Unity!!!
What a week! Unity (the game engine I use for Magical Harvest) has introduced a new payment model, which has caused quite a bit of unrest among users of the engine. A large number of indie developers use this engine.
What's the issue?
Unity's initial post with the new features stated a payment model where developers have to pay a fee to Unity for every install of their games over a certain amount and install count. So if you install and uninstall the game 100x, 100x that fee ($0.20 per install) is charged from the developer (they have since backed down from that and say each install on a new device costs). Now consider how many pirated games there are that don't even make money for an install.
I'm not too worried about the fees themselves with Magical Harvest. The threshold is set really high (with a monthly subscription account, that's $1m in revenue AND 1m installs). But the trust in Unity is gone and people don't want to continue supporting this company. Many negative things (technical things, promises) have been overlooked so far, but this has now taken the cake. Whether this would be allowed in Europe is another matter altogether...?
How does this effect Magical Harvest?
I have to elaborate a bit more on this. Currently I am in a coaching program to establish a game company, to prepare myself for pitching to publishers and to find a publisher to pay team members I would like to have for support.
This of course leaves me with a decision to stay with Unity, since I'm already very far along with it and can present presentable gameplay - or to take longer and switch to Unreal Engine 5. Switching would mean it would set me back a few months. You don't just switch engines and be 100% efficient with it like before. It's a new learning process. Of course, it's easier to switch than to start from 0.
So Unity or Unreal Engine 5 (UE5)?
Many game companies (even smaller ones like me) are just switching to a different engine with their Unity projects, some of which are already 2 years old. I'm still undecided (because of the publisher thing), but have started looking into UE5. I want to give it some time to see if it's really worth it for me personally or not. My personal future also depends on it, because UE5 offers quite some advantages - also on the job market.
So it remains exciting in this area and I will keep you informed about my decisions.
But what has happened in the last 2 weeks?
I could not do everything planned, because somehow a lot of smaller things came in between or demanded more time:
- Flowers: 23/40 flowers are finished in their first phase. Their color variants and icons are still missing.
Because of the color variants and the number of flowers I changed the whole system of how color variants are handled in the game. This took the longest time. But now color variants can be inserted for several Items without any problems. Also for e.g. crops (if there is a need - keyword: golden apple or something like that).
- New rocks: there are new rocks! They are now used consistently everywhere in the game!
- New mine: because of the new rocks the mine has got a new shape, too.
- Sequence from developing field plants to the next magic level
- A trailer sequence for the change of the wasteland to the magic forest for the trailer
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Planned for the next two weeks:
- Working on a trailer
- Working on a "showcase" demo for the "Sweden Game Conference
- Working on a pitch for the "Sweden Game Conference
- Flowers: adding color variations for spring and summer.
And I'll keep looking at the Unreal Engine on the side. Let's see if it convinces me.
What's the issue?
Unity's initial post with the new features stated a payment model where developers have to pay a fee to Unity for every install of their games over a certain amount and install count. So if you install and uninstall the game 100x, 100x that fee ($0.20 per install) is charged from the developer (they have since backed down from that and say each install on a new device costs). Now consider how many pirated games there are that don't even make money for an install.
I'm not too worried about the fees themselves with Magical Harvest. The threshold is set really high (with a monthly subscription account, that's $1m in revenue AND 1m installs). But the trust in Unity is gone and people don't want to continue supporting this company. Many negative things (technical things, promises) have been overlooked so far, but this has now taken the cake. Whether this would be allowed in Europe is another matter altogether...?
How does this effect Magical Harvest?
I have to elaborate a bit more on this. Currently I am in a coaching program to establish a game company, to prepare myself for pitching to publishers and to find a publisher to pay team members I would like to have for support.
This of course leaves me with a decision to stay with Unity, since I'm already very far along with it and can present presentable gameplay - or to take longer and switch to Unreal Engine 5. Switching would mean it would set me back a few months. You don't just switch engines and be 100% efficient with it like before. It's a new learning process. Of course, it's easier to switch than to start from 0.
So Unity or Unreal Engine 5 (UE5)?
Many game companies (even smaller ones like me) are just switching to a different engine with their Unity projects, some of which are already 2 years old. I'm still undecided (because of the publisher thing), but have started looking into UE5. I want to give it some time to see if it's really worth it for me personally or not. My personal future also depends on it, because UE5 offers quite some advantages - also on the job market.
So it remains exciting in this area and I will keep you informed about my decisions.
But what has happened in the last 2 weeks?
I could not do everything planned, because somehow a lot of smaller things came in between or demanded more time:
- Flowers: 23/40 flowers are finished in their first phase. Their color variants and icons are still missing.
Because of the color variants and the number of flowers I changed the whole system of how color variants are handled in the game. This took the longest time. But now color variants can be inserted for several Items without any problems. Also for e.g. crops (if there is a need - keyword: golden apple or something like that).
- New rocks: there are new rocks! They are now used consistently everywhere in the game!
- New mine: because of the new rocks the mine has got a new shape, too.
- Sequence from developing field plants to the next magic level
- A trailer sequence for the change of the wasteland to the magic forest for the trailer
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Planned for the next two weeks:
- Working on a trailer
- Working on a "showcase" demo for the "Sweden Game Conference
- Working on a pitch for the "Sweden Game Conference
- Flowers: adding color variations for spring and summer.
And I'll keep looking at the Unreal Engine on the side. Let's see if it convinces me.