What just happened? If you're a PC gamer, you've probably heard of Unity - it's one of the most popular game engines out there, right next to the likes of Unreal. Unfortunately for some Unity devs, a recent spat between the engine's creators and the developers of SpatialOS (a cloud service used to create MMOs), Improbable, is putting their projects at risk.
As reported by PC Gamer, Unity rolled out an update to its Terms of Service in late 2018 that restricted the use of cloud platforms like SpatialOS in games created with the engine.
Naturally, this caused a bit of an uproar in the developer community (and prompted a swift response from Improbable), as the change seemed to come completely out of left field with no justification or warning.
A few of the games that would have been affected by the change included Lazarus and World's Adrift, developed by Spilt Milk Studios and Bossa Studios, respectively. However, it seems Unity isn't interested in enforcing their new Terms of Service on these games in particular - both studios have been given the green light to continue operating as usual.
"Our team has been working on an unannounced MMO project using the Unity engine this last year," Sensiga CEO Claus Grovdal wrote. "We are very concerned about this news, and hope it is some kind of mistake."
Unity might be willing to make exceptions for games that are live, but titles that are still in-development are likely in trouble. Indeed, game dev studio Sensiga expressed their concern with Unity's SpatialOS block on Twitter today.
"Our team has been working on an unannounced MMO project using the Unity engine this last year," Sensiga CEO Claus Grovdal wrote. "We are very concerned about this news, and hope it is some kind of mistake."
Only time will tell how Unity's dispute with Improbable will proceed moving forward, but here's hoping the collateral damage won't be too significant.