and whistles but you also get a forced splash screen and the text "Unity Pro Trial" in the corner to prevent people from just selling their game without a valid license. Maybe on the splash screen you'd have a further message saying something along the lines of "If you paid for this it was created using unlicensed/trial software" or something
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2012
  13. lmbarns

    lmbarns

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  14. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    I doubt piracy is a concern for unity, can somebody really market a game they made with a pirated copy? While it's unrealistic to think like maya or photoshop will de-compile all games to see if any non authorized assets where used in the game, Unity would be dumb not to ensure games are not made with pirated Unity software. And if people are pirating Unity and selling games with it, lets go beat them up.
     
  15. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    What about non-students? :p

    I would like either a subscription based model, or a "I make a game, sell it, you get 20% of my profits."

    When I say that second option, I mean follow how UDK does it... sorta.

    So you take 20% of what WE get (or the wholesale amount) up until what it would have costed to purchase Unity Pro + interest, maybe?
     
  16. Tseng

    Tseng

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    Economically it's not. You could write of upgrade costs as company, but you can't write of re-occurring subscription fees.
     
  17. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    30% is fine too. Hell, I'd be willing to go equal 50/50 with unity myself in exchange for them keeping my pro up to date and that's on top of me buying the 1500 licence. Though I think it needs to stay around 20-30% for anyone else to go along with it.
     
  18. lmbarns

    lmbarns

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    At $50/mo you wouldn't pay off the license before the next release lol let alone interest.

    And studios would just rent seats for a few months at a time for a lot less money.
     
  19. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    I suppose so, and also small monthly fees are easier to pay, so there's another difference. I'm not opposed to the subscription plan either. In fact that may be just as good as my suggestion as it allows me to stop and start up the subscription based on when I'm using the software. Their current model scares me away from investing because the value will diminish and I may not get enough use out of my hundreds or thousands of dollars invested.
     
  20. Tseng

    Tseng

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    Yea, then your game gold sold 2 million times and you pay like 10 millions for your Unity License? :p
     
  21. superpig

    superpig

    Drink more water! Unity Technologies

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    Unity Pro costs about as much as a reasonably high-spec PC (or a mid-spec Mac).

    Now, you don't need a high-spec PC to develop games. But equally, you don't need Unity Pro to develop games.

    (Or do you? What features in Pro do people actually need, right now, that they cannot ship games without?)
     
  22. andorov

    andorov

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    Collecting royalties is not a simple process, and would tremendously add to cost.

    Additionally, no serious business is going to chose between a 25% royalty or a $1500 x seat license. Its a no brainer. You'd have to be mentally unbalanced to pick a 25% royalty. The only people who would pick that option would be those who know for a fact that they will never make more than $6,000 per developer and would therefor get a free product. Oh, and if they did end up making a product that had a chance of making more than $6k, they would just buy the license at the end of the dev cycle. :p
     
  23. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Sure and Unity and me would party all night long. Bust out some bubbly. Pleasure doing business with you unity. I'm not greedy, I don't care about the money as long as it doesn't burn me when I'm broke.
     
  24. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    I am completely, utterly, 100% unable to implement many of my sprite effects without render-to-texture support.
     
  25. andorov

    andorov

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    Bulllllshit.

    The minute you actually produce something decent and test it out with a small market and realize you're onto a winner, you'll buy some real licenses. Unity would assume all the risk, and you'd get all the reward.
     
  26. Chaoss

    Chaoss

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    Students, students f****ng students lol. What about the vast majority of us who are not students. Sorry I live in an area where 4% of the population are students, but ALL the bars are student orientated some even student only lol
     
  27. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    That's a valid point, it would be hard to enforce my concept. The devs could swap licences if need be with a different person in order to dodge their royalty responsibilities. My idea did not say the royalty would replace the 1500 seat licence, only the upgrade fees. The thing is tho that people could pirate unity to develop and buy the licence right before it's released. So the system isn't perfect right now anyway.

    Are there no possible legit solutions for devs like me that don't want the time constraints that a licence of diminishing value has?

    I'm not a student.
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2012
  28. andorov

    andorov

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    I myself would prefer a yearly sub. As a customer of Unity 3.5, I bought a license 2 months ago, so the $850 kind of stings.

    I'm fairly dissapointed with the release; partly because the UI has been postponed. I can't readily port my current project to another engine, but for my next game, I'll definitely be considering alternative engines. :/
     
  29. Lars-Steenhoff

    Lars-Steenhoff

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    If you look at the apple development pricing it's $99 per year, to be honest I would be more than happy to pay this to unity every year! :)
     
  30. Finjitzu

    Finjitzu

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    QFT Stop the insanity. A one time fee is far better for the consumer or a business.
     
  31. lmbarns

    lmbarns

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    And they give you Xcode to work/develop from for that $99................................................................

    ...................................................................... *facepalm*
     
  32. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    The yearly sub could work, I guess we should all consider that the third option in the poll. The question is would unity make more, less or the same money from it? A lot of people would pay for it that otherwise would have used the free version, but they lose the 1500+upgrade sales. Anybody have any maths to support this idea?
     
  33. andorov

    andorov

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    And then you get to keep all your revenue. Wait...
     
  34. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    That's all you get. You get none of the benefits Unity provides you like a full, working engine with built-in game preview; asset store; or massive development community with loads of support.
     
  35. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    That's why I said that Unity gets a cut up to the price of Pro, and whatever other features you are wanting.
     
  36. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Upgrade fees are not a one time fee. You pay them time and time again.

    As for the subscription idea, many people who never have a chance to complete a game would pay into it, this means more revenue for Unity and more flexible licencing for us who can't pay large lump sums of cash. There is still a question of if their would be as profitable as the standard licence model unity has.

    In the American gold rush the gold miners rarely got rich, it was the business selling equipment to hopeful gold miners that became wealthy. I think a subscription method could work as a more solid business model but I think it would have to replace the standard model as it means selling the licence cheaper but to more people and nobody would want to pay the 1500+upgrade cost vs the cheaper monthly or annual sub fee... ...unless the standard model is cheaper than a few years of subscription, but I estimate the monthly fee would have to be around $100 for that to work.
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2012
  37. Filto

    Filto

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    Alright here is my input. Not that Unity will change anything anyway (which I don't think they should)

    A. Subscription based: I develop my game in free. Buy a subscription for a month, release my game, cancel the subscription. Pro for 25 bucks=Bad deal for Unity

    B. Revenue share: Works when used on big companies. most Unity developers don't earn big money if any= Bad deal for Unity

    C. Non commerical Unity pro: Most developers don't release any commercial products and that includes many of the ones with pro licenses, For many it is an expensive toy that people with 1500 bucks to spare can dish out or teams that dream big but their game mounts to nothing so they will never buy a commercial PRO= Bad deal for Unity

    D. Keep it as it is which obviously work for Unity because they are still here developing their engine and expanding their company= Good deal for Unity

    If you believe in your idea and desperatly need pro but don't have 1500 bucks lying around go to a bank and lend the money, thats what banks are there for.
     
  38. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    A. Implement a way where the game knows whether or not a subscription is still active. If it isn't, it disables features depending on whether or not the subscription is active.

    B. Pre-approve games based upon whether or not Unity thinks they will make lots of money.

    C. Don't really understand what you are saying :)

    D. Keep it and add another?
     
  39. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    I'm all for dishing out the 1500, others may not be, but I don't like the steep upgrade cost, especially when they are retroactive fees for having used the program in the past, which is what they are.

    Really, the bottom line is these steep upgrade cost burn users, they may be fair because unity is always developing etc. but make it easier to pay, make it cheaper, more frequent, like annually.
     
  40. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    Or they could do what Adobe did and make it so you need to commit to a full year's subscription.
     
  41. superpig

    superpig

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    Both of those are totally impractical though. The former would require every game to be online (which is very, very S*** for mobile games) and the latter basically turns Unity into a full-on game publisher, which is a massive undertaking that distracts from their core purpose.

    I think Filto has a good point when he mentions banks. If you're all convinced that a subscription deal would still make Unity as much money in the long run, then presumably you believe that you'll be able to pay the $1500 back to them over time - and if you believe that, then why not just go get a bank loan?
     
  42. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    Agreed. That would probably be the best route for this form.

    Yeah, mine wasn't the best. But the one that MarigoldFleur said is really practical and could work.
     
  43. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    There would need to be a contract that commits the user if any subscription is to work to prevent contract cheesing*.



    *(Just coined that).
     
  44. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    I would be fine signing a contract. Lol. Well, once I'm 18 I could. :p
     
  45. superpig

    superpig

    Drink more water! Unity Technologies

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    Do you have a fully realised demo/prototype of your game, minus the aforementioned sprite effects?
     
  46. Khyrid

    Khyrid

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    Because you may develop for a year and stop, get deployed overseas, come back two years later and resume working or any number of other reasons development stops and starts. With the current system you are shelling out upgrade fees, although I believe the initial 1500 price should be sustained.
     
  47. Filto

    Filto

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    So I can try my luck for a couple of months with my released game? I pay 75 bucks it flops or earns some money during a short peak and then I cancel my subscription? By the way 1500/25=60 months. Thats five years to pay for 1 unity pro release. atleast make it something reasonable like 100-150 per month
     
  48. superpig

    superpig

    Drink more water! Unity Technologies

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    OK, but if you're committing to a year's subscription then you really are approaching something that is just a bank loan. Borrow $1500, pay it back over 12 months ($125/month, plus interest). So what's the benefit of Unity doing it, rather than an established financial institution that does this kind of thing all the time?
     
  49. pivotraze

    pivotraze

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    • Some people can not get approved for a bank loan.
    • Banks usually have MUCH higher interest rates than companies that provide a subscription-based model.
     
  50. MarigoldFleur

    MarigoldFleur

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    Yes, and because this game is very, very much a non-commercial project, the idea that I need to either spend $1500 or build my own engine just so I can maintain proper pixel scaling while rotating a sprite is something I kinda balk at.