Terraria Developer Slams Unity's 'Predatory Moves,' Donates More Than $200k to Other Game Engines

ign.com:

Even though Terraria developer Re-Logic mostly doesn’t use Unity, it’s made a strong statement of condemnation in regards to the engine’s recently announced, controversial install fee policy – and it’s putting its money where its mouth is.

In a statement on X/Twitter today, which you can read in full below, Re-Logic said that the team “has been watching the recent events surrounding Unity with both interest and sadness."

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“The loss of a formerly leading and user-friendly game engine to the darker forces that negatively impact so much of the gaming industry has left us dismayed to put it mildly,” it continued. “While we do not personally use Unity (outside of a few elements on our console/mobile platforms), we feel like we cannot sit idly by as these predatory moves are made against studios everywhere."

Re-Logic went on to say they “unequivocally condemn and reject the recent TOS/fee changes proposed by Unity and the underhanded way they were rolled out,” in a “flippant manner” that disregarded the trust of publishers, studios, and gamers alike.

Adding that they “do not feel a simple public statement is sufficient,” they then promised to donate $100,000 each to game engines Godot and FNA, in addition to $1,000/month moving forward, with the condition that “they remain good people and keep doing all that they can to make these engines powerful and approachable for developers everywhere.”

Unity garnered near industry-wide backlash when it announced the new policy, dubbed the Unity Runtime Fee, last week. Per the policy, which would go into effect on Jan. 1, 2024, Unity would charge $0.20 per install for any game with more than 200,000 installs. This spawned both confusion and derision among developers