Unity's per-install fee will be based on "estimates" and Unity may not spot "fraudulent" installs in advance

14.09.2023 - 10:25 / rockpapershotgun.com / Unity Pro / Will

After a couple of days of furious game developer reactions, game engine company Unity have backtracked a teensy bit on their plan to charge developers who meet certain revenue and copies-sold thresholds a "runtime fee" for every installation of their game.

The company will only make developers pay extra for the first installation of a game on a new device - so no fees for reinstallations, in theory, and no prospect of spiteful players "install bombing" games to drive up costs for their creators. However, the company haven't stated how or indeed, if they can distinguish legitimate from illegitimate installations in advance, seemingly because their method for tracking installations is based on "estimates" using a proprietary data-gathering system, which they aren't able to discuss in depth.

"Once you meet the two install and revenue thresholds, you only pay the runtime fee on new installs after Jan 1, 2024," reads a Unity statement on Ecks. "It's not perpetual: You only pay once for an install, not an ongoing perpetual license royalty like a revenue share model."

For those just joining us, here's a quick recap of the proposed new pricing model and Unity account framework at the time of writing. As of 1st January 2024, developers with Unity Personal and Unity Plus accounts who have made $200,000 in the last 12 months and have 200,000 lifetime installs will pay $0.20 per new install (that's ever new install per device after the new policy launch date).

Developers with Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise who have made $1,000,000 in the last 12 months, and have 1,000,000 lifetime game installs will pay between $0.01 and $0.15, depending on how many times their games are installed per month.

All that's assuming you don't live in an "emerging market region" - as in, any country other than United States, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, South Korea and the UK. Unity developers from emerging markets pay $0.02 per install if you're on Unity Personal or Plus, $0.01 per install If you're on Unity Pro, and $0.005 if you're on Unity Enterprise.

So how will Unity track and invoice developers for game installs? "We leverage our own proprietary data model and will provide estimates of the number of times the runtime is distributed for a given project," the company state on their much-updated FAQ page. "This estimate will cover an invoice for all platforms." The company add on their forums that "We believe it gives an accurate determination of the number of times the runtime is distributed for a given project."

As for fraudulent installations, such as people repeatedly reinstalling games out of malice