Unity Pro versus free versions

Unity Engine
1

I’ve read the licensing differences between Unity Pro and the free version, but I was hoping some Pro users could lay out in non-technical terms the significant, practical advantages of getting the Pro version.

Being able to include videos is a big deal for what I intend to do, and the improved shadows look nice, but I’d like to understand some other ways Pro will help before spending the $$. Looks like some extra assets come with the Pro version as well, but couldn’t tell how significant that was.

I will be doing a fair amount of scripting, so would like to know if the code editor in Pro is a lot better.

Thanks for any feedback.

2

any shaders that use any form of render to texture
better integration with dll’s and networking
great special effects like dof, blur, reflections and many other enhanced effects
removal of splash screens
build size stripping

Talking about it, you are getting a pretty stunning deal with unity free overall, but pro is definately “the icing on the cake”.

3

Thanks for the reply. Would you (or anyone) mind clarifying a couple of things:

  1. When does a render to texture shader come into play? Some of my content will come from (and have shaders from) DAZ Studio or Carrara. Will these benefit by using Render-to-texture? Looked it up in the manual but didn’t give enough background for me to understand where I’d use it. (License comparison mentions water with reflections and refractions, surveillance cameras, or for post-processing effects - maybe someone could explain it differently so I can figure out if it would help me.

  2. Are the special effects that come with Pro just scripts that could be brought into and run in the free version or is there more to it than that?

  3. Just a clarification - on the comparison page it says Pro doesn’t have build size stripping - just iOS Pro and Android Pro

  4. Any other significant benefits that Unity Pro users have noted over the free version?

Thanks to all for their input.

4

  1. The license page comparision gives the information pretty well. Reflection and refraction ("breaking of light due to the uneven surface of water) should be clear, post processing effects should also be clear (depht of field, glow, contract and color modifications) and the “raw rendertexture” usage was pretty well layed out with the surveillance camera I think, another use case is a skinned, non rect radar for example

  2. You can import the Pro Effects asset bundle that comes with unity into free if you want to see whats in. But without Pro, RenderTexture is not supported at all and the effects will not run.

  3. Tahts correct, stripping is a mobile only feature

  4. Plugins (usage of native code at all) and Profiler are out of my view 2 major reasons for Pro, but AssetBundles are as well pretty usefull (the only way to load additional content item by item at runtime or stream data unblocking or load data reasonably from outside at all). The Character Customization Example Project uses AssetBundles (and is thus a Pro only thing) for example