Obligitory Unity licensing proposal thread

Hey everyone,

I am speaking for myself as a hobbyist who wants to throw money at Unity Tech for a license of pro. However I cannot afford it due to its current price point. I know that I will never be able to afford unity pro in a million years unless I whore myself out with contract work. Something I do not want to do.

That is not to say I am not broke. I want to throw money at Unity Tech however I am finding it harder and harder to justify it.

Why do you care you are an unreal engine user or <Insert other remark about UE4 and me here>

I care because I do not want Unreal engine to dominate the market. They have made a really awesome deal for indie developers. However competition is good. No competition is bad. Epic Games could in theory bring the pricing for their engine up if Unity Tech goes under or is sold off. I want Unity Tech to be around for a long time and offer awesome competition for Epic Games and vice versa.

Competition breeds innovation.

What should be done?

Unity should roll out a Hobbyist level of Pro for around 100 to 300 USD. This would include all the features of pro however at a level that hobbyists can afford. If a hobbyist wants to make money they can do that. Basically the Unity free license would act as an umbrella license for both licenses (Free and Hobby).

However you would need to upgrade Unity Hobby or what ever it will be called every time a major version is released.

Pro should remain untouched.

What I am saying -

• Introduce a new licensing tier for hobbyists and upcoming developers that is limited to how much they can earn with said license.
• I am saying that 1500 dollars is allot of money to spend on a hobby.
• I am saying that hobbyists need a chance for their games to shine.
• I am saying not everyone can afford 1500 dollars.

What I am not saying -

• I am not saying get rid of free.
• I am not saying get rid of Pro.

Personally I am invested into Unity3D as is everyone that uses these forums. I have 2 Projects that I want to finish but cannot due to the limitations of free. I want to throw money at Unity Tech however I do not want to go through the mixed bag that is the Unity Asset store. I also have purchased who knows how many assets on the asset store.

Also some food for thought - If Unity Tech does not act fast. Unreal Engine 4 will dominate the market similar to how Unity has done so for years with its massive install base of free users.

If anything Unity should do it as an experiment to see if such license is feasible. I personally would throw at least 150 dollars at unity tech for such a license but of course that is my sweet spot

Just something to consider -

HeadClot

 

I would be all for the free version including all features, but have royalties.

 

Unity has already they have said they are not interested in a licensing model like that.

I think they said that in their WebGL is free Blog. Not sure though.

 

Eh, fair enough. I know I'm a begger, not chooser.

 

yes.

- I'd buy indie pro for: ?00-400usd (even per platform)
- or, i'd buy invidual features (profiler, rendertextures, ..) from asset store for less price (even though it means in the end total cost would be more than 1500, if i were to purchase every feature one by one)

 

I personally think buying features would cause more problems than good.

But of course it could be entirely based situation. I look at is like this - Would you rather buy part of a Cheeseburger or a whole cheeseburger?

I would rather buy a whole cheese burger but that is just me.

 

I agree completely.

The biggest headache for Unity would be the admin involved in knowing who is eligible for the Hobby license. Leading to extra work.

Unity has already said though that they won't change the price structure. (or did I dream that?). I would love a hobby license though.

 

TBH - Unity has a license system in place for Pro. But what would the difference opposed to keeping track of free users who are making more than 100k or what ever the amount is.

Also -

I found the blog post that I was thinking of.

http://blogs.unity3d.com/2014/08/14/building-and-maintaining-value-for-developers/

I really think unity could get some extra money here just from the shear amount of free users wanting to upgrade to pro.

 

The current pricing model us crazy since even after that $1500 you still have to shove out $1500 again for the platform of choice if not standalone. So a mobile developer have to pay $4500 to get pro + android + iOS which is F***ing crazy and feels like gouging. Than if you want working perforce integration that is a other $500 for a total of $5000 per seat.

Hobbyists can't afford that and even small studios find it expensive if they need to do that for every seat.

 

The Mobile licenses need to be reworked that is a given.

 

I am never going to give up my game dev hobby. I don't have a lot of expendable income either as a college student. There are certain pro features that I make use of that make having pro worth it right now. In a few years, I may not be able to give the $600 or $800 to upgrade again.

This will force me onto another engine. I hope by the time that's a possibility, something like this happens. I've made less than $800 total in the last year from owning unity, so I'm clearly a hobbyist

 

I'm not trying to push anyone away or be rude. It seems several people are unhappy with Unity feeling they are charging too much. Nothing wrong with that. It is your right to have that opinion. Personally, I have no plans to buy Unity Pro or Unreal. Yes, if it was $150 to $200 and had a big benefit of doing so then okay maybe I would. But I have seen a ton of games and demos made in Unity Free at this point.

It seems like anything you want to make can be done in Unity Free. Yes maybe your lighting may not be quite as bright and shiny as it would in Unity Pro. Maybe the performance would be better if you had access to Pro. Why not find other ways around the issue? Come up with a creative solution.

If you go back through the decades this is exactly the kind of thing all great game developers have done. There are always limits either the tech just isn't there yet or it is too expensive. So you innovate. You find another way of doing it or you cut that part and do something else that is as important or more important. If it is all about graphics, lighting and such why not just hook up with a skilled artist? I bet that would do far more for making your game look better than some shading light tech thing. Or just focus more on the other aspects of the game. Make it amazing from a game play point of view.

 

As a hobbyist, I agree with HeadClot88. Unity should launch an additional option between Free and Pro. There are a lot of hobbyists that want the Pro features and would be happy to pay something. Unity is leaving money on the table by not addressing that issue. I am guessing a Hobby version with Pro features could easily sell at the $200 price point or at the $19/month price point.

The current price point of $1500 for Unity Pro is actually not that bad. The problem is that it is $1500 per platform. If Unity simply included every platform for $1500 total (instead of $1500 per platform), I would order Unity Pro immediately. But I refuse to pay $4500 (for PC, iOS, and Android). $4500 is way to expensive for a hobbyist.

Seriously, if Unity offered to include every platform for $1500 total, I would order Unity Pro today.

 

Or even if platforms were cheaper like 500 if they kept pro at the current price dropped the cost if platforms and maybe merged android and iOS into a mobile pro. That would be nice.

I'm sure they can get the money back on the asset store since the larger the community the more people there is to buy assets and the more people there are to make and sell assets, I'm sure unity must take a cut from there.

 

How about breaking Unity Pro for PC into its separate platforms? This way if you only need Windows, you could simply buy Unity Pro for Windows at a reduced price.

 

Also a subscription which isn't minimum 12 months long would incentivise me to get Unity Pro for the time I'm actually working on my games as a hobbyist, as I'm not doing it all year long usually.

 

So you're suggesting UT makes another version with all the pro features at a much cheaper cost? How does that benefit UT? I fail to see the difference from just lowering the pro price outright.

 

Oh, come on, Unity is currently barely equal to UE3, not saying about UE4.

Yet, their policy on development, pricing and support is like they are damn Microsoft of game industry, or like that.

Development and pricing was discussed enough already. When there is some virtually 20-bucks-worth AAA engine with unrestricted features and source code, they offer 1500 to 4500 license for an outdated one which source code must be complete mess now, so they will not disclose it. They can't even adopt features that are already there on the Asset Store, like visual shader editors, GUI frameworks, etc...

And don't tell me it wasn't expected. Most of you are programmers here, and, even if you are not experienced at all, you still able to see when your code became complete mess and must be refactored or even rebuilt from scratch.

Unity3D today has huge problems. Currently it offers no top (or at least competitive) technology or tools. No, it isn't bad, it just years outdated today. Development pace is struggling, so not only gap is growing, the growing pace grows too. Investing your time or money or both in Unity means that soon you will be 10 years behind of any engine, even fairly simple ones which, however, aren't limited by an outdated Mono/C# version and mess of legacy code.

And, I tell you, they clearly should have been able to see where it all comes years ago. But they just continued to milk that cow.

Meh.

Go use UE4. That will teach them.

 

A large number of Unity's developers target mobile platforms. While Unity may be behind on PC, it does well on mobile.

 

Okay, then let they not say that it is an "multiplatform" engine to make games for modern PCs and consoles. One may think it is actually capable of making competitive games for modern top platforms.

 

You neglected to mention royalties. I've noticed people who compare pricing tend to do this. Anyone who is interested in game development beyond a hobby level is going to pay more in the long term than the cost of Unity.

Once you've hit ~$30,000 per platform, you'll have paid the same amount in royalties as the cost of Unity Pro.

 

This has been heavily discussed in the past, and it always seems to have plenty of support from the users, but rarely sees comments from Unity staff. If there was a +1 button to vote for a better pricing model, I'm sure 99% of people here would press it.

But I don't see things changing until Unreal starts wiping the floor with Unity. I played with Unreal, and while I was probably a little too close-minded to appreciate it's power, I could never see myself making the switch. I can actually pinpoint the timeframe when I switched from Flash to Unity. I've been straight hooked for 3 years now.

Everyone knows about the restrictions in Unity free and they suck. Render textures, Deferred lighting, and what I consider to be quite absurd, missing the damned Profiler!

How is cripping a developer's ability to pinpoint performance issues a good thing? It makes a S***tier end product, and makes Unity games look bad. Placing stopwatches is not a solution.

But I won't rant on this all day. I've nearly copied and pasted my response from the last time this thread was posted. I know things won't change until Unity see's some kind of massive shift, and so far, it hasn't happened. Sure, a lot of devs flipped, but not enough for it to make $$$ differences. If Unity watched a ton of paid clients switch, I'm sure they would have changed something by now.

 

Hi Eric! Goodbye topic... hu3

 

If you want nice things be prepared to WORK for them. Compared to other hobbies you could have $1500 isn't that much. For all the features the Unity provides it's a great price.

That's right, precious you shouldn't have to do anything you don't want to do. The world should instead change for you.

Actually, that's pretty much exactly what your saying.

 

1500 dollars is allot to spend on a hobby when I know I just want to make games for fun in my spare time. Hence the point of the topic. "As for it is a great price comment." Not really... especially when you look at the features that Unreal Engine provides for allot less price wise out of the box. Some people feel like unity tech is price gouging at this point.

I look at it like this - 1500 dollars per seat. If you are a one man band OK that is fine if you are developing for PC, Mac and Web as well as have the money to spend on pro and know you can make a return on it.

When you want to start to developing for mobile. Depending on what platforms and if you want a perpetual license which most do. You then want to keep in mind that these extra platforms cost the same as Pro. Not to mention the upgrade costs.

As for the the rest of your post - Nothing really to reply to. It is obvious you are just trying to get a rise out of me.

 

I think this is the best model...

Perpetual License
If your business makes less than 100k annualy, you get a discounted Unity Pro license, i.e $300
If your business makes more than 100k annually, you pay the full price, i.e $1500

Subscription
If your business makes less than 100k annualy, you get a discounted Unity Pro license, i.e $29 monthly for all platforms
If your business makes more than 100k annually, you pay more, i.e $150 monthly for all platforms

I think this model will keep Unity competitive, but at the same time get more free users paying.

 

Glad to see we are on the same train of thought and at least some form of Constructive criticism is being given.

Thank you

 

While I agree that $1500 is a lot to spend on "a hobby", it's kind of your fault for deciding that your "hobby" is writing to a render texture buffer and casting high quality shadows, rather than something like "making games". It's kind of like saying that your hobby is fixing cars and then lamenting that Ferraris are too expensive and they should make them cheaper for hobbyists.

 

Also, as to "price gouging"... you guys are lucky you weren't around in the days before Unity, when most professional engines cost upwards of $100,000 and/or 30% royalties. THAT was what I'd call too expensive for a hobby.

 

It's simple, you need to register a company, and the hobby license needs to be licensed out to that company.
The company gets a letter from their accountant, stating the annual revenue.
When the company applies for this license, they upload the document online, with the license application.

Unity already has a 100k limit on a free license. So they already entertain the concept.

 

The price for Unreal is limitless. Monthly fee + 5% forever. It is cheaper up front but you are never done paying them.

Really not trying to get a rise. More hoping you'd re-consider how your position sounds. These are YOU problems, not Unity problems. Unity is selling plenty of licenses at $1500, they have no reason to change that.

 

I have two games I want to finish with unity.

But we are not talking about cars here are we? We are talking about a digital product that is delivered via the internet almost instantly.

First 3000 per quarter on what you make with unreal is exempt from their royalty based licensing. Unity Tech needs to adapt to an ever changing market.

Unreal is making its presence known - Go back and read my post - The whole thing. Unity can do better with their licensing. Just saying.

 

And thats a real factor for a couple of different types of developers. But not for many hobbyists for which the deal seems attractive because they may entertain the idea that it will be 5% of nothing, that they will not be getting much or anything in the way of revenues from their hobby, and if they do they don't think they will mind giving 5% of it away.

Much as with Unitys decision on pricing and minimum commitment for the subscription version of Unity, it seems clear that any response they make to changes in the market, competition, or recognition of potential revenue they aren't managing to tap from certain kinds of users, are going to be offset by not wishing to cannibalise their existing pro revenue stream. And whether the revenue is worth the administration hassle of offering lower-price options for sale.

It would not shock me if they offered a new option or changed the current model at any time going forwards. I won't be surprised if they change the features of the free version, nor if they leave it mostly alone for Unity 5. And it really wouldn't surprise me if they ever wanted to offer a price structure that is related to developer revenue in some way, that they do it as part of some of the services/networks they are starting to (or hope to) offer that attempt to solve some of the other issues developers have, such as discovery.

 

what about $20/m + 5%, i know its not original, but it's something that looks like lots of hobbyist can live with. its basically matching the competition. if they want to beat it they could do $10/m + 5%, or what about $20/m+5% for pro + mobile and $10/m+5% for just pro (no mobile) that makes it even sweeter... basically this will allow hobbyist who do things for free and small players who make little to no money to get access and if they do something that makes money lets unity get some of it...

 

I bet Tencent is funding the $20/m + 5%

 

Funny you should say that - I have heard that the CEO of YoYo games got a prediction right about John becoming CEO of Unity or something along those lines. My guess is that Unity is still up for grabs to the highest bidder.

Tencent owns maybe 43% of Epic Games. Still not the majority of the company but still a decent chunk.

Anyway I am getting off topic.

 

I've noticed people who compare pricing tend to neglect to mention that while UT charges full price in advance, Epic charges only when you actually made some money with UE4. And like that isn't enough, UT is charging full price per seat, so licensing Unity for a team of 10 developers will cost $15000 to $45000. More likely $45000 as you've already mentioned that mobile is the only competitive area for Unity these days.

So, an engine which is years behind still putting all risks on users, while UE4 offers almost risk-free licensing model. Remember, Luke, risks are always with you, unlike "$30000 per platform" (and, frankly, per seat) you can never actually hit.

 

Unity could make a bunch of additional money at $20/m + 5%. A lot of Unity Free users would switch to the $20/m, and the 5% part would prevent most existing Unity Pro users from switching to the $20/m. And the users that eventually sold enough games to justify the $1500 license would do that in addition to all of the $20/m payments they initially made. I am guessing Unity could easily increase their annual revenues by many millions by adding a $20/m + 5% license for Unity Pro. Maybe the new CEO will see the logic when he runs the numbers.

 

Its the same discussion we had a hundred times and it never seems to get us anywhere. The only way they will listen is when they have to-- if unreal4 starts kicking there ass then they will react.

 

i think your right. but i also think unity is missing out, leaving some honest money on the table while servicing a need for people who would pay some money for pro, but not a lot, cause they don't make money off it... $20 = $240/yr and if they ever made a penny unity would start getting 5% which means on $10k sales out of it lets say = $500 which is not bad when you add the two its $740 plus that is forever so its basically another way of doing subscriptions that is not $75/m up front... and if they make more unity wins big as has been pointed out... plus if keeps more people away from going to unreal 4 / crytek cause of the higher upfront costs that unity pro now has vs competition. i mean when i go to steam store lots of news games using unity, but lots of new developers going unreal cause of the pricing so at some point if the trend continues the two lines should show up as new unity use going down...

 

Which is a great concept as it means you need to be successful in order for Epic to be successful. I would love to see Unity go the route of only charging for Pro when you are actually successful with it.

That still does not change the fact that UE4 is more expensive for anyone who is not a hobbyist.

 

@HeadClot88

A well written OP
Broadly Agree with most of it
Have been using Unity Free so far
Yes, at 300 bucks count me in.
I don't know the grief involved for the Unity management vis a vis fragmentation problem from one more Unity license and its effects on the asset store. So I don't think most users can comment on that.

(Hopefully this thread too doesn't get derailed/degenerate into Unity vs UE4. Why do I suspect that some of those people doing that are doing it on purpose because they KNOW that such threads will get shut down)

 

You can only have so much of a price discussion without bringing in the competition as a line of reasoning.

 

Ok. Point taken. My only hope is that while posting people take into account the recent history of such threads and be careful about that

We know that the people administering this forum do not like multiple threads talking about the same topic or rehashing the same topic that has already been discussed to death. Why deliberately aggravate them?

You know given that "The house always wins" and all that

 

We've already discussed price changes both with and without UE4 being mentioned. If it is going to aggravate them either way you may as well bring UE4 into the discussion as a valid reason.

 

Sorry but - what? You do not want to "whore yourself out with contract work"?

 

This topic has been discussed to death on the forums and internally as well. We made a blog post just before Unite Seattle stating that for now, we're not changing anything. A thread even started about that too, another thread about this topic is not necessary.