Unity angers developers by announcing new fees based on game installs
Unity Technologies has made a major change to how it charges developers for using its engine. Starting January 1, 2024, Unity will begin charging a fee for every time a game is installed, with fees dependent on which subscription to Unity a developer has. Once a game has surpassed a threshold of $200,000 in revenue and 200,000 installs and are in either the Unity Personal or Unity Plus subscription tier, a "Unity Runtime Fee" will be applied to the development team. Those subscribed to Unity Pro, which is a tier that Unity will soon be retiring, or Unity Enterprise, will instead be charged fees once a game has made $1,000,000 and has been installed 1,000,000 times.
Depending on which tier a creator is a part of, these new changes could see developers charged as much as $0.20 every single time a game is installed by a user after the threshold is surpassed. It has been confirmed that if an owner of a game were to install a game, delete it, and redownload it, it would cost the developer money, if they were already past the limit. This will also retroactively apply to already released games as well.
Smaller developers have expressed their concerns over these changes, with some concerned about how pirated game installs will cost them, the impact it will have on free to play titles, or that Xbox Game Pass installs will also count, and have the potential to see smaller companies put at risk because of it.
SIGH pic.twitter.com/YgJEKGVQEI
— AGGRO CRAB 🦀 ACT OUT NOW‼️ (@AggroCrabGames) September 12, 2023
Additionally, Unity's own CEO, John Riccitiello, sold 2,000 shares of the company stock just prior to the announcement of the new Unity Runtime Fees.