Comment on No love lost: AppLovin helpfully releases tool to switch from Unity to Godot or Unreal
WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
It’s interesting to me that articles mention godot before unreal. I mean this is not the first time I see it
One of the big reasons to have picked Unity over Unreal in the first place was because Unity was royalty free. Unreal Engine, despite being absolutely amazing, is not.
To preserve your existing business model, Godot just makes the most sense for many former Unity developers, and I say that as an unapologetic UE zealot.
However it’s currently difficult for games made for Godot to port to consoles (XBox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch,… not those non-Switch “gaming handhelds” since they are all just Windows/Linux handheld PCs) while keeping Godot open source since the SDKs, APIs, porting kits of these consoles are proprietary and you have to sign in NDAs. If most of your games’ revenues are from consoles, you don’t have much choice currently.
Hopefully a new generation of consoles based on regular PC hardware takes the market so we don’t have to deal with locked-down platforms, NDAs, exclusive titles, and overpriced games anymore. The Steam Deck is doing great so far.
Unreal Engine royalties only start after you make $1 million from a project. Even then, it’s 5%, and waived for sales done on the Epic Store (whose 13% cut is almost a third of what Steam takes). If you are a small indie dev, you won’t be paying Epic a dime unless you start rolling in some serious dough, and even when you do, 5% of your revenue for using one of the most powerful 3D game engines is pretty fair
Yes! This is why the hate I see for Epic (or non-Steam in general) bugs me so much. Epic has done nothing but right by developers. While they could definitely make their storefront/app better (and they claim they are working on it) for the customer experience, I have nothing but respect for them as a company.
I will still buy games on Steam first, given a choice, but that is only because I am now a staunch acolyte of the Steam Deck, and installing via Steam is much easier than trying to get EGS games running on the device.
That’s because both Unity and Godot use C# while Unreal uses C++ for development. It is much easier to move from Unity to Godot since they use the same language for development. Moving to Unreal basically means starting over.
Unity C# and Godot C# havr different APIs and writing in GDScript is best practise in godot afaik
Yeah exactly, Unity and Godot both use C# the same way React and Svelte both use JavaScript. Definitely some level of transferability, but honestly worth learning GDScript in my opinion because it’s a simple language and a pretty good fit for game scripting, and the one that gets first class attention from Godot.
Pretty sure Godot has it's own scripting language (hence the prompt converting all the C#/JS code from Unity).
Unreal is C++ but it's also another commercial proprietary engine, so they could rug-pull in the same way.
Godot supports C# as well as its native python-like GDscript.
I mean, UnrealCLR exists
It’s interesting to me that articles mention godot before unreal.
Makes sense to not immediately jump into another walled garden if you have the option.
lowleveldata@programming.dev 1 year ago
There is a potential chance of unreal doing the same stupid shit afterall
Veraxus@kbin.social 1 year ago
Not a chance, and definitely not time soon.
There are certain indicators for enshittification, and Epic (like Valve) doesn't meet any of them.
Now, you may not like Epic for some reason, but they are currently a very stable, reliable, and trustworthy company that is focused on sustaining their business through dedication to quality and reputation. Personally, I respect them every bit as much as I respect Valve.
Dark_Arc@social.packetloss.gg 1 year ago
Yeah… Tim Sweeny hasn’t been kind to Linux like Gabe has, but Sweeny has really pushed for increasing developer margins, breaking down monopolizes, etc.
Ultimately, competition is good… even if competition does result in some discomfort from having two major PC game stores instead of one.
VonReposti@feddit.dk 1 year ago
Would be great if one of the stores weren’t utter shit, didn’t work on Linux, and hoarded exclusivity deals with game developers.
YMS@kbin.social 1 year ago
According to https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/64901-80, there's over 100 investors in Epic, and of course there is Tencent holding a 40% share.
But those investors are not much of an issue either, because you forgot one important point in your list: Epic is swimming in money (and Unreal is just a side business for them).
PlexSheep@feddit.de 1 year ago
It’s a company, they can just say “fuck it, pay more”. It would be weird, self destructive and illogical, but they can do it (like unity did it too.)
lowleveldata@programming.dev 1 year ago
I’m not saying it’s going to happen. Still there’s a chance of stupid COP shits happening when compared to open source.
millie@lemmy.film 1 year ago
The thing is, this could change at any time. The problem with enshittification is that it spreads. A company that’s doing great work today could be bought out by corporate profiteers and leeched of its actual value at any point in the future. We’ve had plenty of companies that started out with a vision and a set of strong principles who’ve been reduced to predatory business practices that are bad for everyone. You can’t assume that because a company seems to have integrity now, that integrity will remain.
Remember Elon Musk 15 years ago? Wasn’t quite the same, was it?
To me, sitting in a position of getting started in game development, that makes me want to sink my time and effort into an engine that I know can’t be enshittified because it can’t be bought out. I want to know that in a few years I’m not going to completely scrub every asset and mechanic that I make for the engine because somebody’s pulled some Darth Vader shit.
Veraxus@kbin.social 1 year ago
OSS is not a panacea, especially when there are upstream dependencies. Even things you think are safe can be compromised or enshittified. The important thing is to take a close look at the indicators.
Right now, as far as I'm concerned, Godot and UE are both very safe bets, depends on your project and business needs. Epic's license is not conducive to retroactive shenanigans the way Unity's was. Epic clearly invests heavily in fostering customer trust.
Why9@lemmy.world 1 year ago
The conspiracy theorist in my always thought stuff like this was the result of corporate espionage; a loyal employee of a rival firm joins their competitor’s ranks and works their way up and finally gets the commanding role, only to announce something this dumb and then take it back (losing their reputation without anything in return) and then the guy leaves the company and finds a comfortable position on the board of their original rival company.
But… No? These people really are that stupid and actually did that to themselves.
And these are the people being paid 300x the salary of ordinary, hard working people!
gila@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Epic allows devs to stay under the license terms for specific versions of the engine. If they started charging for installs, devs can just use the older engine versions and avoid the charges.