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Unity adding a fee for devs for each time a game is installed, after certain thresholds
(www.gamesindustry.biz)
this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2023
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Sail the high seas ๐
This actively hurts the developers and helps Unity.
The devs will be charged for every install. Even if that install wasn't legitimate.
So if you pirate a Unity game, it's no longer a victimless crime. You're actively making the developer pay for your piracy.
Like normally, I am totally cool with piracy. But giving piracy as a solution here is actually detrimental to the developers and doesn't hurt Unity the company at all.
I don't think a pirated copy of the game would call home, that's something that hackers should patch really quickly IMO
Crackers often only patch out the DRM to redistribute a pirated copy of a game. If it is a game from a small studio, something like Goldberg is enough to "crack" the game, and it wouldn't remove any of the Unity telemetry.
huh, that's true. I've "forgot" about emulators like Goldberg.
Tho, I can imagine some kind of methods will appear sooner or later for that too.
Like others said, I am sure it will be one of the patches applied to the Unity games. Crackers are not really bad people, and turning off some telemetry should be a piece of cake.
What about all the games that have already been cracked?
Bear in mind this affects every game, including games that have already been released. So if that stuff wasn't patched out before, then devs would be charged for piracy.
I dunno. It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I agree that crackers aren't bad people, but it leaves some unknowns because you're counting on them to go above and beyond, essentially.
Agreed, games would have to be fixed retroactively. That is a problem, but maybe it creates enough uproar people will actively try to block it.
That's even worse for the devs, because they might still need to pay Unity for your install.