Epic Games Updates Unreal Engine Pricing for Non-Gaming Developers
Epic Games is soon to apply a yearly fee to non-gaming developers leveraging its Unreal Engine. The company estimates an annual cost of $1850 for a toolkit corresponding to one workspace. Gaming developers, on the other hand, will still pay a percentage of their overall sales as was agreed prior.
New Subscription Terms
Last year, Epic Games released statements heralding the future changes in their tariffs. The new conditions will come into effect with the release of Unreal Engine 5.4 slated for the end of April. While gaming developers are exempt from the changes, they must still pay 5% of earnings exceeding $1 million from sales of a specified game. Non-gaming developers, however, will be required to pay the annual fee for workspace use in products deploying Unreal Engine, such as movies, TV shows, infotainment car systems, and theme park attractions.
Exemptions from the Changes
While the new pricing model will impact many developers, some exceptions will apply. For instance, Epic Games has exempted firms with less than a million dollars in gross annual revenue, students, teachers, and individuals using the engine for hobby projects. Furthermore, developers creating plugins for the Unreal Engine will continue to enjoy free use of the engine, as the company plans to incur commissions from sales on the Unreal Engine Marketplace.
Annual Subscription Package Details
For $1850 a year, subscribers will have access to the Unreal Engine, real-time visualization toolkit Twinmotion, and photogrammetry software RealityCapture. According to Epic Games, the software included in the subscription will be integrated into Unreal Engine by 2025. Additionally, Twinmotion and RealityCapture are offered separately for annual subscriptions of $445 and $1250 respectively.
Previous Controversy
This announcement comes only weeks after Unity published a proposed change to their royalty model, which was met with significant backlash and quickly rescinded. Notably, the new pricing structure will only apply to Epic Games products based on Unreal Engine 5.4.
