UNITY, you are losing so many new devs to UE4 due to Oculus support

Interesting games are definitely going to be necessary too if the Rift wishes to catch the eye of more than developers and enthusiasts. Consumers may not always be the brightest bunch, but they aren't going to jump at the chance to own a product that few support.

 

Heh.. I like this concept. They will pay for Oculus but won't pay for Unity Pro. Well..go bug Oculus for free dev kits and use your saved money to pool for Unity Pro. And you are correct.. Giving away Unity Po features for free only enhances FaceBook's CEO's bottom line and does nothing for Unity's bottom line.. I could give a flip about FaceBook and if they were wiped off the internet tomorrow it wouldn't phase me one bit except my heart might do little pitter patters of joy knowing they have hit their demise. Unity on the other hand I wish to remain a positive entity that can remain in business and keep upping the quality and spread of their toolsets. Give the man the money he deserves is my motto. Freelancers understand this concept. Freestuffers don't.

 

Do you really think that putting unkind words in people's mouths is an effective way to convince them to help you out?

Yes, you're right that there's potential customers to gain here. The question is whether something can be done to access those customers in a mutually beneficial, cost effective manner. There's no point Unity giving away something for free to get a few thousand low-paying customers if at the same time they end up losing tens of thousands of existing customers because the main thing they previously paid for is now free.

The only people with the data to make a meaningful decision on that are Unity, and based on their track record of lowering prices and increasing feature sets I'm confident they're doing all they can, and am eager to see what makes it into the free license when 5 rolls around. Further than that, killing the golden goose would be bad news for everyone.

 

Must be the only one who doesn't care about Oculus Rift.

 

1. For those who repeated that that Oculus will vanish like the other VR systems in the 90's: We don't live in the 90's, the world today is a different one, technology is so much intervened with our life that I can clearly see that demand for VR systems will occur (the future could be pretty scary). Look how many hours people spend with MMORPG like World of Warcraft and how they dive into them. Also Oculus has much more visibility due to YouTube. We will never know if a technology will rise or fall.

2. Yeay, let the Oculus Developers go to the competition, they aren't losing anything anyway: UT IS losing renevue even when those developers that have not paid for Pro license. Sure this could be none of our concern, but saying the opposite is not true. The Asset Store gives UT pleanty of income from those Free users. And I highly doubt the statement that the income from the Asset Store is not worth mentioning or marginal: http://www.joystiq.com/2011/10/01/unity-technologies-revenue-up-258-7-percent-asian-pirates-to-bl/
That is pretty old info but I think it gives the right impression. Just ask yourself how much have you spend in the Asset Store.

3. Don't invest into a technology which is not proved! Unity invests in Unity Ad's a technology which will enables to play videos in you games as far as I got the info. "Great more money for us! *rubs hands*" - But who will say that the customers like it? And don't throw thier mobiles away? - And in the meantime we still can't set the animation speed of a state via scripting... horray for advancing technology!


http://9gag.com/gag/aPvzz9K/just-a-...rts-to-go-down-the-oculus-rift-roller-coaster

 

If you're referring to render textures, I disagree. They don't need to make render textures available in the API for VR to work in free.

If you are saying no one would use pro if VR was available in free, then I think you're overestimating the number of VR developers. And professional studious would need pro features regardless.

Wow, you're greatly misunderstanding this. The point is you don't need to "spend a week on a freelance iOS or android temple run clone" to do VR in UE4, but apparently you have to in Unity. I, as a Unity fan, think that's bad for Unity. Do others care? No, they don't. They will simply use the tool that's available to them. In this case probably not Unity if you're a hobbyist.

I don't "whine" because I desperately need VR in free. If I want to do VR, as a hobbyist, UE4 is the obvious choice. I "whine" because I care for Unity.

 

First off..explain how to use VR without render textures. If it can be done then why are you not doing it??

Second.. Given your stance on this I don't see why Unity should cater to your mindset. Go use UE4. It ain't no skin off Unity's nose. IOW. Your threats are insignificant to their bottom line. They profit nothing from people like you.

Third..yer whining about not whining.

 

Heh... I have never heard the term "Freestuffers" before. I like it, it fits.

 

Can't tell if you're trolling or have no concept of development. I'm saying Unity can ADD this feature. It's not in Unity free yet. I can't use it right now because Unity hasn't added it. They don't need to expose render textures API. The same way 3D model importer is not exposed in the API, still you can use it.

On the contrary. My assets in store has so far grossed near $600. I've spent about $300.

False (see above). And even it it weren't, it's still bad to lose users to a competitor.

How old are you?

 

This attitude has come up quite a few times since the UE4 announcement back in March. Basically you are saying that it is no loss to Unity if Unity Free users switch to UE4. Honestly, I do think it hurts Unity when Unity Free users switch to UE4, even if those users were unwilling or unable to pay to upgrade to Unity Pro.

Asset store sales add up, even with Unity Free users. Asset store sellers use the asset store because they know Unity has a huge install base, and the vast majority of those installations are for Unity Free.

More importantly, Unity Free users create a lot of buzz. Unity Free users post in forums, tell their friends, make YouTube videos, write tutorials, create assets for other users, etc. Unity Free users generate a massive amount of buzz, and that buzz is more valuable than any amount of advertisements that Unity could purchase. In fact, it is probably safe to assume that Unity Free was a major driver in the brand awareness that Unity currently enjoys. If a lot of Unity Free users switch to UE4, it will hurt the Unity community and Unity ecosystem.

I would like to see Unity find a way to better monetize Unity Free users (maybe with a low cost Unity Pro subscription) instead of simply shipping those users off to UE4.

 

First off exposing render textures in the API let's everybody use them. Unity then suffers a financial loss to people who have shown in spades they have no worries about Unity's bottom line and continually press their unreasonable demand using FUD.

I am 57 and have been doing freelance gigs since 18 y.o. and worked for some of the top money, names in showbiz and hold records for landmark sculpture and largest art install at the 96 Olympics. Yer trolling didn't get too far with the "you must be young and naive" bit. You young whippersnappers want the world handed to you on a silver platter. That ain't the way it works.

Wow..hundred of dollars. Unity made a whole 180 bucks from ya. That oughta cover the morning time pay for one Unity dev for a few hours and that amount will add like .00005% to Unity's bottom line. They oughta have a conference call about this. To satisfy your demand they will lose much more in revenue than you could possibly contribute..even if you stacked every reddit poster in your crew.

How old are you?

 

It would be pretty stupid not to believe technology is tightly intertwined in our daily lives. There is a difference though between the technology itself and a specific device.

The technology concept itself, namely wearable headgear with display and motion sensing, is already a success as other companies such as Sony are now investing in the concept. As a device though the Rift has yet to prove itself successful.

Competition, specifically from Chinese manufacturers, could very easily crush the Rift simply by offering affordable solutions. Sony itself is selling their headset for $100 less than the Rift.

Facebook is a company with investors. Investors will want OculusVR to bring in money. At the very least the initial $2 billion investment will need to be paid off. Selling 100,000 units may sound impressive, but it is a long way from the amount required to pay off.

How much of that $350 price tag is cost and labor? Regardless of the answer, you will have to sell at least double digit millions of the devices and it could easily be triple digit millions.

If every penny of that $350 went into paying off the investment, that's still 57 times the sales so far or a little over 5.7 million units.

You're comparing apples to oranges. World of Warcraft, being downloadable software, has little to no distribution costs, requires very little to host server-side, and is much less expensive than the Rift.

Exactly! Who will say that the customers will like the Rift!

Unity has stated in the past that they aren't really making much from asset sales. Certainly it is not enough to keep the company afloat by itself.

He is stating they should provide a way to enable (like selecting a checkbox) behind-the-scenes processing for the Rift. Not that they should actually expose APIs.

 

I know. I read that as well. But that does not mean the revenue from the asset store is meaningless or worth giving up to a competitor.

 

I'm a very happy Unity Pro user, and have been for years. I have no plans to switch to UE4 or any other engine.

However, I'm concerned for the future. The students I work with are very excited about VR, and in particular about the Oculus Rift. When they start working on their projects and find out that Unity doesn't support the Rift, they immediately drop it and switch to UE4 (and seem to be quite happy with it).

Once someone invests time and effort into a particular platform, it takes a lot to get them to change. There are a lot of indie developers who want to get on board with VR. Once they start using UE4 and become familiar with it, they have no reason to ever switch to Unity (and shell out $1500).

And that's a problem, a problem that UT needs to address. And soon.

I realize that many people on this forum are not aware of how important VR will be. Please don't take my word for it, since you don't know me and have no reason to give credence to my opinions. Listen to other people:

Michael Abrash believes VR is the future of gaming.
John Carmack believes VR is the future of gaming, and he even quit id software to work on it.
Valve Software has invested in developing cutting-edge VR technology (their "VR Room" is impressive).
Kickstarter campaigns for VR-related technology are pulling in millions of dollars.
Samsung believes in VR enough to create their own head-mounted display.
Sony believes in VR enough to create their own head-mounted display.
Facebook has invested $2 billion in VR, which is more than UT would sell for.

People who dismiss VR and consider the Rift a "toy" are seriously out of touch.

 

I doubt it makes that much. Regardless the true reason it exists is to encourage developers to use Unity by offering them an easy way to buy and sell assets.

People who believe VR being successful automatically implies the Rift will be successful are out of touch.

 

I don't think there is anything to stop someone from buying an asset in the Asset Store and using it in UE4. Granted, scripts probably would need to be seriously edited and might not work at all, but models will all probably work with very little effort. In fact, I'd wager you won't find a better source for inexpensive, high-quality game-ready models.

Perhaps a better way to handle this is talk to the company who makes Rift and get them to find a way to make the product you have paid for work with the engine you didn't. If you buy a saddle that doesn't work on your gift-horse, you talk to the guy you bought the saddle from. You don't ask for a new gift-horse.

 

I couldn't find anything specifically limiting it when I read the Asset Store license agreement.

Actually the UE4 Marketplace is starting to get some of the same content that the Asset Store has. I've already noticed authors like BitGem and Manufactura K4 over there.

 

This. The people dismissing OR's potential remind me of the know-it-alls who thought television would never catch on. This tech isn't going away, and OR is leading the charge. The initial adoption rate won't even matter yet because the tech will continue to improve, more and more games and applications will make use of it (integration is not difficult), and as cooler applications come to light (think, for example, of its potential just within the adult industry), more and more people are going to want it.

And of course, this:

 

The Oculus Rift is a device, not the technology. Television is the technology, not the device. There have been many companies over the years that have manufactured televisions. Not all of them are still around or still manufacturing them.

Another great example of a company that pioneered a product based on technology but failed to stay the primary manufacturer is IBM. The IBM PC was released on August 1981.

So if they introduced the PC, why are we not still using them? Simple really. Competition in the form of clones called IBM PC compatibles. The first IBM PC compatible released was the Compaq Portable on November 1982.

Over the years that followed many manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon and eventually brought costs below IBM. As a result IBM ceased being the primary manufacturer.

This same concept can easily occur for the Rift. They may start off as the primary provider, but the concept can be cloned by other companies and potentially crush the Rift.

 

No, as i said before, with the new SDK, render textures is no longer needed !
The barrel distorsion is done natively by the driver. It justs need native plugin support to work in Unity Free.
Look at here : https://developer.oculusvr.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=10929
Someone modified the sdk to not use the native plugin function, and i didn't found readpixels, so he justs modified the sdk to not use native plugin code.

 

And the TV that started it all isn't still used. It improves, evolves, expands, and gets cheaper!
Yes rift is popular and so are the other people that are making similar tech. But that isn't nor the last. It will get better and probably much smaller by the time it is done.

 

And yet:

A) Oculus Rift spearheaded this new VR push.
B) It's currently ahead of everyone else in the development curve
C) Its achievements are the reason so many other companies are hoping to jump on the bandwagon.
D) Facebook's $2 billion investment means OR is likely to keep its edge.
E) Most other VR solutions are targeting consoles and/or devices, and OR is very supportive of their efforts. OR is the big dog in desktop VR tech, and that's unlikely to change any time soon.
F) Until you actually try it, you probably have no idea just how amazing the tech has become.

 

IBM spearheaded the computer markets by providing an architecture. That architecture still largely exists in some form but they are not the primary manufacturer.

An investment means it has to eventually be paid back. They've only managed to sell $35 million worth of devices so far and that isn't pure profit.

Competition for the IBM PC did not appear until after it was released.

You're right. That doesn't make my statements wrong though.

 

And IBM did quite well until that happened. If Rift were to go the way of big blue, ignoring its impact on the market until then would still make little sense. The argument

"Someone may do it better someday!"

doesn't mean you should stick your head in the sand until that happens.

It's likely a more complex equation for them. FB acquired the tech because they want to see it integrated into our online lives as much as possible in the near future (and, of course, profit from that integration). OR is just the starting point. They would have no reason to pull the plug; they'll keep improving the tech with the goal of dominating the VR market.

 

This is completely true. While Rift currently seems like the clear winner, another VR hardware device could win at some point. In the PC 3D video card industry, Rendition Verite and 3dfx Voodoo were the early winners and obvious market leaders, and neither of those exist today. But that is not really the core issue in this thread.

The core issue of this thread is that Unity Free does not currently support any of the major VR devices, and UE4 supports all of them. Unity Pro supports the VR devices, but the pay wall is too steep for hobbyists, so hobbyists are leaving the Unity ecosystem if they want to mess around with VR tech of any time (not just the Rift).

 

I'm pretty sure no one demanded free chairs to watch TV.

Sounds like a problem for Rift to fix for it's paying customers and not one for Unity to fix for free users.

 

Do you how any idea how mean spirited and jerky you sound?

Even though I use Unity free, I have purchased probably $300 in assets from the asset store which Unity makes decent money on. I would also need to buy pro before my project was done if I continue with Unity and my project looked like it was viable enough to sell. Now that I want to convert my project with to a focus on VR I have to either fork over $1500 up front or give up Unity. For me, who is not sure I can complete my project, or if it would be good enough, or if it would be worth that investment, no it doesn't make any sense.. But Unity is losing all that potential revenue.

You need to stop putting people down in knee-jerk reactions and calling them freeloaders before fully thinking through what you are saying.

 

If most potential OR developers just choose UE4, then I'd say it should be UT's problem.

 

Rift does not need to fix this issue. If a hobbyist cannot afford Unity Pro, the easy answer for Rift users is to use UE4 instead of Unity. That makes this Unity's problem, if Unity believes those hobbyists are of any value. If Unity does not value those hobbyists, then Unity can safely ignore the issue.

 

But rift wants the masses! More people that can use it, the more they sell, the more money they make. Remember everything and I mean everything comes down to money!!! Never ever forget that.

 

C++ plugins... like RenderTextures... are unlikely ever to be in Unity Free.

However can't you just write a C# wrapper around the C++ which I think you can do in Free?

 

Do you know how naive and needy you sound?

They made $90. That's very little in the world of development costs. Staff would be necessary for developing a solution, implementing it, and supporting it.

Only if you make $100,000. Until then you can use Unity Free and a lot of developers do so.

 

I agree, and that's where this thread comes full circle. Some are arguing that OR might not be worth the investment, but UT obviously disagrees - OR development has been available to Pro users from the beginning!

This thread is really about whether UT should offer OR development to the masses or not. I think the potential upside would be well worth it, and part of that upside is attracting new users to the engine. We'll just have to see if UT agrees or (IMO) misses the bandwagon on this one.

 

One of those people complaining they cannot afford Unity Pro should try to see if it is a workable solution. If it is they could try selling the wrapper on the asset store. It might very well fund their purchase of Unity Pro.

 

Well this spiralled quickly .

 

I'm actually amazed it hasn't been locked down yet.

 

I'll ignore the first comment.......

I need the other pro graphical features to make it better looking, I know I can sell it without pro license.

 

This is not correct. UT has put in nothing specific for OR into Pro.

Again...

You are not asking Unity to add OR support.

You are asking Unity to move a Pro feature to Free. That feature would then be available to everyone... not just those that are developing for the Rift.

 

I suppose this guy is right, and they don't see the value in retaining us as Unity free users, regardless of the Asset store purchases we have and will make, or the future purchase of pro some of us might make, or the contributions some of us make in the support forums or bringing other people to unity (I myself have shown another hobbyist Unity and he loves it and has also made asset store purchases).

I think however, I am done posting here, I hope.. cause there are a few people here who keep trying to marginalize rift devs, or put down Unity free users as "freeloaders" etc...

So, time to pickup UE4 =( Or maybe just keep going with Unity hoping their policy changes in the next year or so...

 

I never said UT created the plug-in. The Unity plug-in has been available for about a year and a half (AFAIK), and UT has happily trumpeted the integration during that time (as demonstrated above in this very thread).

I'm not asking for anything; I'm just pointing out that UT is missing the boat by ignoring OR hobbyist developers. It's their problem to either remedy or ignore.

 

If only developing a quality game were as simple as adding graphical features. Anyone with any real experience will tell you that good quality assets are going to be needed to take good advantage of the engine.

Unless you are capable of making those assets yourself or find an artist in the Rift community, you'll need to either hire someone or buy them. If you cannot afford Unity Pro, you will likely be unable to afford the assets.

Start with the aspects of your game that require the least interaction with the engine. Start by prototyping the gameplay and then move to the assets that are least dependent on the engine.

Push the aspects that require tight integration with the engine off for as long as you can. That way if something changes you can more easily migrate.

 

I am being realistic. And I am tired of you freestuffers hogging forum bandwidth and dragging every thread you can possibly do into the UE4 vs Unity BS. Get a job like I had to for everything I ever owned. I am cranky this week. I have 57 years on the planet. I am entitled to be a cranky old fart BTW..I made 300 bucks from Unity in one hour last night..

 

I keep hoping they will drop the price for the iPhone and Android add ons. They didn't so I am sucking it up, doing extra freelance work and buying them without a bunch of pissing and moaning. I have no interest in UE4. It does not do what I need it to. This is the Unity forums and this kind of disrespect towards the core product on a daily basis by non-pating customers would not happen in most other forums of any professional import..

You can stay as a Unity free user if you stop pretending that any sort of development can only happen if they give you render textures. It is an illogical sham on the face of it . Build your game and mechanics and environment and UI and then you might have a leg to stand on. Anything worthy of commercial interest in consumer VR will take some serious resources to create and it is not necessary to be strapped to a VR diving mask the whole dev cycle.

 

It really feels like the OP is expecting VR to magically sell his game for him. Thus why I called him naive.

 

Your response shows that you really don't understand developing for VR. Game mechanics, UI design, and to some extent environment are very dependant on the VR experience. Without plugin support for motion controllers and the Oculus SDK, Unity would be completely useless to me. VR is not something that you just strap on at the end.

 

Yet most companies are likely to be doing exactly that. At least if their history of developing PC games as merely ports of the console version are any indication.

 

And the games will suffer because of it. The opportunity in VR isn't to slap on VR. The only area that I see that working is in games where you are seated in a cockpit. Even then, the UI has to be designed with VR in mind and any shortcuts that worked in the non-VR game can totally mess up. For instance some racers don't model the back of the car since you can't look back anyway. How do you think that will work when someone tries to look behind them while driving with VR. The opportunity in VR is new experiences and new game mechanics.

 

I've worked on a few VR projects (indie), both ports and built for VR. You can just port games to VR but they differ greatly.

VR games/apps allow the player to turn and move the camera their head as opposed to full body turns in a normal game e.g. FPS aiming and head/body movement should be separate.

Also VR games need a very high and consistent FPS for best effect, with a target of 90 fps being the current recommended bar for presence, and with stereoscopic VR you are drawing everything twice. My point is that few modern AAA games can easily be ported to stereoscopic 90 fps on modern mid range hardware.

UI elements need to transition to 3d elements and work with the reduced resolution and barrel distortion current VR HMD require.

My thoughts on VR is it now has the new beginnings of an amazing technology base derived from mobile phones, also it allows mobile phone/tablet screen developers to continue developing and improving their display technology which is reaching the limits of our visual perception on a device. And will push the PC/Mac GPU/CPU market further as well.

But imagine a world where you can get up, get ready and then step into your 'office' to being working at your VR business. Now in theory that business could be building things in VR or working in a VR office but also we already have the robotic technology that can enable manual workers to 'VR Presence' anywhere in the world.

So VR is the future, but will Unity allow it's engine to be a very easy way to create and play in that future?

 

For crying out loud, I've explained this already. The API doesn't need to be exposed. The feature in the engine can still be there, and available in the tools. Not render-textures, but a VR camera instance.

Wow, really? You're resorting to mocking me? Being 57 years old, you should know this wins no arguments.

The point is that even though I'm a free user, they still made $270 from me (my purchases count too). The majority of people using Unity are using the free version. Do you think it would be a good thing for the community and asset store if these users moved on to a competitor?

I'm an IT consultant since many years. I can easily afford Unity Pro and all addons. That's not the point. The point is that it makes no sense to spend $1,500 on something with no intention of making a profit, if there are alternatives offering the required features for far less. (Professional use is another matter entirely.)

Unity might not be interested in hobbyists, and if that's the case then there's nothing more to discuss. I, however, was under the impression that not only are hobbyists interesting to them, but actually crucial to the survival of their community, asset store and future.

Again - I'm CONCERNED for Unity. This has nothing to do with me NEEDING VR for my hobby project or whatever. I don't even have an rift - I just think it's an amazing tech and I'm very optimistic about it. Development for it is without doubt really hot right now.

Ah, so that's where the shoe pinches. You purchased pro, it was a huge investment for you, and you want others to take the same plunge even though it doesn't necessarily make sense for what they're doing.

 

Someone finding out they can't use Unity free for the experimental hardware they just spent a lot of money on (ignore the right half of the picture. Too lazy to crop it):


Sorry.