Unity reveals plans to charge developers per game install - plans revoked and CEO fired, lol

[:Flash:]

I feel like the best move for Unity at this point is do the Wizards of the Coast thing and admit total defeat and rescind everything, revealing them to be pathetic idiots with no understanding of how the law works or any kind of backbone.

I'm still angry I spent two months learning this shit engine.

I'm quite happy that I told a friend of mine to go with Godot for his game project a while back. I even said "with Unity you can never know when and how they will change their license fees", but I would never have imagined something this insane.
From what I've heard from him Godot has also been making some baffling (technical) decisions, but I'm sure he's happy nonetheless.

 

[Glop_dweller]

I doubt we are so far down the rabbit hole you can demand payment from someone who didn't even agree with an EULA.

So that then lets pirates off the hook?

*Damn, legitimate buyers get screwed yet again.

 

[MF]

It's beyond retarded. Even removing Plus is ridiculous. I don't want enterprise features or a cloud AI.

The per install fee is never gonna fly and they're already backpedaling on that.

On a serious note does anyone have any idea how does it look legally speaking?

Unity is based in San Francisco so who knows, but legal department for a company I do contract work for says this is illegal in the EU.

 

[Alex]

I doubt we are so far down the rabbit hole you can demand payment from someone who didn't even agree with an EULA.

So that then lets pirates off the hook?

*Damn, legitimate buyers get screwed yet again.

Maybe I am wrong about the terminology, but I believe that what you can demand from a pirate is restitution and maybe damages. Payment is for legal transactions,

 

[whydoibother]

Install on 3 devices, using the same license? Charge the dev 3 times lol.
Not to speak of the Epic Games, Sony and Microsoft free installs. Not to speak of games that are cheap/free and make money on ingame purchases rather than installs. Not to speak of Steam refunds, where people can buy, install, refund, basically griefing the dev.
And what about early access or demos? Do demo installs count? A demo is a game developed with Unity, after all.
I am also sure that their propriety mechanism to track installs isn't EU laws compliant, would they ask the user to be tracked upon install? Many users would just opt out of the install and the game right there.

This won't stand, they fucked up and will backtrack, having ruined their reputation.

 

[Jaesun]

I feel like the best move for Unity at this point is do the Wizards of the Coast thing and admit total defeat and rescind everything, revealing them to be pathetic idiots with no understanding of how the law works or any kind of backbone.

I'm still angry I spent two months learning this shit engine.

I'll assume and hope you moved completely away from Unity for your games?

 

[Tyranicon]

I feel like the best move for Unity at this point is do the Wizards of the Coast thing and admit total defeat and rescind everything, revealing them to be pathetic idiots with no understanding of how the law works or any kind of backbone.

I'm still angry I spent two months learning this shit engine.

I'll assume and hope you moved completely away from Unity for your games?

I'd rather use RPGMaker held together with custom code and plugins than Unity.

Hilarious and true.

 

[duskvile]

Somebody needs to go full Elon on that company.

Zuckerberg

 

[Orud]

I'd rather use RPGMaker held together with custom code and plugins than Unity.

Hilarious and true.

I'd rather make custom engines for 3D stuff, but the coding to properly do animations, physics and asset streaming is just uughg. Unreal and Unity are far more manageable alternatives.

 

[darkpatriot]

I just can't see this in any way legally binding, you can't just suddenly change your terms of use without an agreement. If I am understanding this correctly. Will just have to wait for the first lawsuit in 2024 challenging this. Or possibly the EU will step in. Or possibly a complaint filed with the SEC.

I assume it has something to do with them trying to force people to accept the new licensing agreement and terms in order to continue to have a valid unity license to let them continue to sell or distribute their games. And that they included some kind of language in the previous license agreement saying it is subject to change.

I am no lawyer, but I assume there are some pretty meaningful limitations on how much you can change an agreement like that even if you have a clause in the agreement saying you are allowed to change it. The lawyers in this thread and elsewhere certainly seem to think this is going to fail the legal challenges it will face.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

So can I take revenge on Sawyer by installing and reinstalling PoE over and over until he goes bankrupt?

 

[Artyoan]

So can I take revenge on Sawyer by installing and reinstalling PoE over and over until he goes bankrupt?

PoE 1/2 and Pentiment all at the same time.

 

[darkpatriot]

It only takes one dev to go to court with Unity and win for this scheme to collapse.

On a serious note does anyone have any idea how does it look legally speaking?
I doubt Unity did it without contacting lawyers and vetting every single word in the new TOS or whatever to make it so it's as watertight as possible, but for me it would seem that retroactivity and the fact that they've admitted they won't have the actual sales/install numbers for given title, just estimation(especially for the older games) are probably the weak points of the whole deal.

The fact that they want to charge based on their estimate for how many installs there have been is the most mindblowing part of this proposed licensing model. It isn't even based on anything that would use a confirmed number of installs. It uses their "proprietary data model" for estimating installs and they don't plan to provide the details on how that "proprietary data model" even works.

 

[thesecret1]

It only takes one dev to go to court with Unity and win for this scheme to collapse.

On a serious note does anyone have any idea how does it look legally speaking?
I doubt Unity did it without contacting lawyers and vetting every single word in the new TOS or whatever to make it so it's as watertight as possible, but for me it would seem that retroactivity and the fact that they've admitted they won't have the actual sales/install numbers for given title, just estimation(especially for the older games) are probably the weak points of the whole deal.

The fact that they want to charge based on their estimate for how many installs there have been is the most mindblowing part of this proposed model. It isn't even based on anything that would use a confirmed number of installs. It uses their "proprietary data model" for estimating installs and they don't plan to provide the details on how that "proprietary data model" even works.

You owe me a million dollars. Trust me bro. And pay up.

 

[Ismaul]

Man, you have to give it to Riccitiello.

Wholesome belly laughs for all. Gamers and devs agreeing despite current day polarization. Unity achieved!

feelsgoodman, need more of this

 

[Spectacle]

What is the quality of the remaining employees though? "Hey we're returning to the office, if you don't agree to this by Thursday at noon we will accept it as a voluntary resignation" - lose everyone that can easily get a remote gig elsewhere keep the mediocrity/people who just keep their heads down and don't give a shit.

Downsizing is fine but there needs to be better methods deciding who stays and who goes beyond "do what we say or else" in a sector that favors the worker at the moment.

From the team pictures posted by twitter after Musk took over, it looked like the only employees left were the H1B workers, i.e. people who literally lose their permit to stay in the US if they lose their job, and have to go back to India or wherever immediately.

 

[Strange Fellow]

Baffling situation. Even as a scheme to intentionally tank the company's stock, this sounds extremely stupid. What kind of game could they possibly be playing here?

 

[Zed]

I looked up Godot again. They seem to be developing it nicely. Can use their own script language, c# or c++ (I think) to code in it.
Completely free and no bullhockey.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Baffling situation. Even as a scheme to intentionally tank the company's stock, this sounds extremely stupid. What kind of game could they possibly be playing here?

It might be an attempt to turn Unity into ad-platform.

 

[darkpatriot]

Baffling situation. Even as a scheme to intentionally tank the company's stock, this sounds extremely stupid. What kind of game could they possibly be playing here?

Even if they back down from this, as I think is likely, it has broken trust with a large number of developers who are going to flee from unity and not choose it for future products.

 

[Alienman]

Can't wait for this cost to be transferred to the customer in some way. Imagine swiping your credit card for 20 cents every time you get into the mood to install and play some Unity-based game.

 

[Dickie]

Why didn't they just go all the way and make you insert a quarter each time you want to play your game?

 

[Alienman]

Heh, all the way back to the arcade days, but with a slot for coins connected to your USB.

 

[Orud]

Can't wait for this cost to be transferred to the customer in some way. Imagine swiping your credit card for 20 cents every time you get into the mood to install and play some Unity-based game.

God damnit, stop giving them ideas.

 

[Tacgnol]

I looked up Godot again. They seem to be developing it nicely. Can use their own script language, c# or c++ (I think) to code in it.
Completely free and no bullhockey.

Biggest issue with Godot right now is most of the tutorials and documentation is written for Godot script.

Resources for C# and C++ are slowly starting to appear, however.