Under the Code

Ever since Unity 2.5 was release, it seems like there has been a lot of users that are annoyed with the splash screens and watermarks (well most people are ok with the splash screen but a lot of people really hate the watermark) that Unity uses if the user is running the indie license.  These splash screens and watermarks have the option to be disabled if you own the professional license however people think that it is not fair and think of it as punishment for people using indie.  There are two reasons that people say why Unity has the splash screen/watermark and here is my view on both, whether or not either one plays into the reason that Unity has the splash screen/watermarks.

Marketing

The first reason is that of marketing the engine.  Is this a way to generate a lot of leads, well yes and no.  I mean a good way of marketing your game engine is to show the games that have been developed with it.  A lot of the big time engines have major games they have pushed with the engine, like Unreal Tournament made with the Unreal Engine, Crysis or Fry Cry with the CryEngine, Half-Life with the Source Engine, and so forth.  Now the main reason, I believe, that people know what engine these games are made with (besides the game name using the game engine’s name in the title) is not because of the splash screen but because of the game engine’s company (and sometimes the game’s company) is self promoting the game and what engine it uses.  Now I have no real data to back this up (and doubt anyone has any truly reliable data about the amount of sales the splash screens generates for game engines, but would love to see it if you do) but I have the feeling that splash screens alone for game engine make up the lowest amount of sale generation when it comes to marketing.

A steady means of marketing for game engines is word of mouth.  I think one of the best way to market your game engine, which all major engines do, is present your engine at game developer conferences since a large percentage of the people there ar potential future customers.  The next best thing is being able to get the word out on the internet and get the best SEO for your website.  The way I have found every game engine that I have looked at is by my own searching and word of mouth from other people.  When I searched game engine in google, wikipedia had the first 2 results and then I go results for Torque, C4, Blender, Cipher, Game Studio; Unity comes up on the second page along with a bunch of other engines.  When you are behind 6-8 other results in google, that really hurts your chances of being found however most people who look for something as important as a game engine will not just try and buy the first one.

Incentive to Upgrade

This is the other popular reason why unity has the splash screen/watermark in the indie version.  Does it work, I think so.  If someone is serious about building video games, spending $1500 vs. the $200 is a small investment for be able to build a game especially when other engines cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  I also have been told some of those engines require splash screens too, even tho I have others who say it is not required and since I can’t find the full license agreement for engines like Unreal, I don’t know for sure.  The professional version of Unity also comes with a lot of other things besides the ability to remove the splash screen and those other reasons (render-to-texture, post processing effect, c++ plug-ins, etc…) are the real benefits of upgrading, not to mention funding the technology you are basing your game(s) around.

Back to Unity

Since Unity lead me to post this blog let me end on this note.  If you think the splash screen/watermark is too much then go ahead and look for another engine that gives you so much, including what I think is one of the best overall IDE for game engine tools, that costs at or under $200 and does not require a splash screen/watermark.  I will say that I think Unity could remove the watermark (which is only on the web player build, not standalone applications) without effecting the marketing effect of the engine as they still have the splash screen.