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[Verger]

I guess GDC is as good a time as any to do so. Gotta fire back at Unreal as well.

EDIT: The engine features that were previously behind a paywall are now in the free version (Profiler, Occlusion Culling, Render-to-Texture, and Post-Processing Special Effects )

SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwired - Mar 3, 2015) - Unity Technologies today announced the immediate availability of Unity 5, the next generation of the award-winning Unity multiplatform engine and development tools. The most powerful version of Unity to date includes massive graphics improvements and an expanded editor feature set that gives developers everywhere the potential to create incredibly beautiful and innovative gaming experiences across 21 platforms. Additionally, Unity announced the availability of Unity Cloud Build, which enables developers to increase productivity by leveraging the power of cloud computing in order to remain focused on game development.

With the launch, Unity bolsters its longtime mission to democratize development by opening up the entire engine and editor to all developers through progressive licensing options that add big value for large studios and massive power for hobbyists and developers just getting started without taking a share of revenue. Unity 5 comes in two editions:

Unity 5 Professional Edition
Unity 5 Professional Edition is all about adding incredible value whether for a small 2-3 person studio or a 100+ person studio with the addition of Unity Cloud Build Pro, Team License, Game Performance Reporting, Asset Store Level 11, Unity Analytics Pro, access to previews and betas and more for the same low price of $75/month subscription.

Unity 5 Personal Edition
Unity 5 Personal Edition is a free solution empowering hobbyists, sole developers, and studios just getting started with all the powerful features found in the Unity engine and editor such as Profiler, Occlusion Culling, Render-to-Texture, and Post-Processing Special Effects as well as all the big Unity 5 features like Physically-based Shading, Enlighten, and reflection probes. Completely free to developers with revenue or funding less than $100,000 a year, and which includes the full engine (but no advanced services package.)

"Unity 5 is a massive step up for Unity that empowers developers to make more beautiful and intricate games that reach bigger audiences, across more platforms," said John Riccitiello, CEO, Unity. "We want everyone to have access to Unity 5 which is why we've increased the value of our royalty-free licenses. Unity 5 Professional starts with the power of Unity 5.0 and adds valuable tools such as Unity Cloud Build Pro and Team License. Unity 5 Personal Edition is for the developer just getting started and offers all the power of the engine and editor for free."

Developers around the world are already finding great success using Unity 5, such as the recently released Republique Remastered from Camouflaj and the upcoming games Ori and the Blind Forest from Moon Studios and Rival Kingdoms from Space Ape.

The most powerful version of Unity yet adds big features to an extensive creative toolset that enables developers to craft stunning visuals and innovative gameplay experiences across any style, genre, and platform:

A Graphics Powerhouse
Unity 5 has massively enhanced graphics capabilities like physically based shading, real-time global illumination with Enlighten, and reflection probes that enable developers to create stunning visual experiences.

Feature Rich and Highly Flexible Editor
Unity's comprehensive, time-saving, and extensible editor is even more powerful in Unity 5 with 64-bit support, unprecedented audio tools, big improvements to animation, huge physics upgrades, and much more. With Unity 5, developers have the power and flexibility to let their creativity run wild.

Industry-leading Multiplatform Support
Unity 5's industry leading multiplatform support does the heavy lifting so developers can focus on crafting awesome gaming experiences across 21 different platforms, including the new WebGL target as well as consoles, desktop and mobile.

Unmatched Efficiency Boosted in the Cloud
Unity's legendary development efficiency reaches new heights with the launch of Unity Cloud Build that taps the power of the cloud to further increase productivity and keep developers' focus where it should be: making great games. To find out more about Unity Cloud Build, which is also available today, visit https://build.cloud.unity3d.com/.
Unity 5 Professional and Personal Editions are available for immediate download today at http://unity3d.com/5.

 

[SteveWinwood]

no black ui for free tho

 

[_woLf]

That 75 a month really looks like a lot now after epics announcement yesterday..

 

[SmithnCo]

They scared

 

[Verger]

That 75 a month really looks like a lot now after epics announcement yesterday..

It's all about the royalties. If devs don't want to sacrifice potentially 5% of their revenue to Unreal they may just go with the monthly subscription.

Like anything it depends on the team and studio and what they want to pursue.

 

[kiyomi]

That 75 a month really looks like a lot now after epics announcement yesterday..

You don't pay royalties with Unity though.

 

[Dead Prince]

no black ui for free tho

no download. need black theme.

 

[spoonztt]

So it would be $75 per install with Unity vs UE4's 5%overall right?

 

[RoadHazard]

That 75 a month really looks like a lot now after epics announcement yesterday..

Yep. Unity is awesome for small/beginning devs, but there are quite a few really nice features missing from the free version. They need to do what Epic is doing.

 

[thehillissilent]

So it would be $75 per install with Unity vs UE4's 5%overall right?

Unity 5 Free has all of the programming features available, which is HUGE along with 64bit editior

Unity 5 pro you get advanced services and it's $1500 per seat or $75 per month per seat.

If you make over $100,000, you will have to upgrade to Unity 5 Pro

There are NO royalties with Unity 5

Yep. Unity is awesome for small/beginning devs, but there are quite a few really nice features missing from the free version. They need to do what Epic is doing.

Unity 5 Free has ALL of the engine features such as Profiler, Occlusion Culling, Render-to-Texture, and Post-Processing Special Effects which used to be exclusive to the Pro versions in the past. This is huge.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

So am I reading this right - the only difference w/Pro now is that I don't pay royalties? Both are otherwise the same?

Sounds like I am wrong - there are still advanced features in Pro that are not in regular Unity 5.

 

[Verger]

So it would be $75 per install with Unity vs UE4's 5%overall right?

That seems to be the case. And in either case it all depends on your team's revenue. Here if you make less than 100K a year it's free, and I think Unreal has a revenue target as well.

 

[emb]

Yep. Unity is awesome for small/beginning devs, but there are quite a few really nice features missing from the free version. They need to do what Epic is doing.

Aren't all the actual engine features free for Unity 5 personal?

Edit:
Here's the image that was posted in the other thread:

Some of those things could be important. I don't really know enough to say.

 

[Kinthalis]

I'm flip flopping over here.

Unreal?
Unity?
Unreal!
No, Unity!

 

[Dead Prince]

I'm flip flopping over here.

Unreal?
Unity?
Unreal!
No, Unity!

whynotboth.jpg

 

[Uncle Rupee]

That 75 a month really looks like a lot now after epics announcement yesterday..

Yeah or you could build it using the free version and then before you crack $100k spend $1,500 to buy a pro license. That's quite a bit smaller than 5% of revenue.

 

[thehillissilent]

Aren't all the actual engine features free for Unity 5 personal?

Yes, ALL engine features are FREE with Unity Free!

Services like Cloud Building are apart of Pro or extra cost for Free users.

 

[Verger]

So am I reading this right - the only difference w/Pro now is that I don't pay royalties? Both are otherwise the same?

Sounds like I am wrong - there are still advanced features in Pro that are not in regular Unity 5.

Which are these? the only ones mentioned in the PR are "Unity Cloud Build Pro, Team License, Game Performance Reporting, Asset Store Level 11, Unity Analytics Pro, access to previews and betas and more", but they claim the personal edition has the same functionality otherwise as the Pro version.

 

[Genji]

Yep. Unity is awesome for small/beginning devs, but there are quite a few really nice features missing from the free version. They need to do what Epic is doing.

I don't think this is the case anymore with Unity 5.

 

[Tiu Neo]

Yep. Unity is awesome for small/beginning devs, but there are quite a few really nice features missing from the free version. They need to do what Epic is doing.

All the engine features are free, now. Unless you are refering to things like cloud building, but I'd say the most important parts are on Free, now.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

So this is a bunch of bullshit and the only real news here is that Unity 5 is out because this looks exactly the same as they have been doing for free/Pro Unity 4.

edit: Or I could be wrong yet again. Argh.

Did you not read this thread. ALL engine features are FREE!!!!!!

Yep, my bad.

 

[thehillissilent]

So this is a bunch of bullshit and the only real news here is that Unity 5 is out because this looks exactly the same as they have been doing for free/Pro Unity 4.

Did you not read this thread? ALL engine features are FREE!!!!!!

Extra services like Cloud Built are NOT.

The engine features that were previously behind a paywall are now in the free version (Profiler, Occlusion Culling, Render-to-Texture, and Post-Processing Special Effects )

 

[dukeoflegs]

What's the difference between what they offered for free with Unity 4 vs what has just been announced?

 

[Dead Prince]

What's the difference between what they offered for free with Unity 4 vs what has just been announced?

some of the features were locked out in unity 4 and you had to get pro like advanced lighting,effects, audio, and stuff like that.
now you get it all regardless of status.

 

[HelloMeow]

Source code access? Interesting.

 

[RoadHazard]

Unity 5 Free has ALL of the engine features such as Profiler, Occlusion Culling, Render-to-Texture, and Post-Processing Special Effects which used to be exclusive to the Pro versions in the past. This is huge.

Oh, it does? That's awesome then. I'll admit I just assumed it'd be pretty much like like U4. Does that include stuff like advanced pathfinding for agents and such? What's still Pro-only?

 

[Dead Prince]

Oh, it does? That's awesome then. I'll admit I just assumed it'd be pretty much like like U4. Does that include stuff like advanced pathfinding for agents and such? What's still Pro-only?

 

[JeffG]

I'll admit I just assumed

Didn't stop you from posting your "facts" though

 

[kiguel182]

The projects from Unity 4 are totally compatible with the new version correct?

Really curious to try this out and see if there are chances to 2D development tools.

 

[Tiu Neo]

Oh, it does? That's awesome then. I'll admit I just assumed it'd be pretty much like like U4. Does that include stuff like advanced pathfinding for agents and such? What's still Pro-only?

Advanced Pathfinding was part of free since ~4.3, wasn't it?

Anyway, yes, all in-engine features are free, now.

 

[The Friendly Monster]

The projects from Unity 4 are totally compatible with the new version correct?

Really curious to try this out and see if there are chances to 2D development tools.

It imports them but a couple of things won't work exactly the same. Physx has been updated and isn't totally backwards compatible for example.

 

[SteveWinwood]

it amazes me people don't understand percentages

 

[Chance Hale]

When is Crytek going to announce their plans at GDC?

 

[AngryMoth]

Really happy the stopped paywalling certain engine features, especially after the unreal announcement.

 

[kiguel182]

It imports them but a couple of things won't work exactly the same. Physx has been updated and isn't totally backwards compatible for example.

It shouldn't be a problem for my current stuff but it's nice to know. Thanks!

 

[D4Danger]

When is Crytek going to announce their plans at GDC?

does anyone really care at this point?

 

[Huw_Dawson]

When is Crytek going to announce their plans at GDC?

Nobody in their right mind would use Cryengine in 2015.

 

[Aisen]

Wow this is great.
Guessing the free version supports the rift now instead of forcing you to go pro.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Advanced Pathfinding was part of free since ~4.3, wasn't it?

Off-mesh links were previously Pro-only

EDIT:

Wow this is great.
Guessing the free version supports the rift now instead of forcing you to go pro.

Rift support has been available in free for awhile now - to the extent that you were able to access Pro only render-to-texture features in free just by running the official OR SDK demo scene

 

[Verger]

When is Crytek going to announce their plans at GDC?

I won't be surprised if they don't really announce anything, except maybe the latest version of the Cry3 Engine. Crytek seems to be doing its own thing despite its own issues and hasn't bothered to insert itself into the "Engine War" between Unity and Unreal.

I guess in a way it's nice they don't play like that, but we will see.

Nobody in their right mind would use Cryengine in 2015.

It's still a very powerful engine and has the best graphical fidelity of them. Look at this video of Kingdom Come which uses it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0ybCrr8c4g

If you're a talented dev or have lots of money like the Star Citizen people then it's a no brainer.

 

[charsace]

The projects from Unity 4 are totally compatible with the new version correct?

Really curious to try this out and see if there are chances to 2D development tools.

I would guess so. Unity 5 is supposed to be a proper Entity Component system now I can see some problems arising with how people called components in code.

 

[LiK]

Battle of the engines.

 

[Vulcano's assistant]

Nobody in their right mind would use Cryengine in 2015.

Star Citizen guys are slowly taking over crytek's staff so they'll be fine

 

[RoadHazard]

Looking great! As I got more and more into Unity last year the free version did start to feel limiting in some ways, so this is pretty huge. Hopefully 4.x projects carry over smoothly.

Off-mesh links were previously Pro-only

Yes, thanks, that's what I was referring to. Couldn't recall the term.

 

[Keby]

Trying to download. Getting a a blank page. I guess they're getting hammered right now.

 

[TekGryphon]

Still C# or UnityScript, right?

 

[Ourobolus]

Beautiful. I just started working with Unity over the past month and this makes it even better.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

Didn't stop you from posting your "facts" though

No need to be so hostile.

 

[Aisen]

Off-mesh links were previously Pro-only

EDIT:


Rift support has been available in free for awhile now - to the extent that you were able to access Pro only render-to-texture features in free just by running the official OR SDK demo scene

Ah my mistake it's been over a year since I used unity with the rift.

 

[Candescence]

Still C# or UnityScript, right?

Pretty much. They've got a new C# compiler and runtime which is pretty much five times faster than the old one, though, really, UnityScript is pretty much barely used anyway, which even Unity's developers have noted, so they've been moving all their example scripts over to C#.