About Unity's Recent Changes (Patreon)

This post is going to be a long winded rant, feel free to skip to the "So what are you doing" section if you just want an update.

I'm sure most of you are aware of Unity's change to their pricing plans by now as it's become mainstream news. For those unaware the basic gist is that Unity announced that they would be charging developers 20 cents per installation of your game once you pass certain thresholds (200k revenue per year, 200k lifetime downloads).

Some of you may be concerned with how this effects me, since I'm one of the idiots who uses Unity. Well, the short answer is, it doesn't. In fact it's better for me since if I ever make over 100k I now won't have to buy Unity Plus. I don't make anywhere near 200k/year, and with these changes I would do everything in my power to NEVER make that much in a single year. If I were to pass that 200k threshold, the announced changes would cost me literally tens of thousands of dollars. Somewhere around 30-40% of my annual revenue by my estimations. It's a land mine, laid by an idiot, but I can walk around it unless they decide to move it.

But what does effect me is that Unity:
1. Has proven that they are complete morons that will burn their company to the ground.

This change has resulted in unprecedented backlash. Developers all across the industry who use Unity have announced or threatened that they are leaving the platform. Unity was already losing a billion dollars every year and now they are killing the only thing that makes them money, which is the relationship between themselves, developers, and publishers. I currently don't believe Unity as a company will be around in five years if they continue this anti-developer sentiment. This means the future of the engine itself is in question. Once there's no longer any support for it, the Unity runtime might go the way of Flash if a serious problem is found with no one to patch it.

2. They can change the terms of our agreement with a single whim from one of their two brain cells.

Unity deleted a clause from their terms of service that basically said "you will not be forced to agree to different terms at a later date, so long as you are still using the version of the software you are using now". This retraction enables Unity to wake up tomorrow and say "Developers now owe us 100% of all revenue they make going forward". They can change the terms to whatever they dream up, and so long as the new terms are less expensive than redesigning your entire game from scratch in a new engine most developers will end up paying it. This is the real problem. As far as I'm concerned Unity could charge a billion dollars per seat going forward, but if I have the ability to say no without losing years of work I will just laugh and say no.

3. Is destroying the viability of cheap to free indie games for developers who can't sustain themselves on 200k/year.

This one has less to do with Smutcube the company and more to do with myself as a person. I've gone back and forth on growing Smutcube into a full fledged studio with multiple employees, but ultimately I think I'm more comfortable only worrying about myself and happier improving my own skills than outsourcing work. However, I personally enjoy playing games that happen to be made with Unity that are from a small team of talented people. These new fees hit these developers much harder and if they are supporting 4 people they can't navigate around the thresholds the way I can. These games, which could have been in development for years, might never be released due to the fees and missing the release could bankrupt those companies preventing any future titles.


So what are you doing?

This depends on Unity and the changes (if any) they make between now and when the fees are supposed to start (January 2024).

Immediately and regardless of Unity's response:
I am diversifying my skill set by learning how to use Unreal. You can't learn an engine over night and so if I have to make the jump at some point, it's better that I start learning as soon as possible. This will invariably eat up development time so I'm looking at ways to minimize its impact, my current plan is to have tutorials for Unreal playing in the background while I work on FuckNAF, then taking an hour or two afterwards to attempt to repeat the tutorial.

If Unity reinstates ToS protections, regardless of whether or not the new fees go through:
I will continue working with Unity indefinitely. I love working with Unity, I spent years developing tools in Unity with the intent to be working in Unity for decades. With the protections in place Unity can ask for any amount of money they want and I can simply say no.

If Unity doesn't reinstate ToS protections but abandons the new fees:
FuckNAF will continue to be made in Unity, "F2" (working title for the spiritual successor to FuckNAF) will be made in Unreal. FuckNAF's development is nearing completion, once it's done I can abandon Unity and theoretically still add certain content to the final version, such as new animations, without opening up the editor. That would be my protection from any changes that may happen years from now.

If Unity does nothing, the new fees go through despite the overwhelming feedback, and the terms of service remain mutable:
I will make efforts to port FuckNAF entirely to Unreal and cease development of any games in Unity until they are no longer a company, either due to bankruptcy or buy out. Or until there is a complete change in leadership at the company that recognizes what a colossal fuck up this is. Although the fees don't effect me, their decision to go ahead with them demonstrates a complete inability to be reasoned with under any circumstances. And since there are no protections in place, I would be completely at the mercy of their whims when they do decide to make a change that would effect me.

This post isn't in anyway an ultimatum or really even an attempt to communicate with Unity. Unity does not care about me, I've made them and will continue to make them effectively no money from the perspective of a billion dollar company. I am only communicating to the people who do care, my players, what the future looks like for my games going forward.