[gonehome]

+1 - I actively avoid games using the unity engine in favor of ones using unreal. It’s a noticeably worse experience for end users of the product (not just the devs, but also the players).

It’s unfortunate because it’d be good to have some real competition in the space, and there’s basically none.

[derstander]

> +1 - I actively avoid games using the unity engine in favor of ones using unreal. It’s a noticeably worse experience for end users of the product (not just the devs, but also the players).

I often wonder how common this view point is. From a player perspective, I don’t think about game engines. If there’s a game that I’d like to play, I play it regardless of the engine.

If you were to see a video for a video game — say Hollow Knight or Cuphead, for example — and think that it might be fun to play but then see that they use Unity, what do you do instead? Do you search for a close analogue made in Unreal engine? Or do you just play something completely different?

From a hobbyist game dev perspective, I definitely think about engine — of course. But usually when I work with other people they want to use Unity. I’m guessing that might change now, though.

[gonehome]

I doubt it’s common - almost certainly most users don’t think of it or even know what an engine is.

I just notice it - if I see something is unity I’m less likely to give it a try vs. something unreal. Usually I’m just scrolling Xbox gamepass options that look appealing.

If it was some specific game I wanted to try, unity wouldn’t stop me - but I have a bias against it. Unity games generally feel crappier imo.

[krapp]

It's common enough that it used to be a meme (often pushed by Jim Sterling and other online influencers) that Unity was only useful for incompetent developers to make garbage cash-in games and asset flips. That was when it was much easier to publish to Steam, though.

[techdragon]

I definitely remember some people throwing shade in my direction in a couple of game playing friend face to face conversations for my opinions about Unity in this time period… despite the fact my criticism was entirely based on my own subjective personal experiences as someone playing games on multiple platforms combined with my experience as a cross platform software developer…

It was seen as fashionable to hate Unity and there was some pushback from fans of games built with Unity… which since it corresponds to my first developer experiences with unity, was actually about the same time I started to ask Unity developers how much of their games used the Unity provided components for various things as opposed to writing replacements…

I learned a few tricks about arguing with gamers but for the most part stopped mentioning my dislike for Unity in any face to face contexts until someone else mentioned a dislike first… I didn’t care enough to argue over it… I have opinions but I’m not trying to change anyone’s mind, it’s not like there’s financial benefits steering people away from Unity … I’ve got no short positions on Unity stock or stock in Epic, etc…

Doesn’t mean I won’t bitch in the appropriate professional context… like this thread. ;-)