Castle Magus

"Hi. In today's episode, we look at how people make money on the internet, how vulnerable tech platforms affect people's livelihoods, and why 'being your own boss' often means your boss is just Jeff Bezos."

I mean, he probably shouldn't have ever been "in" at Unity to start with, but better late than never?

Or is the phrase I'm looking for actually "too little too late"? Yeah, it's probably more that second one.

Unity is proper fucked, regardless of whether Riccitiello stays or goes. I'm still never going to use Unity for anything at all ever, doesn't matter what shitgibbon they may have in charge. Also, wake me up when the rest of the board at Unity follows Riccitiello out the door, because you know this wasn't all on just his head, despite his rancid history.

(EDIT) They've apparently brought in some "private equity firm" ghoul to replace him. Yeah, Unity's done and gone. (EDIT 2) Huh, as it turns out, at least according to Wikipedia, Riccitiello himself started out as a private equity ghoul. So I guess this is more a lateral move at worst. (/EDIT 2) (/EDIT)

Here's an analogy of the whole Unity situation, via "Charlie Murphy's True Hollywood Stories."

In this scenario, Charlie Murphy is the average dev using Unity, and Dave Chappelle-as-Rick James is the Unity company itself. Or, at least, that's what Unity was hoping it would be like. In reality, it's more like Charlie Murphy kicking Dave Chappelle-as-Rick James in the balls in response. (Including the insincere apology afterward.)

Hell, this is a pretty accurate representation of that matter, too.

"After outcry from the gaming community, Unity revealed a new plan that’s a drastic departure from what was initially announced."

Funny. Because all I'm hearing, still, is "never use Unity for anything at all ever."

The title is a bit of clickbait (though not untrue), but the video itself it pretty on point.

One of the comments: "Imagine if you had to pay the person who sold you pencils for every drawing you sold because they believed they were entitled a piece of your profit, because they sold you the pencils you used to make the drawing."

And then, a reply to that which is probably even more accurate: "Imagine if you had to pay the person who sold you pencils for every person who saw any drawing you ever did"

Also, Reggie coming up with the idea of a "per boot" fee. Don't fucking give them ideas man! ಠ_ಠ

Seriously, I'm still (futilely) hoping for another 1983-like crash, just to clear the board (and maybe the boardrooms).

(EDIT)

And there are bunch of comments along the lines of "How did it come to this?" or "How could Unity possibly think they could get away with this?"

And I'm sitting here like "How do you think it came to this? Video game players have been gleefully attaching their lips to the sewer pipe and sucking down each and every disgusting diarrhetic deluge that the video game industry has been squirting into their toilets for the past thirty-plus years. Even worse, too many of the same video game players have been militantly defending their right to guzzle down those liquid turds and have been defending the right of the game industry to eat the greasiest, spiciest, nastiest, most past-the-sell-by-date Taco Bell meat that they can find before hitting the bathroom. That is how it came to this. That is why Unity believed that they could get away with this."

(/EDIT)

"No details yet, but update coming in 'a couple of days'"

Nope, sorry, the damage is already done. Same as with WotC, I have absolutely no use for Unity from this point forward, because even if they fully backpedal on this particular thing (which remains to be seen if that's what they actually do), they've already shown their true colors and desire to utterly fuck over their customers.

Note to self: never use Unity for anything at all ever.

Glad now that I never got into it in the past, though I'd been toying with the idea of trying for years.

(EDIT) Of course, this assumes that I would've ever made a game that made any money at all, Unity or otherwise, so... probably actually irrelevant to me. However, on the vanishingly small off-chance that if I ever do make a game and actually try to sell it at some point, it sure as shit won't be on Unity now. (/EDIT)

(EDIT 2) Also, if I'm understanding this right (which is not a sure thing, given how piss poor the communication from Unity is) and devs are going to be charged per any install now, no matter what, then what's to stop dedicated trolls from simply setting up a script on a throw-away shitbox to just forever constantly uninstall and reinstall a game that they've deemed unworthy (like, say, Subnautica: Below Zero, which was made with Unity) just to drive up the costs for the developers of said game? Like, if I uninstalled and reinstalled Below Zero five times, that would cost Unknown Worlds Entertainment an extra dollar (or however much) that they otherwise wouldn't have to pay. Imagine trolls setting up something that will take some game they don't like and just uninstall and reinstall it hundreds of times a day, every day, forever, from now onthe point this asinine pricing model goes into effect. And you know they will. (/EDIT 2)

(EDIT 3) Oh, it looks like Unity may have already backpedaled on the whole "charging for repeated installs no matter what" bullshit? Well, if that's true, it's a slight improvement as it would negate everything in "EDIT 2" up there, but their new pricing is still bullshit, regardless. And the fact that they even thought that was a good idea in the first place makes me no longer trust that they won't try to do something equally bullshit or worse in the future, thus I'm sticking with my "never use Unity for anything at all ever" stance. (/EDIT 3)