I’m looking for ways of distributing my app outside of the Windows Store. I’ve received numerous emails from customers that are experiencing issues purchasing my app via the Windows Store. Ideally I could distribute it straight from my own website/store, but I’ve never done this before. It seems like if I just sent a customer the binary they could redistribute it to whomever they feel to, which is obviously undesirable.
Any suggestions? Has anyone done this before or have any tips?
Bump.
What I need help with is licensing. Are there any guidelines on licensing software made with unity outside of the Windows Store? How do you create a serial number that users need to enter? Are there services to assist with this process?
No, I’m talking about distributing the app outside of the Windows Store. I’m talking about PC Standalone export. Has anyone sold an app this way, just directly from your own site?
Hello, if you’re looking for DRM, that is something you will have to implement on your own or purchase DRM from someone who developed it.
It seems like most single player indie games I see for sale directly through the developers web site is generally DRM free. Most forms of DRM these days require connecting to a server and providing some kind of unique key to verify the product is authentic.
If you go through the Steam Greenlight process, they have optional DRM they can wrap around your .exe. You can also sell on gog.com (DRM not allowed) or itch.io (You must provide your own DRM).
The goal is to prevent it at launch for a while because that is generally when most sales are made. However, all DRM that doesn’t require online is generally crackable. Eg: If your game is popular, the people who know how to crack Steam DRM can pretty much crack any game that only uses Steam DRM, then redistribute it. The only DRM I know of that currently has high success rates is Denuvo used by AAA titles.
Thanks for the info. To clarify, my app is not a game, it’s a productivity app so I don’t think Steam would work. You’ve mentioned that I need to do DRM myself but if I’ve never done it before, where should I start? Are there any Unity plugins/tutorials to assist with this?
I assume this would involve sending the customer a license key, them entering it in the app, then the app sending it to a server and the server validating that it is a valid key (likely from a database of keys). If the server declines then the app essentially shuts down/stops working. Is this the basic workflow?
Something like that. Might want to have unique ids for each device too, and encrypt or hash communications between the client and server. You could have something like, allowed to install on 5 devices. If the client doesn’t have access to the device, then have a web portal where they can deauthorize all machines so they can reauthorize a new 5 devices.
I haven’t actually implemented this myself but I imagine this is how it would go.