Unreal Engine Made Free By Epic Games

[scionicspectre]

I've been targeting OGRE 2.0 for my current projects, but given Unreal's variety of supported platforms (and arguably richer feature set), I'm very seriously considering it. Who ever thought indies would have so many great engines with physically-based shading so soon?

Honestly, I think my reasons for using OGRE have more to do with the tools being available on Linux. I'd rather not do any production work on Windows if I don't have to.

[Kano]

It is a wise marketing step to open the code for everybody. It should definitely increase the number of new multiplatform games. I think it was a great fault that Unigine did nothing like that before. Epic just followed Unity and even surpasses it right now. As i am no game developer i do not know how many really need to change the engine to fit to their needs, but it is certainly a very interesting aspect. It it really impressive how many Unity games you find on Linux/Android right now, Epic is prepared for a challange it seems.

[Blahblah]

True, it's not FOSS yet, but it still a large step in the right direction. I applaud them for this move.

[gerddie]

It wouldn't be too hard from here to take another step and dual-license the engine, following the Qt model.

I don't think it's that easy: With Qt the program you release is the major part, and if you want to release a version for which people always must pay (i.e. no third party has the right to redistribute), you have to go for the closed source option.

With a game engine this is different, if you were allowed to redistribute the software part of an Unreal engine based game under the GPL, then Epic would have no right to ask the game developer for money, but the latter could still sell the assets (textures, sound, etc) and charge for in-game items, i.e. make money off the engine without giving anything to Epic.

For example, ID games like the DOOMs, Quakes etc, that have the code available under the GPL still require that one buys the actual game to obtain these assets.

[peppercats]

Is there anything stopping them from releasing it under a FSF license but still charging royalties?

You could still redistribute your game for free and wouldn't pay anything unless you charged for it.

[AHSauge]

Is there anything stopping them from releasing it under a FSF license but still charging royalties?

You could still redistribute your game for free and wouldn't pay anything unless you charged for it.

Yes, there is something stopping you. How can you comply to GPL or some similar licence when you yourself have a clause saying you have to pay money for it when you earn enough? Being GPL or similar does not mean it's free as in free beer. You can charge a million dollars for it. As long as you actually provide the source code under the condition stated in GPL, you're free to do so. So how do you make sure anyone using your copy (you were the one accepting the licence by Epic) isn't going to make money out of it? You can forbid making money out of it, but that means you won't comply with GPL. The same holds true for other FOSS licenses as well.

[dungeon]

Is there anything stopping them from releasing it under a FSF license but still charging royalties?

When licence is about "once you commercially succeed, we are coming to get you" well, that can't really be free software licence nor opensource one.

[dungeon]

And from pure economic standpoint it is valid and better for them, because people like free of charge stuffs, so this way is better from marketing standpoint and can lead engine to more wide adoption...

Once you have wide adoption, you can rest on one's laurels like Intel do - more or less just follow Moore's Law

[ravyne]

This. And I say this having done several university projects with Unity and liking it for the purpose :P

Unity will likely have to adapt their business model, but they're doing fine now and will continue to do so. Unreal doesn't have the reach or the ease-of-use that Unity does, and in particular Unity holds a huge advantage in mobile where it dominates and Unity is comparatively non-existant; a great deal of money is made in mobile -- more than on the PC where Unreal's stronghold is. Unity powers fully 60% of the top-grossing mobile games, its nearest competitor holds less than half its developer audience and its not Unreal (which is third; that's across PCs, console, and mobile).

My guess is that Unity will be forced to stop putting premium features behind a paywall -- they can continue charging a premium to publish on Consoles, as Unreal will also likely do. But everything a mobile developer or Steam-hopeful would want to do will have to become free.

I don't know whether they'll stick with their 20% after the first 100k/yr income model, or if they will restructure to recoup more from the long-tail of smaller indie developers. To leave it as is might help retain developers who don't expect to make more than 100k in a year, but they're not making any money off of those folks. I will say, though, that Unreal's 5% royalty after 3k/quarter is a very low bar to have to limbo under. There are probably more than a few folks over in Unity-land that will be sleeping less-well tonight.

[gens]

Who ever thought indies would have so many great engines with physically-based shading so soon?

i'm looking into PBS
it doesn't seem complicated at all (global illumination part does, though)
but it does seem gpu heavy