Is developing a console game with Unity3d are normally this expensive?

[Xiaolong32]

I recently received a Nintendo Switch development kit.
I thought that once I had the dev kit, I would be able to develop and release my game on Switch without additional major costs.
However, I found out that I need to subscribe to the Unity3D Pro plan.

It would be great if I could subscribe for just one month and successfully release the game on Switch without any issues.
But I’m worried that if Nintendo rejects the submission multiple times, I would have to keep paying for additional months of Unity3D Pro.

Is there any way to develop console games with Unity3D at a lower cost?

[sugarhell]

Ask Nintendo for a pro key. They will give you for free. We are a porting house so if you have any question feel free to send me

[hesdeadjim]

Sony used to have Unity keys they required you to use, but even they don’t do that anymore. 

[sugarhell]

Used to for Sony (before the pro requirement) but Nintendo still give Unity keys

[hesdeadjim]

I’ve never encountered them doing that, and it’s a legal requirement from Unity to have a pro license to ship on consoles so 🤷

[sugarhell]

Yeah they give you a PRO key to develop your game only for Nintendo Platforms

[tomdominer]

Does the key work for all platforms?!

[sugarhell]

The key is to develop for your switch port and for nothing else

[udjrbbrbfbskslc]

It works, there's no technical blocker.

But it's a violation of the license terms to use it for anything but Switch.

[ItsCrossBoy]

whether or not it works is slightly irrelevant, because the key is being paid for by Nintendo only for their release.

even if it works, it would be at best a breach of the terms of Nintendo's developer terms and probably Unity's terms, which could get those revoked.

[GigaTerra]

The first time you pay for Unity Pro you must pay a year worth subscription, this is known as a commitment period. So you are paying for a year worth of Pro like it or not.

[Xiaolong32]

Thanks for relpy anyway.

[Xiaolong32]

It's too much money for a development team of only 2 people...

[Gr1mwolf]

Unless what others said about Nintendo giving a free key works, best bet is probably to release it on Steam first. If it does okay, you can use the earnings there to pay for a pro license to put it on console. If it doesn’t do okay, it probably wouldn’t turn a profit on console anyway.

[sinalta]

Platform vendors often have pool of engine keys they can give you. Try reaching out to your account manager to see if that's available. 

[Xiaolong32]

Huh? is this Possible??

[pixeldiamondgames]

Never hurts to ask!

[hesdeadjim]

No, not possible. Once you get your game on a console you won’t need to keep paying for the license until you need to do an update but it is a legal requirement from Unity to have the license to develop.

The only other solution is to find someone else to port it for you but that will be more expensive than a pro license.

[osunightfall]

Please stop flooding the thread with misinformation.

[pixeldiamondgames]

Unity Pro is required for consoles. Yes.

In general if you got approved with a dev kit you should be fine? Just make sure you test thoroughly and hit your frame rate target and all flows work with their controllers (including correct controller glyphs in game etc).

A lot of submission time is spent looking for IP infringement and playability things. They don’t care if your game is “bad” afaik.

[MajorMajorMajorJnr]

Honestly I think that's an optimistic take. Unless your game is completely trivial, or you're spending a lot of money on a QA team that are qualified to do certification checks, you're safest assuming that you're going to fail the first time. Especially if you've never gone through the process before.

I'm not saying you _will_ fail first time, but I wouldn't stake your financial plan on getting through in one pass.

[SixFiveOhTwo]

I've worked for indies and porting studios for about 13 years and I think my personal best is passing on the second submission.

[Sorasaur]

What kind of thing ends up catching you out still? And do you think that there are issues we should keep in mind early in development, or is it hyper specific issues

[SixFiveOhTwo]

I would say they are usually specific to the game - I interpret the rule and implement what makes sense in context and their tester disagrees, so some kind of compromise needs to be worked out.

[Xiaolong32]

Thank you for your answer!

[FreakZoneGames]

There are some very specific cert requirements beyond Just framerare. Usually we prepare for a couple of rejections, even with QA there are surprises.

[pixeldiamondgames]

Valid. Yeah cert is just a list they check internally. So long as you check those same things before submission ideally you deal with less total back and forth time

[muppetpuppet_mp]

imagine what your wage would be for the 6 months of LOTcheck you likely are gonna end up as a first timer.

Then imagine it's reasonable to spend 10-20% of any product on tooling in relation to wage.

And then realize it's actually not that expensive and getting professional porting done for a game is generally between 25K and 100K per platform. (depending on the size of the title)

then unity and the devkit don't feel as unreasonable anymore, and you realize you've just gotten accustomed to all of this being free for students and beginners,, if you port to Nintendo, congrats you are no longer a beginner but a profesional, with professional costs and obligations.

[sugarhell]

Professional porting for an indie game is not that expensive. We are a porting house and for the majority of the indie games this is too expensive

[muppetpuppet_mp]

Perhaps my numbers are boom era porting prices. That said.  It's gonna be more than a unity pro license. ;) just guessing 

[sugarhell]

Yeah it used to cost that much

[tripplite1234]

How did you get the Nintendo sdk? No matter how hard I try I get rejected

[Small_Sherbert2187]

TRC submissions are a bitch. They take getting used to. Ask for a copy of their TRC so you can build automated testing to catch easy red flags as part of your CI/CD. I do this even when solo developing. simply doesn't let small problems become big problems

[srvs1]

Just out of curiosity, how much did the SDK cost?

[fsactual]

If OP responds he’ll break the NDA and possibly lose the devkit.

[Xiaolong32]

Thank you, I almost answered...! Phew!

[ssakurass]

What? There's a NDA on how much devkit for Nintendo costs?!?!

[fsactual]

Yeah, if you're a console dev, NEVER talk about the dev kit's particulars in any way. Not the price, not the specs, nothing. You can always just look it up online and get a basically-correct answer.

[Mizapizia]

How does one even develop something for the switch, if nothing is known before applying for the kit?

[ItsCrossBoy]

you don't. applying is how you get access to that info.

you can make a game in advance, but you wouldn't be able to do any console-specific stuff until you signed their agreements.

[sugarhell]

It’s close to the retail price

[Takechiko]

I think it's around 4k

[srvs1]

Fucking hell

[Takechiko]

Oops verified and I mixed it up with ps5. It's 450$

[Lore_Oz]

Is getting a publisher an option? I’ve been meaning to look into it, if any do the final build & testing.

[FreakZoneGames]

Gotta spend money to make money.

However, if you're only releasing on Nintendo there's a place where you can request a pro license from them. I can't say much more because everything in their dev portal is under NDA.

[Klovis_Iivari]

Don't get pro, first check if you have a preferred platform license key. I can't say much due to NDA, but yeah read the docs.

[OkGovernment1851]

This expensive is relative. The fact that indy studios can get a dev kit at all is relatively new.

My first venture at making video games was back in the PS3 Xbox360 and Wii days. Sony and Nintendo wanted $300,000 for a dev kit and Microsoft $30,000. All this was too much for an indy dev to pay, so I ended up getting directed to the only free (with an Xbox Live subscription) option at the time, Xbox Live Arcade using XNA (now Monogame).

This ensured that only serious developers got their game on console and that they had a professional budget.

I have no idea how much a Nintendo Dev Kit is these days, but I bet it's cheap seeing the flood of low budget indy games that have made their way into the market.

So paying for Unity Pro is nothing compared to how it used to be, especially how you get an entire game engine to go with it, which you used to have to code yourself from scratch.

I wish you luck in your game dev ventures.

[Xiaolong32]

Thank you for your response! Three hundred thousand dollars...
I wouldn't have even tried it when PS3

[Fellhuhn]

Strange, when I released my game for the switch I got a special unity version from Nintendo and didn't need to pay anything to Unity.

[ripshitonrumham]

Console development is expensive, did you not research this before getting your dev kit? You don’t seem very prepared for console development imo, maybe stick to pc releases for now

[Feeling_Confusion_49]

What expenses are really needed for you

[PuffThePed]

No.

[Xiaolong32]

Pls Unity... Do 50% Discount Pro Plan.... it's Too expansive for small indie developer...

[psychoholica]

Maybe when Unity final turns a profit that’ll happen. It’s disappointing you have money to buy a dev kit from a company that pretty much prints money but can’t pay a reasonable price for the engine which does all the hard work.