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Here’s what we got for you today:

• Unity’s new pricing model

• SEC hates NFTs now

• DAO experiment failed?

Let’s get started!

Unity’s New Pricing Model 💣

The life of a game developer is hard as it is. Increasing costs of production. Immense competition. Now guess what’s happening? It’s getting even harder!

Unity introduced a new fee called Runtime fee in their pricing model that could alter the landscape of the gaming industry. Unity is a game engine used for developing video games on multiple platforms, including mobile, desktop, console, and virtual reality systems.

This new pricing model charges developers per game install after crossing a certain threshold. And this threshold differs based on what plan the creator is on, like Unity Pro, Unity Personal and Unity Enterprise.

In the case of Unity Personal, the fee per install after threshold 200,000 installs is $0.2. For Unity Pro, this varies from $0.15 to $0.02 based on new installs per month. A similar lower range for Enterprise users as well.

So what was the reaction like? Well, everyone is pissed! For two main reasons.

Firstly, this new fee is likely to hurt indie developers a lot and big studios too. The thing here is the company didn’t have a dialogue with the developer community. Now, with such a big change, games that are near completion have to think about everything differently because they didn’t factor in the runtime fee cost.

Secondly, the developers are pissed because Unity changed its terms of service without any transparency. The GitHub repository used for tracking changes is now deleted. This is where trust was broken because Unity in previous years said you can use the current-year version as long as you don’t upgrade your project.

And you know what happens when big corps break community trust.

The entire game dev community united and stood against these new changes. A collective was also formed by top game studios and wrote a letter highlighting their concerns and stated they are turning off Unity ads monetization.

Unity also saw this heavy backlash and apologized about the new fee policy. They haven’t said they’ll reverse course yet, so we have to wait and see what happens. Either way, it is a wake up call for devs to be on the lookout for alternatives and prepare for the unexpected.

SEC Hates NFTs Now 🛑

The SEC has taken a swipe at Hollywood's "Stoner Cats," a unique NFT-based web series created by a famous power couple Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher. The show revolved around house cats gaining sentience through exposure to medical marijuana.

Fans had the chance to snag one of 10,000 NFTs at $800 each, granting exclusive access to the star-studded animated series featuring Jane Fonda, Chris Rock, Seth MacFarlane, and even Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

What raised eyebrows was the promise of a 2.5% royalty for original NFT owners with every resale, coupled with marketing that suggested NFTs would appreciate the show's success. The SEC jumped in, declaring these NFTs as unregistered securities due to their investment implication.

A humorous tweet from @StonerCatsTV added fuel to the fire, suggesting buying more ETH during crypto market dips and sweeping the Stoner Cats floor.

In the end, Stoner Cats settled with the SEC, agreeing to pay a $1 million fine, establish a Fair Fund for harmed buyers, and destroy all remaining NFTs. This case highlights the SEC's vigilance against celebrity-endorsed crypto projects, emphasizing that it's the economic reality, not labels, that determines an investment contract.

What this tells us is that 99% of NFT projects could face similar charges. We all saw how projects promoted their NFTs, citing monetary returns and whatnot.

DAO Experiment Failed? 📉

The Nouns NFT community, a prominent Ethereum collection, faced a dramatic split as over 55% of Nouns NFT holders opted for a fork in the project. This move saw them collectively withdraw a staggering $27 million worth of ETH from the project's treasury.

In a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) twist, each NFT holder, approximately 472 out of 846, took around 35.5 ETH (about $57,850) from the treasury into a new DAO organization. In return, they forfeited their original NFTs, receiving replacement NFTs with identical artwork for the new DAO.

The fork reveals a lack of confidence in the current Nouns DAO format, which has spent millions since its 2021 launch to fund various Nouns-themed projects. Some concerns included disagreements over proposals, early holders paying significantly more for the same voting power, and the decreasing value of Nouns NFTs.

This split highlights the challenges faced by DAOs in managing diverse interests and evolving over time. Despite the divide, Nouns remains a pioneer in the NFT space, having supported numerous creators, artists, and even an esports team while fostering over 158 projects.

Game Updates

• Gaming platform Enjin launched its blockchain and its suite of products are made compatible.

• Ronin Network announced a new partnership with Pixels, helping the game with migration to Ronin.

• ARC8 released their free NFT collection Beasties that will act as in-app game companions and help track player progress.

• Crypto native esports team BLVKHVND stood 3rd place in the Global Championship of Apex Legends.

• Gods Unchained released a new mode called Sealed that is said to unlock new ways to compete and build decks.

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