Couldn’t use Unity3D iPhone Basic if I wanted to…
From my understanding, I have to have Unity3D installed prior to installing Unity3D iPhone, and due to Unity3D 2.6 not being compatible with Unity iPhone 1.5, I couldn’t buy the $399 version and use it without owning Unity3D Indy 2.5 or earlier, instead of just using the now free Unity3D 2.6.
Am I understanding this correctly or am I mistaken. I don’t want to plunk down $399 to end up not being able to actual make use of the software.
Your mistake is the assumption that the software versions are what are costing money. There is no free version, or $399 version of the software.
There are licenses. Unity iPhone Basic will work with the Unity (Free) License. Unity iPhone 1.5 will operate with the Unity iPhone Basic + Unity (Free) License. The Free license is not limited to 2.6, but Unity 2.6 just happened to be released at the same time as the license price changing.
You do not have to have any version of Unity installed to install and use Unity iPhone.
You can purchase Unity iPhone and install it as a standalone with no problems.
You used to have to provide a Unity Basic license key to be able to purchase Unity iPhone, but now that Basic is free, this requirement isn’t there anymore (I believe).
In short, you can go plunk down 400 bucks, get Unity iPhone Basic, and begin work!
L
Lokken thanks for the measured response, I am also glad you didn’t resort to brow beating me over silly Version Vs. License semantics.
Your statement about not having Unity3D installed to be able to use Unity iPhone is news to me, because it seemed that every post I was reading said it was a requirement.
I am hoping that you are correct in this.
I didn’t mean to browbeat, if that’s how it came off. I was just trying to clear up your confusion. Unity and Unity iPhone are different applications, and the installation of one is independent of the other.
Thanks Tempest, I appreciate the effort, just seemed a bit browbeaty ( new word ) 
If I don’t even need Unity3D installed to be able to purchase and run Unity iPhone Basic I will be a happy camper.
It’s a requirement from a licensing point of view, not a physical point of view. Eventually Unity and Unity iPhone will become one app, and then the confusion should disappear.
–Eric
So Eric5h5, your saying that I do need to download, and install for example Unity3D 2.6, and set it to the free license activation. Then I could delete the Unity program, install the Unity iPhone Basic, and activate it with the purchased serial number, and never have to worry about Unity3D 2.6 causing me any incompatibility issues?
Also currently to run Unity iPhone Advanced I need to have a license for Unity3D Pro which is $1499, so a combined total of $3000 ( rounded up )
So would the base cost of Unity3D Pro ( if the 2 became one piece of software ) double in price, to equate the current cost structure?
I see you have a large number of posts, couldn’t tell if you worked for Unity3D or not.
Since the recent change to Unity being free, I don’t know how the licensing stuff is handled, sorry. All I know is that Unity and Unity iPhone are currently two separate apps, with no dependencies between them.
Nope, none of the pricing would change at all. (Well, they could if they wanted to, but nobody has indicated anything like that.) Unity Pro would be $1500 and Unity iPhone Advanced would be $1500. Simply being one piece of software doesn’t have any bearing on that. Besides, that would really annoy people who don’t want to do iPhone development…
Nope. 
–Eric
With hope, this won’t add to the confusion…
Until recently, you needed a copy of Unity Indie to run Unity iPhone Basic.
Until recently you were not allowed to “mix” your licenses, and if you had Unity Pro, you were required to have Unity iPhone Advanced, or if you wanted Unity iPhone Advanced, you were required to have Unity Pro.
However…
With the recent changes since the Unite Conference at the end of October, Unity Indie (now just called “UNITY”) is now free.
Does that help?
Thats actually only half correct.
You need to own Pro to get iPhone Advanced or upgrade to it.
But there is and was no vice versa requirement. You could have iPhone Basic with Pro as you could have iPhone Basic with Indie.
I doubt there are very many people with the Unity Pro/Unity iPhone Basic combo, but it’s true, there was never any prohibition against this.
–Eric
Huh… I would have sworn there was something about that before … but it’s too early to check with WayBackMachine.
I could have been confusing this:
from Real-time tools for 3D, AR, and VR development | Products
… with the fact that this is the same requirement dictated for Unity Pro, and made the assumption that you couldn’t have Unity Pro and iPhone Basic.
If you moved to Pro due to the income then its clear, then its enforced.
But I actually moved to Pro because I worked with a team and “required” the Asset Server (could have worked without it, but I earned enough money with Unity and that made the work easier). Guess others had none financial reasons too.
Upgrading Unity iPhone was no requirement along that step and that was in Dec 2008. I owned Unity Indie + iPhone Basic before that.
Indeed, I suspect most of us using Pro are <$100,000, and are using it by choice. As a Pro owner, I definitely had the option to buy Unity iPhone Basic last year, but decided on Advanced because A) why not and B) they had a sale.
–Eric