Devs on Unity Runtime Fee: "The trust is gone forever"
Devs on Unity Runtime Fee: "The trust is gone forever"
Sign up for the GI Daily here to get the biggest news straight to your inbox It's been almost a full week since Unity a…
It's been almost a full week since Unity announced its controversial Runtime Fee, and the developer backlash continues.
Studios around the world have expressed concerns that the new fee – charging them every time their game is installed after January 1, 2024, providing they meet certain thresholds – threatens to jeopardise the health, or even existence, of their business. And despite subsequent statements from Unity, it's still not entirely apparent how badly these businesses will be affected.
"The most ridiculous part of this fiasco is that the full effects of Unity's decision on the business aren't even clear," says Ustwo Games chief creative officer Danny Gray. "We're left astounded that an operation of that size can move forward with such ill-thought-out plans and are now scrambling to make amendments."
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"Trust" won't matter if they just continue writing new games in it.
Who would want to write new games for a company that can just screw you later?
Not just "can" but, from statements from the CEO, still plan to... just a little later.
Probably enough people to keep Unity afloat. Let's be honest, who's going to reskill their gamedevs to learn Godot or some other game engine? Decision makers will probably spend more money on trying to find ways around the problem than actually solving it aka using another game engine.
It's what they do.Very few, of any, major studios do their work in entirely one engine. Hell, plenty of studios develop engines from the ground up for specific games. Plus, a huge amount of the development is stuff that's going to be engine agnostic. Things like the assets and sound development aren't based on engine-specific skills at all.