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610°

Unity Will Charge Sony, Microsoft, Apple, and Netflix Runtime Fees

Unity Technologies says it will charge Microsoft, Sony, Apple, and Netflix for Unity Engine games included in their subscription services.

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IMissJimRyan647d ago

It's easy to blame Unity and being a cool gamer on internet by saying they are doing the wrong thing. But when Unity started its business model, they innovate allowing people to develop and publish their games for free, without paying for the engine only if the developer starts to making money. I know myself at least five people that started game development because Unity allow them to.

However, the game subscription model came and change all the business landscape for game publishing. Now, selling your game is one of the ways to monetize, not the only one anymore. Unity is not an engine focused on big triple A games. Most developers are small and indie ones. They are the ones most likely to sold their games to subscription services.

What Unity should do? Keep bleeding money on business model made for a landscape that doesn't exist anymore? Ask for a ludicrous price and sell their engine alienating small developers and students? Or ask for those giants selling games and getting a 30% cut or paying little money for games of their subscription?

For me the answer is easy. But to be cool with gamerz we always need to simplistic and made everything a game about good guys and bad guys.

victorMaje647d ago

I have a game made in Unity that I’m removing from the app store by Jan 1, because me paying a fee to Unity every time someone installs my game is just not sustainable.
I read there’s even the concern if someone repeatedly abuses that mechanic & installs-reinstalls the game causing a large amount to have to be paid to Unity. Apparently Unity has no answer to that, wow!

I have another game on the app store made in Godot & guess what, I gladly pay to Godot on Patreon because of all the good the engine has to offer, for free, & using the engine is a breath of fresh air, i.e: by the time I launch Godot try some changes, compile & run, Unity hasn’t launched yet!

Unity had the opportunity over the years to do good by developers but every decision they made was stupider than the previous one, it got them exodus after exodus. Look at the number of devs leaving & going for other game engines.

Do you have any idea how destabilizing this last decision is when it comes to an indie-dev that has a game they’re trying to launch or run.

What about Unreal Engine? Why don’t they implement such anti-dev practices? & guess what Unity is as heavy to launch as UE, but UE is way more professional & in terms of the available toolset & what you can do with it.

It’s almost like Unity are doing it on purpose so they can short their stock in some crazy insider trading scheme.

But I guess I’m one of the cool gamerz.

shadowknight203647d ago (Edited 647d ago )

Loco and Victor you both make valid points and are correct. Unity paying for runtime for specific streaming services should be something they can do, after all that's them charging big streaming services as the facts pointed out by Loco.

And Victor is correct in that they shouldn't charge per download if it's a free game anyway, or if the subscriber or purchaser is downloading the title for a second time after purchase. It should be if its free to play, then IAP percentage should go to Unity in some form. Or if it's pay to own, then the initial purchase should go to them as a percentage.

Sephiroushin647d ago (Edited 647d ago )

Why are you defending a guy that wanted to charge 1$ for reloading guns on a videogame (battlefield)... this guy greediness is just play evil at this point it doesnt even has to do with Unity bleeding, this CEO is just awful and should be thrown out, while youre correct on some things, charging for download is super evil, trolls who are mad for w/e reason at a dev using unity could just make a script for redownloading a game making a small dev go bankrupt.

theindiearmy647d ago

Maybe they should slightly increase the licensing prices of using the engine instead of tacking on a whole new fee that starts an entirely new pricing model. 🤷‍♂️

sadraiden647d ago (Edited 647d ago )

Literally the worst take on this issue I've seen yet. Take the boot out of your throat. You're advocating the destruction of indie devs/publishers because you think that Unity deserves to employ a more predatory business model.

MrBaskerville647d ago (Edited 647d ago )

@VictorMaje
But don't you have to have a million installs anf earnings over 200.000$ before the payments trigger?

Thought the issue was one of trust for the most part. That thet retroactively changed their tos without warning. And that they made an overly complicated system that makes it hard to predict your costs.

Palitera647d ago

@Mr

Yes, that’s one of the main concerns remaining.

Still, economically, they’re almost killing one of the biggest gaming markets (F2P), because the usual margin is not enough to put another 20 cents in (or a very expensive top version, for discounts). You might hate F2P, but the market is huge and important for the growth of companies and professionals.

Also their system to accurately counting installs and avoid counting pirate installs is a full black box, which some sources even claim do not really exist how they are saying it does. Recently they also admitted “two machines = two installs”, so yes, a script kid can generate thousands in fees very quickly for anyone.

In the first and second statements, they were still holding the even worse “reinstall” fee and the webgl fee, which they waived later.

But yes, the damage is done. Unity became open to investors in 2020 and went downhill from there. The trust is completely gone and most of us (dev here) think that, even if they backtrack even more, another backstab is due at any time.

Unity is seen now as a liability for companies.

+ Show (5) more repliesLast reply 647d ago
Profchaos647d ago (Edited 647d ago )

Yeah when Unitys own ceo sells his shares prior to the announcement questions should be asked

https://gamerant.com/unity-...

This smells of insider trading to me but what do I know I'm just a cool gamer on the international apparently.

jznrpg647d ago

2000 shares out of 3.2 million doesn’t make much of case.

--Onilink--647d ago

By regulation, they have to sell shares every now and then (though its always possible they can time certain actions based on when their next batch sale is happening)

Based on the actual % of shares sold by him and some other people, this seems the more likely scenario and the sites reporting it were just looking for clicks by making a more sensationalist story. The CEO for example sold like 0.06% of his shares….

That said, everything else happening is pretty scummy from Unity and I would expect to see some major legal action from Nintendo, Sony, etc

jznrpg647d ago

@Onilink I agree what they are doing is pure shite but the insider trading thing is flimsy as hell.

babadivad647d ago

They are trying SO hard to be the next Flash.

crazyCoconuts648d ago

Ultimately this will all get absorbed by the price we pay as consumers in subscription fees.
Sucks for everyone but Unity.

Sciurus_vulgaris648d ago

Apple, Netflix, Sony and Microsoft are way larger than Unity. They could all likely drop Unity titles from their subscription services without heavy negative impacts.

BrainSyphoned648d ago

And can as easily pass the cost on to us without heavy negative impacts. People complain and stocks drop temporarily until the credit card recurring charge shows up and life goes on as before.

0odama647d ago

Maybe this is part of the reason why there was a price hike that Sony and Microsoft just did to their subscription services.

Zeref648d ago

Lol developers are ditching Unity for their future project. Unity needs developers more than developers need Unity.

crazyCoconuts648d ago

I wonder if the alternatives are any good

Pedantic91647d ago

@crazyCoconuts

My hope is that the devs would rather learn to adapt to a new engine than allow themselves to continue being screwed over by Unity. I do wish the devs affected by this land on their feet but at the same time i would like to see Unity crash and burn for doing this.

Palitera646d ago (Edited 646d ago )

@crazyCoconuts

They are good and will get much better now, and I think much much better things will come out of this in the close future. I'm betting on Godot, which is what the community is heavily leaning to.

The thing is... Unity was a jack of all trades. Unreal is worthless for mobile, for instance.

For small games, Godot, Cocos, Defold, Construct, GameMaker etc.
For medium games, Godot, CocosCreator.
For big games, mostly Unreal.

HollowIchigo25648d ago

even indie devs can drop Unity
Sony/MS/Apple are probably laughing at Unity

JackBNimble647d ago

This will crush indie dev's , which is why you're going to see developers abandon unity .

Becuzisaid647d ago

Ps plus gets hooked up by $20 out of nowhere with zero explanation or extra benefit to us. Coincidence?

crazyCoconuts646d ago (Edited 646d ago )

Based on my own spending patterns I'm guessing they were losing a lot of potential sales based on the overly generous/ too cheap plans they had. That was probably reason enough imo

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 646d ago
FalcorMononoke648d ago

What's to stop these companies from barring games developed in Unity to their platforms? If I were them, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Zeref648d ago (Edited 648d ago )

They wouldn't want to remove games like Genshin Impact they're likely going to sue first

dumahim647d ago

The cut of profit they make from Genshin would easily cover any install fees they're on the hook for. Many other games without that monetization built in, not so much.

648d ago
S2Killinit648d ago

Subscription prices were always going to go up. Just like all other subscriptions in history of subscriptions.

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50°

Little Nightmares Enhanced Edition announced for Nintendo Switch 2

We have another announcement from the Little Nightmares universe as Little Nightmares Enhanced Edition was just announced for Nintendo Switch 2. It launches on October 10, 2025. According to today’s announcement, Little Nightmares Enhanced Edition will run at 4K and 60 frames per second.

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Terry_B8h ago

..announced for every System including the Switch 2.

hiawa2318m ago

Definitely getting it for the Switch 2.

650°

Microsoft planning “major” Xbox layoffs next week

The cuts are expected to be announced next week.

Microsoft is also planning thousands of job cuts that will impact other parts of it businesses

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Obscure_Observer21h ago

MFs has been beating their chests over great quarterly results and big profits to shareholders while firing people by the thousands just like Sony.

I wonder if at the top of those rumored layoffs they´ll also cancel upcoming or unannounced games while shutting down more studios as well.

21h ago
pwnmaster300020h ago

Always got to throw shade at Sony smh.
Yes we get it,
MS good Sony bad
MS bad Sony is also bad lmao

20h ago
Obscure_Observer20h ago

F* them both!

Just for the record, I don´t care about your victim complex crap either. Find someone else who cares.

blacktiger19h ago

He was talking about both. Why you getting offended when he's using both names

pwnmaster300019h ago(Edited 19h ago)

@Blacktiger

Im not offended , that’s just his formula lol
He can’t help help himself, he needs to bring Sony down when the topic involves MS.
Whether is good news for MS or bad, it some how leads to Sony doing bad lmao.
It’s actually hilarious.

InUrFoxHole14h ago

He's not wrong but im tracking what youre saying. In this case is should just be MS bad. Thats a lot of people fired

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Tacoboto20h ago

"just like Sony"

Gosh you're insufferable, not everything needs to be both-sides'd. Sony's had layoffs, but nothing like what Microsoft has been doing and is continuing to do.

CrimsonWing6920h ago(Edited 20h ago)

I mean, no offense, but this is why you’re not some corporate business person running a major corporation. Big profits don’t mean jobs are safe. Do you understand why things like this happen:

Cutting jobs to maintain or increase profitability, especially in underperforming divisions like parts of Xbox like other gaming divisions.

Corporate restructuring and relocating resources for strategic stability in ever changing markets and consumer behaviors.

Investor expectations and optimizing operations to maintain investor confidence. Whatever boosts stock prices and improves future margins.

And there’s many other factors at play. It’s never as simple as business doing well, everyone’s safe. That’s just you not understanding at all how corporations work and have been working since the beginning. This isn’t something that’s specific to Xbox, you can bet your ass Sony and Nintendo do this and if it’s not clear by now, game development is not a stable job nor has it ever been for many. A lot of developers are contractors and guess what happens when a project is done?

Ganif18h ago

Nintendo said they have no plans for layoffs, and you can't seriously claim that the scale of Sony's layoffs most of which involved Bungie which is self managed as even close to the same scale as what Microsoft has done since they purchased Zenimax. And that significantly less layoffs would have happened if those publishers had stayed independent. Keep in mind that much of these layoffs have been due to redundancies specifically related to these buyouts.

CrimsonWing6918h ago(Edited 18h ago)

@Ganif

Nintendo:

https://gamerant.com/ninten...

Sony:

https://gamerant.com/playst...

https://techxplore.com/news...

I don’t think it’s realistic to treat Sony’s layoffs as somehow outside the norm for the industry right now. Even if Bungie is self-managed, Sony’s cuts went far beyond that like Naughty Dog, Insomniac, London Studio being shut down completely, and multiple teams across the globe took hits. These weren’t just minor adjustments.

Nintendo, I had to look up and you’re right. They seem to be an outlier, but rest assured at some point it happens. And even then there’s been layoffs, albeit a smaller amount and contractors.

Would fewer layoffs have happened if studios from acquisitions stayed independent? Maybe. But even independents have been hit hard and look at what’s happened with Embracer’s fallout, or smaller devs like Digic, Roll7, or Volition. This isn’t just a “Microsoft problem” or strictly tied to acquisitions; it’s a broader correction happening across the whole industry, and unfortunately, layoffs are a big part of that process right now.

Ganif18h ago

From your article:

"According to reports, Nintendo of America restructured its testing operations, leading to layoffs of about 120 contractors, part of a strategy for global integration.

Nintendo of America, publisher of iconic franchises like Mario and Zelda, is shifting some contractors to full-time roles for better development integration."

Contractors are not employees, and even if you want to count them as that, it's 120 people vs around 7500 since Microsoft purchased Zenimax.

In an era of game industry layoffs, Nintendo is hiring more people
https://automaton-media.com...

Nintendo Announces 10 Percent Pay Raise For Devs Despite Lower Profits
https://kotaku.com/nintendo...

Nintendo CEO’s refusal to layoff staff goes viral following industry-wide cuts
"Satoru Iwata took pay cuts to ensure staff didn’t have to be let go"
https://www.nme.com/news/ga...

And as for Sony you're comparing less than 1000 total jobs to an estimated7500

Has the industry faced layoffs, yes, but that still doesn't account for the mass layoffs due to redundancies that was easily predictable, or that fact that at least 1/3 of Microsoft's layoffs and studio closures happened before the industry downturn.

thorstein17h ago(Edited 17h ago)

Take the L, Crimson.

People hate Nintendo, but Ganif proved why they deserve support.

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-Foxtrot19h ago

It's like banging your head off a wall, he just can't help himself.

Microsoft can do no wrong, Sony sucks at everything and Nintendo is bigged up because it's less hassle than trying to defend Microsoft all the time

What's going to happen when Microsoft finally turn completely third party, then what?

anast19h ago

I enjoy Obscure. Obscure does good work.

crazyCoconuts19h ago

Did you know that the first n4g was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program.

Tacoboto18h ago

I wouldn't be surprised at this point if anast and osbcure were both alts for the Admin.

We know how Obscure especially drums up additional comments and clicks with his spam-worthy remarks that somehow never get moderated

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 18h ago
Profchaos16h ago

Thats business present a strong front to your shareholders while your company burns around you.

Keep shareholders happy at all costs andnif not happy keep them numb to the reality of you organisation

Angyobangyo7h ago

" Just for the record, I don´t care about your victim complex crap either. Find someone else who cares. "

Just for the record, you clearly you do if you have to vent this hard.

TheExecutioner4h ago

Basically you think like kids when it come to choose between candy or chocolate.

Sonic18813h ago(Edited 3h ago)

Are you and Anast the same person?

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20h ago
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140°

Sony Faces Class Action in the Netherlands Over Allegedly Inflated PlayStation Store Prices

Mass Damage & Consumer Foundation in the Netherlands has filed a class action against Sony for inflating PlayStation Store prices.

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dveio19h ago(Edited 19h ago)

My personal opinion:

Manufacturers and publishers have indeed inflated the industry.

From $700 million development costs for games like Call of Duty, to digital (store) prices for games and DLCs, online multiplayer fees on consoles (why can you play Helldivers 2 online for free on PC but not consoles?) or still preventing sell/lend digitally purchased games.

Sometime in the future, this bubble will collapse.

They should know better, but they just can't help themselves and suck even the last penny out of our wallets.

BeHunted17h ago

Because Sony knows people will be forced to pay those prices for single player and multiplayer games, not everyone prefers PC gaming. Sony also has a monopoly on PlayStation digital games. In 2019, they stopped allowing retailers and game key sellers to sell PlayStation digital games, making them available only through the official PlayStation Store

anast19h ago

The Dutch gov. wants a piece of the pie.

Eonjay19h ago

They should be suing the individual publishers increasing the prices to $80 instead of suing the store. There are plenty of publishers still selling game for like $50 with much success (like E33). But this proves that the publishers are the ones setting the prices.... so again nothing changes because they aren't even going after the main offender. How is suing Sony going to make Microsoft not charge $80 for the next COD? Sony being the number one store in the market doesn't mean that publisher have to charge us an arm and a leg. Again the industry is laughing at us because consumers never get real representation. Just these fake platitudes that are meaningless.

BeHunted17h ago

"How is suing Sony going to make Microsoft not charge $80 for the next COD"

Because Microsoft doesn't have a monopoly, I can purchase Call of Duty at a huge discount from CDKeys or other gaming retailers. The only way to purchase digital PlayStation games is through the PlayStation Store.

djl348516h ago

Weird, I swore GoW, Stellar Blade, Horizon Zero Dawn, TLoU, etc. were on the steam store....uh.....

BeHunted12h ago(Edited 12h ago)

@djI3485

I'm talking about PlayStation games that you can only purchase on PlayStation. I can purchase Steam and Epic games from 3rd party retailers and key stores.

"Sony to stop selling full-game download codes at retailers"

https://www.videogamer.com/...

Killer2020UK17h ago

About time. There is zero fair reason why digitally distributed products that you cannot recoup any value when you want to dispose of them, should be priced higher than that of physical copies that entail all of the costs and the benefits of owning.

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