It’s a new financing strategy that is making people cringe: the company Unity Technologies, at the origin of the Unity engine, very popular among others among independent video game developers, announced Tuesday September 12 that it was going to review its financing system, provoking the ire of an entire section of the video game sector.
Engines are essential cogs in the creation of a video game. They allow, for example, to compose character animations, game maps or lighting. Until now, Unity was favored by small studios because of its economic model: the platform offered, in fact, free access for low-income structures and a subscription system above a certain threshold.
In his blog postthe American company has however made a major change for the sector: from 1er January 2024, each development studio will have to pay a tax when a game designed with this tool is downloaded by a user. The tax applies if certain thresholds are crossed in terms of income and number of downloads, and its amount changes depending on the version of Unity used for the development of the game.
Despite these thresholds, presented by the company as protective measures in favor of developers who have not yet achieved success, certain studios immediately expressed their concern, like Innerslothat the origin of the famous license Among Us, or Massive Monstersdeveloper of the highly successful Cult of the Lamb. The latter even threatened to withdraw his game from the market from 1er January.
Everyone fears for their economic balance and highlights, like the Aggro Crab studio, the many questions raised by the announcement: will a game downloaded several times by the same person be subject to a tax each time? How will this tax apply to games accessible free of charge to millions of players benefiting from monthly subscriptions, like Xbox GamePass?
On this last point, Unity Technologies finally clarified, Wednesday at the site Axios, that the tax would apply to the distributor in the case of subscriptions (for example Microsoft, regarding GamePass), and not the developers. The company also added that the tax only concerns initial installations, that it will not apply to demo versions, but that it will still concern installations made by the same user on a second console. The company also ensures that it listens to criticism, while asserting its right to seek a viable economic model.
Unity is, in fact, currently looking to get back on its feet. Founded in 2004, the company went public in 2020 and has since used Many times to waves of layoffs, the last (600 people, or 8% of its payroll) dating from May, reports CNBC.