How much would you pay for an engine?

[Xilef]

RPG Maker VX Ace - $69.99 | 30-day trial
CryEngine - $9.90/month
UnrealEngine - 5% gross
Unity3D - Free | Pro $75/month | Buy $1,500

I personally am a fan of upfront payments and try-before-you-buy, which is RPG Maker's model, although RPG Maker is arguably quite expensive for what you get (I disagree) and other engines are cheaper with more flexibility, features and compatibility (Unity3D Free) at the cost of a higher barrier of entry.

Imagine you have this engine, we'll call it "Ultimit-Engine" as it's our dream engine;

• Easy as RPG Maker
• Cross-platform deployment (mobile and desktop)
• Support for full 3D graphics
• Eventing system
• Scripting system
• Native extensions (C/C++)
• Networking built in
• Not focused on a single genre
• Editor can have resources plugged in via free downloads or bought from store
• Peripheral support built in (RGB keyboards, gamepads, VR headsets)
• Shader material editor
• Deploy to test devices on the network like with console develpment (across platforms)

How much would you pay for that? Would you do subscription or % of gross?

Feel free to ask questions of what this pretend "Ultimit-Engine" can do if that helps you come up with an answer.

 

[ZenVirZan]

RM/Unity model works best for me. Trial first, and if you like what you see, you buy it.

As for the price, I wouldn't want to pay any more than Unity. Considering it's as easy to use as RM, I'd assume that the demographic isn't seasoned developers only so I'd suggest a trial, a paid and a pro edition depending on who the user is. This engine can cover most bases, and not everyone would need every feature straight away; if you removed things like peripheral, cross-platform, etc. support, you'd have the serious developers paying the serious amount for their serious needs, and if someone wants to fiddle around and make a quick game, it won't cost them a grand.

Upgrading would also be convenient, because if you hit a feature restriction wall on a project you're serious about, you know it would be worth the money to finish it given your past experience with the program.

 

[rey meustrus]

Couldn't one produce a set of Unity scripts that brought the limited-but-easy-to-use RPG Maker interface to Unity? That sounds like a fun project actually.

But it sounds like you're doing marketing research for your own venture. I'll bite. Subscription models are completely unfriendly to indies I feel, because how do you justify paying for a subscription to something you might actually forget about or put down for a while? It might make fiscal sense but psychologically it pushes the wrong buttons. On me at least. Personally I'm a fan of any (fair) system where you only pay if you make money, but to make that work the software actually has to be used for money-making projects, which RPG Maker isn't usually.

Maybe the best scheme for an "Ultimit-Engine" would be a 30-day trial with a lower purchase price than RPG Maker ($20 maybe) for non-commercial use, and a larger price ($500 maybe) for a commercial license.

 

[Xilef]

Couldn't one produce a set of Unity scripts that brought the limited-but-easy-to-use RPG Maker interface to Unity? That sounds like a fun project actually.

You can't extend Unity's interface (to my knowledge), so the best you can do is make a Unity game that is basically RPG Maker, which is pretty pointless at that point.


I would also say subscriptions are unfriendly to indies, a lot of RPG Maker users are just screwing around in the software, so for them the $20 price point seems nice but restricting a lot of advanced features that commercial products are more likely to use over smaller projects.

So let's discuss the idea tiered pricing, I can do a 30 day trial to see if I like the basic software, buy the $20 full thing and screw about and see what can be done, if I am serious and I hit a limit what do I pay? What is that limit, and what do I pay? Is it worth paying $100 for mobile deployment when most of that money goes towards features that won't be used like online support or team-development support?

 

[Spoo]

I'm a fan of Unreal's policy of 5%. Lets prospective devs learn about the whole program free of charge, but still gets Epic a cut should someone go commercial with it.

Flat rate wise, I'd pay an upwards of $100 for an engine I feel I would use. Following a limited time but non-restrictive trial, of course.

 

[arev]

Couldn't one produce a set of Unity scripts that brought the limited-but-easy-to-use RPG Maker interface to Unity? That sounds like a fun project actually.

I'm doing this, actually. Extendable is Unity's interface's middle-name (I'm surprised you didn't know that, Xilef : )
A few screenshots of features I've already implemented:
Event inspector - list of pages, page conditions and command list:

Command select window

Actual command editing window - playing a sound from a predefined library

Transforming an object

Game Database - weapons tab

Anyway, for the business model of my ideal engine - Unity pretty much nailed it with the release of Unity 5. Before that, the free version missed a few advanced features. Not that I've had any problem with that, but it's really cool they've finally unleashed all the power to free users. I kind of expected it at some point too, though maybe not all at once.
So, yeah, free until you make decent money, then a fixed payment would be my go-to pricing model.

Possibly what rey said about your target audience making non-commercial projects is more important to the pricing debate. Either way you're going to have a hard time competing with what's already available on the market (for the price of zero-bucks). If that's why you're asking, obviously.

p.s. It's been ages since I posted here, so a new Hello() is appropriate ; )

 

[Xilef]

I never knew that you could do that to Unity, learnt something new about it.

As a refresh for the discussion;
Unity5 has personal edition which is free, but will show a Unity splash on start-up and does not feature tools that larger, team-based studios would benefit from.
The professional editions has these extra tools and can change the splash. Professional edition is a $75/month subscription or a $1,500 payment.
From the professional edition, you can pay for source code access to the actual engine.

 

[arev]

The differences between two versions of Unity are inconveniences, rather than showstoppers. Asset Server (Team License) can be replaced with SVN but even without it it's still possible for a few people to work on a single project. Cloud Builds is a fancy gimmick, imho. The splash screen is a funny thing... Back in Unity 4 the text said "Powered by Unity". Nothing wrong with that. Most UE games have flashy animated sequences telling what were they made in. But now the text says "made with Unity - personal edition"... sounds more amateur-ish? Still not a problem if you're developing your game by yourself, especially if it's just a hobby, like most RPG Maker games. For any small to mid sized studio releasing their first game this could be a problem. One of public image, but still.
Also worth noting is a fact, that even with subscription plans - it is not possible to "rent" Unity for a month or even three. Minimum subscription period is a full year so $75 suddenly becomes $900.

 

[rey meustrus]

arev, I'd really like to see how you implemented some of those GUI elements. I've been doing a lot myself but it looks more complicated than it should be to change the background color of certain elements. And how did you get the rounded corners and dark gray backgrounds? Keep in mind I am on Mac so it already isn't the same there. Also, for all the excitement over Unity 5, I am ashamed I actually still haven't got it.