On September 22, Marc Whitten shared an open letter with the community detailing changes to our runtime fee policy. One critical commitment was that “we will make sure that you can stay on the terms applicable for the version of the Unity editor you are using – as long as you keep using that version.”
To follow through on this commitment, we have updated the language to the Editor Terms based on feedback from our employees and community. Our goal is to make sure that the terms Unity users accept state that they can stay on those terms for the named version of Unity they are using, regardless of any changes to the Unity terms afterwards. As of today, this update will be added to our Github repository and unity.com/legal.
We’ve also made sure to explicitly state that the runtime fee is not in effect unless a game is created with or upgraded to the next major release of Unity (shipping in 2024) and beyond.
Our overall goal is to make it easy and transparent for developers to choose a version of Unity that works for them so that they can be successful.
Why do you phrase is this way, other than to mislead. You don’t mention this being 2023 LTS. You avoid mentioning the actual version number, despite having a whole sytem for version numbers, and purposefully mention a version that sounds like it’ll start with 2024…
2023 LTS isn’t a major release, that’s a support release. From 2023.2 to 2023.3/4 - you’re incrementing the minor number.
The major number change in 2024 would be 2024.1.
Because still using the same misleading terminology isn’t exactly explict, or helping to regain trust.
Why does this matter? Because there’s already projects out there, before the TOS changes that were made in 2023. And if the new terms come in for 2023 to be supported more, then you’re still retroactively forcing those users to either accept the new terms, or stick on a version that’s unsupported, despite them thinking they’d have an LTS version by the time their games ship.
This will have no effect on the trust issue. Unity it was YOU that burned the bridge and developers cannot cross it again for fear of getting burned again.
Frankly it’s still pretty goddamn messed up that these terms will be pushed on to the 2023 LTS versions. People using the tech stream are free from this but won’t get any actual support unless they switch to the new licensing model?
Yeah, this is exactly my point - If you started on a project in 2023.1 or 2023.2 before these new terms were announced you’re either
Ship in an “unsupported” tech stream version, and quite likely have bugs that are impossible to fix (if working on modern XR or console stuff, this might not even be an option)
Downgrade to 2022 LTS, which will still get bug fixes. This may not be an option depending on which 2023 features you’re relying on
Be forced to accept the new terms just for a few bug fixes
The really cruel part of this is if you’re going from 2023.2 (or 2023.3 if that comes out before next year) to 2023 LTS, you’re probably not even really getting any new features, or quality of life changes - you’re being forced to accept the new terms & rev share just for some bug fixes & support, of a release that when you started using, you assumed would be supported without any new fees etc.
While this isn’t as bad as unity’s original, probably illegal proposal to force this on all existing users, it’s still painful they’re forcing these terms on a subset of their users this way.
So what is stopping you from deleting the GitHub, again, silently changing the TOS to remove the protection, again, and then tell us, again, that according to California law you can do whatever you want retroactively as long as you notify us 3 months in advance?
If the answer is “nothing” (and it is, right?), these are just empty words from a company whose word already means nothing.
That sounds like a you issue. It’s not just rev share. Aside from rev share being foisted on people if they want to use the LTS of the current tech stream that uses a different license, there’s also the issues that come from Unity having done this in the first place.
So yeah, they’re charging more money for what isn’t a major version release, but they also did so much more than that.
Unity once again. Makes incomprehensible ToS announcements… other engine manufacturers see this and STRENGTHEN the rights of the developers so that they feel safer. e.g. Flax Engine did this.
Okay so I am looking through the current run time fee and it’s only asking 2.5% of your revenue earned that month, and that’s only if your using unity pro, which you most likely only be using because you passed the 200K a year threshold.
And if I recall was the original fee like 5% of revenue when you pass the 100k a year threshold, diffidently correct me if that’s incorrect.
With that info in mind isn’t the new fee actually better or at least on par with the old one or am I missing something?
This thread isn’t really about the fee though. If that’s fine with you then good for you. If you are also fine with Unity changing the terms whenever they want, also good for you.
Isn’t the whole point of this update that they can’t retroactively change the terms for each LTS anymore? Like if they pull some crap in a future LTS you can still stick with a previous LTS right? Isn’t that the same thing Unreal’s licence is doing?
