Unity apologizes and updates their infamous Runtime Fee
An open letter from Marc Whitten to the Unity community in September 2023.
They're still doing it, albeit in a slightly pared back fashion.
Not really good enough, honestly. Backpedal further, guys, you're almost there.
But they’re not almost there.
The exec team isn’t changing. They didn’t even mention the scummy anticompetitive (and potentially illegal in some jurisdictions) fee vouchers they were handing out to try to steal users from AppLovin, nor was the sneaky update of their license terms that was done to enable the whole snafu addressed.
I don’t think Unity is coming back from this. The industry doesn’t trust them anymore, and nothing has been done to materially address the root cause of that lack of trust: the exec team and the board.
If they do a leadership shakeup, it’s possible they can save it. But I don’t think that’s going to happen.
I thought at minimum they needed a sacrificial lamb. The screw up was too big and their first response too blithering.
I was watching a YouTube video of one game Dev saying he's met John (CEO) and said he's quite pleasant and has a great rapport with staff. However, this move shows a complete and utter lack of competence.
While they didn’t directly address the retroactive license changes, they did counter the argument. The following text being relevant.
The Runtime Fee policy will only apply beginning with the next LTS version of Unity shipping in 2024 and beyond. Your games that are currently shipped and the projects you are currently working on will not be included – unless you choose to upgrade them to this new version of Unity.
We will make sure that you can stay on the terms applicable for the version of Unity editor you are using – as long as you keep using that version.
If they started with that proposal 2 weeks ago, there would be no drama at all. I hope studios will stand by their words and will not continue to collaborate with Unity in the future.
Plan was always 2 steps forwards 1 step back
"Updated", not removed.
This is still completely unacceptable. They just changed the threshold so as to not charge devs whose games don't sell at all. It does nothing to address any of the other concerns.
Our Unity Personal plan will remain free and there will be no Runtime Fee for games built on Unity Personal. We will be increasing the cap from $100,000 to $200,000 and we will remove the requirement to use the Made with Unity splash screen.
No game with less than $1 million in trailing 12-month revenue will be subject to the fee.
Okay, fine, we won't bankrupt you if your game doesn't sell.
The Runtime Fee policy will only apply beginning with the next LTS version of Unity shipping in 2024 and beyond. Your games that are currently shipped and the projects you are currently working on will not be included – unless you choose to upgrade them to this new version of Unity.
Okay fine, you won't retroactively bill us. But you still never answered how we can trust the install numbers that your tool supposedly collects, whether we will be billed for people pirating the game, whether botnets can immediately spike up our costs out of spite, how this affects Game Pass/PS+/donated licenses, etc.
And where are the assurances that you won't randomly decide to update the policy again in the future? I also can't imagine they'll let people keep using the version of Unity without runtime fees in perpetuity.
So, I still don't trust Unity, and wouldn't in good faith advise its use moving forward given that there's no way to know they wont try to pull this again in the future (especially given that John "Pay a Dollar to Reload" Riccitiello hasn't resigned in disgrace as CEO). However, I feel there's a part of the letter that you've left conspicuously out of this response.
But you still never answered how we can trust the install numbers that your tool supposedly collects
They addressed this, see this copied paragraph, emphasis mine:
For games that are subject to the runtime fee, we are giving you a choice of either a 2.5% revenue share or the calculated amount based on the number of new people engaging with your game each month. Both of these numbers are self-reported from data you already have available. You will always be billed the lesser amount.
This also addresses two your immediate followup concerns, piracy and install-bombs -- always being billed the lesser amount would act as a safety valve against unprofitable install spikes, on top of the fact that using licensee-reported numbers allows for agency on the part of the licensee to screen for malicious activity before being billed.
Self-reports:
Yeah, it’s strange. Our game has ballooned in popularity on stores - but as far as our reporting tools are showing, not a single person has installed it, ever.
Each one of these placating statements from them expressed sorrow for not listening/communicating more with their consumers, but I can't help noticing a conspicuous lack of apology to their own employees.
Like, stop acting as if this is out of a clear blue sky and you're simply course-correcting in good faith. Your own people told you this would happen. My trust in Unity is gone until they address this.
Surely they won‘t try to sneakily ramp up to their original goal and beyond now. „Sorry, we made it too obvious, we‘ll do it better next time.“
So they’re only pushing back the implementation? It’s still going forward? How does that address the pushback?
If I were a developer, it would still be a cold day in hell when I trust them again. As a player, I still don’t want their spyware on my machine.
Edit: typo
It doesnt suddenly affect old games, so games that are already out amd no plans on updating is immune as long as they dont upgrade to the new version of unity, so now it mainly targets games that are still updating, or new games, but not neccesarily games that are old or choose to stay on an older LTS build of unity.
Regardless, even if they backpedalled even further I feel as if the trust is already broken.
Oh well unity, you were fine tool for independent developers before the corporate greed hit.
Imagine telling your girlfriend that you want to fuck someone else and when she freaks out you go: okaaay, i'll use a condom, chill.
Okay, still mad, i'm not gonna fuck anyone else then, you won, happy now?
It was a moment of weakness, clearly he's changed his ways and that desire is completely gone, never to return.
