Ultra Software Company Blog

I am happy with the current pricing policy, I just hope modelling features in the editor have been added in 3.1.Things like boolean and hollow.

One of the reasons I look forward to updates is they bring the forum back to life for a few weeks .I hate it whe there are no new posts.Maybe big updates hould be twice a year.

+1 on the no mobile upgrade cost when it comes out! (too)

I agree cassius. The forum always dies when we know a new upgrade is coming.

Let me just say first that I think that $99 is a good upgrade price for existing customers. However I am trying to figure out why loyal customers (beta testers) had to pay $400 for Leadwerks 3.0. And new customers get a hell of a lot more features for half the price. There is not one company out there in buissness land that does this (repeatedly) to it's loyal base customers.

 

Cost of Leadwerks 3.0 $199. - Windows and Mac. Low end renderer

Cost of ios add on $99.

Cost of andriod add on $99.

Cost of 3.01 upgrade $99

 

Cost of Leadwerks 3.01for new customers $199- windows, mac, linux, ios, andriod, high-low end renderer and additional features still to come from kickstarter.

 

Being slapped over and over again by Josh- priceless

I may be missing something but where does he say that mobile is included with this 3.1 new customer price? He says there won't be an upgrade cost for mobile from 3.0 to 3.1 but my assumption there is that a person would have to buy the 3.0 mobile first to get that free 3.1 upgrade for mobile. Maybe I'm wrong, but it would seem that's the logical thing to do in the mobile case.

 

If you look at the pre-order upgrade it doesn't mention mobile at all: http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/?app=nexus&showbanner=0

 

Businesses pretty regularly give new customers cheaper rates to try and get them using their service. Cable/dish/phone companies are a prime example of this. Josh is also giving beta testers a free upgrade, so he is rewarding who he deems the most loyal customers to Leadwerks.

 

I think we figured out that it was $99 cheaper to be a new normal customer getting 3.1, which is the "new customer" deal one gets. However, if you always wait for the cheaper deal you'll never get anything and never make games that we all must seem to enjoy since we use it.

 

Note, that on the next upgrade the 3.1 people will be complaining about the same thing, but we got 3.0 for $199. So when we were the new customers we didn't care (he was going to charge like a grand or something it was at first!) but when other new customers get the deal we care?

 

http://www.ask.com/question/what-is-promotional-pricing

 

I bought Windows 8 Pro for $35 when it first came out. If you buy it now it's like $199!

From this blog right above our comments. "Leadwerks 3.1 for Linux and Windows will be released together next, with the exact release date to be determined.  Leadwerks 3.1 for Mac will follow this, with mobile add-ons for iOS and Android coming last.  (There is no upgrade purchase necessary for the mobile upgrades for Leadwerks 3.1.)"

 

Each "feature upgrade" should be an add on. Not bundled into the sdk.

 

Most of the products you are referring to Rick are cheaper because they became older overtime. Most likley no new features where added to the product or software. When windows 9 comes out I will think you will able to "upgrade" to 9 from 8 cheaper than buying 9 outright. Right?

 

Edit- p.s. the people that bought Leadwerks 3.0 were the real beta testers!

I'm also curious why the Android and iOS versions were removed from the store. Josh?

I guess I read that in that he's just telling us when each platform order will be worked on and what order they will be available. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's how I read that.

 

Promotional pricing isn't because the product is older. New products/services still get promotional pricing to get new customers to use it. I'll admit this is mostly on the services side though in other industries.

 

When windows 9 comes out I will think you will able to "upgrade" to 9 from 8 cheaper than buying 9 outright. Right?

 

Assuming mobile isn't included in all of this (pending clarification from Josh), we got the software for $199 and now pay $99 per upgrade. New people get the software for $199 and now pay $99 per upgrade going forward. The newest users will always get the deal. You were a new user at some point so at that point you got the deal. This cycle has to start at some point. He can't keep adding each upgrade cost to the new user price. It'll get way to high for a new user and we'll get no new users. The community won't grow and the product will die. He can't not charge for upgrades and only rely on new customers because he'll lose money and not be able to run his business. You always have to have repeat business.

 

I'm not sure what you want to happen. Do you want new users to pay $299 so it's "fair" to the 3.0 users? Do you want 3.0 users to get a free upgrade to 3.1? That's basically free upgrades for life then which I don't think is a very smart business model in the video game engine business.

 

Maybe state how you would want to see this happen instead of just saying what's currently happening is bogus?

As I first said. $99 for existing customers is fair. I think some smaller improvements should be free. Like hopefully in the future more modeling tools will be added for free. But for the larger features like, high end render, networking, crowd steering path finding.ect... so my only problem is the new customer price.

You talk about return customers. Return customers should never have more invested into the same amount of features.

 

Earlier you referenced a cable company or dish. Yes a new customer will normaly get a few months cheaper if they choose to get the same old cable box that been out for a few years. Where the award or benefit comes to the return customer is that the new customer normaly pays full price for new technology like a new and Improved cable box. And the loyal, faithfull, reliable return customer get the new tech for a discounted price.

 

I think each feature could be a seperate add on. And depending what your needs are you could pick and choose which feature is good for your game.

 

 

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Assuming mobile isn't included in all of this (pending clarification from Josh), we got the software for $199 and now pay $99 per upgrade. New people get the software for $199 and now pay $99 per upgrade going forward. The newest users will always get the deal. You were a new user at some point so at that point you got the deal. This cycle has to start at some point. He can't keep adding each upgrade cost to the new user price. It'll get way to high for a new user and we'll get no new users. The community won't grow and the product will die. He can't not charge for upgrades and only rely on new customers because he'll lose money and not be able to run his business. You always have to have repeat business.

 

 

 

 

 

Are you saying the base priced should never go up? No matter how many features are added the base price should be the same? I do not understand this thinking. If I go buy a new car and add some options (features) the cars price will go up. So how can you expect the base price for LE to stay the same forever, no matter how many features are added. And the only people that absorb the cost and profits for creating that new feature are the return customers.

so my only problem is the new customer price.

 

So you want them to pay more? How will this change your experience with the software? If anything this will hurt the community as we'll get fewer people. So new 3.1 users pay $299? Then 3.2 users pay $399?, etc to the point where no new users are coming because it's out of their price range. How does that cycle stop? That's the part that I'm not following you. Old features eventually die out. You paid for that feature at the time and the other person didn't. As much as people don't want to look at an older renderer as a feature it is/was. It allows us to hit more hardware than before which equates to more customers.

Are you saying the base priced should never go up? No matter how many features are added the base price should be the same? I do not understand this thinking. If I go buy a new car and add some options (features) the cars price will go up. So how can you expect the base price for LE to stay the same forever, no matter how many features are added. And the only people that absorb the cost and profits for creating that new feature are the return customers.

 

Because like in cars what was once a feature today is a standard or not a feature (maybe trend goes away) tomorrow. Josh is charging us for the new features he codes not the old features he's coded, which seems clear given the same price between 3.0 and 3.1. If I recall correctly Unity is basically always $1500 between new versions. They pick a price point and stick to it no matter how many features they have. I mean we'd be paying like $1000 for Windows if we always pay for the features they coded in the past and are still in the product. They don't totally scrap the entirely old code. They reuse features/code from previous products in their upgrades yet the price point is always around the same (of course inflation and all that has to be included).

 

It's all about a price point vs current effort.

 

Old features don't hold their value, especially in the game industry where things move really fast. However, old features can again become popular which will raise their value again. This is what happened with low end renderer's when the mobile market became big. Suddenly the new high end renderer's everyone had won't work on these mobile devices so they had to go backwards and suddenly low end renderer's became popular again so people could make games on mobile devices! So then it becomes a feature (again) and you can charge more for it. That's slowly fading again though because of how insanely fast the mobile devices are increasing in power. So that value is dropping again.

So Rick, you're saying that a week ago Josh should have been charging $99 for 3.0 because of the deteriation of value?

I'm just pointing out how some software companies seem to do business. They pick a price point for their product and they want to stay around that price point so the price doesn't just keep climbing, making it out of reach for new users eventually (this is a good thing for the consumer). This statement seems reasonable does it not? So the question becomes how do you do that then. I'm giving my opinions on who, what, when, where, why.

 

If I'm fine with paying $99/yr for upgrades, and I'm OK with giving new users a little break to grow the community, then my experience with the software isn't hindered in any way. I'm hearing people say they are OK with $99/yr upgrades, but become not OK because of what new users are paying for? 1 year later those new users are in our same boat. I bet the new user was grateful the product price stayed the same when they first bought it, but then get angry when the new users get that price too?

 

I'm open to hearing how others would tackle this. Dan wants to charge new users an extra $99 each year to the original price. I don't think that's a winning strategy to keep getting new users because at some point you take yourself out of the price range of too many people. How would you handle this?

You make some valid points Rick and I admit that I don't have a good answer. I imagine Josh thought this through and his projections of renewals and new customers versus various pricing options makes this the optimal path. I sincerely hope he's right.

About the

 

Coming to Steam 1.6.14

 

on your landing page - at least every European will read that as "June 1st"...

I think the real and fair solution here is simple and easy:

 

1. Base price that stays roughtly the same at least unless new features balloon and add to all platforms (currently it seems somewhat a tick tock, half the platforms are ignored for the other half of the platforms and alike)

 

2. Stop the upgrade price policy and sell support contracts which can be paused at max 1 year. That way people know that they pay for 12 months, not 'perhaps 12, but could just as well be 8 or 16 months'

 

That way we all know what we are up to and leadwerks can push things more continously instead of starting to freeze releasing stuff to the licensees just cause its required as selling point at 'last release + 10m' (compare it to Adobes development cycles during standalone CS versions version cloud now)

To me this is what its hurting most, that there is a very high likelyhood that stuff gets pushed back or scheduled in stupid / counter intuitive / developer hurting way when it does not need to be like that and should not be like it.

I got 3.0 with mobile addons, cost me a good $500 and I can't say that I'm satisfyed with how the mobile engine works etc even remotely right now. ITs the least capable, performant and productive engine I've at hand to use (compared to Shiva, UDK, Unity) and a year later its already 'dead' again as its now all about eye candy and linux due to the 'year cycle selling point focus'?? I kinda doubt that there will be going any more cash from my end to leadwerks until the development phylosophy itself gets fixed to a more 'the engine as a complete, real crossplatform product' approach without exclusive yearly focus

I don't think a support contract would work. Josh would have to hire someone to do it and less people would get the support contract vs upgrading (someone would just start a community forum if this one was only available to support contracts) so he'd be making less money and now have to pay someone else (because he can't do support AND development on his own. Especially at the level of a real support contract would require vs just a forum).

 

 

ITs the least capable, performant and productive engine I've at hand to use (compared to Shiva, UDK, Unity)

 

It's also potentially the cheapest out of those listed. I say potentially because of UDK taking royalties, and free Unity makes you buy the full version after you make > $100,000 in a year from the game. You would have to buy the pro version on each platform. It is much cheaper than Unity Pro and all their mobile addons, and sounds like the full version of Shiva is $1500(?), so it's cheaper there also.

 

The point being that LE is building towards being an amazing product (right now it's still good but you have to do some work arounds for some things to make it great and like you said development has to be focused on specific areas because it's just Josh doing it all) and paying $99 or so a year to get there will be cheaper in the long run than getting those other engines and upgrades they charge over the years and or paying royalties if one plans on trying to sell their game at some point.

 

So then the question becomes can one make a product with LE and I think one can. The nice thing about Josh is that generally if you show your product is far along and you'll actually be releasing it, he's pretty good about helping you as much as he can. He can make certain bug fixes a priority over others to help your product. It's to his benefit to get games made with LE.

About the

 

Coming to Steam 1.6.14

 

on your landing page - at least every European will read that as "June 1st"...

no we don't... because we are anticipating on regular US formatting

I skipped the 3.0 version of LE, and I am not proud of that fact. But I have moved most of my work and play over to Linux and almost gave up on LE, until Josh started the kickstarter and got me intrigued again.

 

I paid for the 2.3 update, and I will pay for 3.2 update as well, long as Linux support stays in and the features are worth the pricepoint.

The high end/powered renderer is deffinately worth a 99$ upgrade in of itself, so I just don't know why people are even discussing this.

Josh need to make a living, he is creating some awesome software for us and deserves getting paid for it. With an engine as cheap as LE is (200$ and no royalties) his payments has to come in through paid upgrades.

 

Thats just my two cents.

I didn't received my key before january 6th why?

i think steam is still reviewing it, asked about it early and they said they have send it to steam for review

when is 3.1 expected to come out ??I have preordered it just wondering when to expect it be able to use it .

Hi merandrew,

 

I was about to ask the same thing myself. Don't mind waiting for it but some idea on release timeframe would be good. I too bought the pre-ordered version. 199 dollars worth. Bough mine on the 10th of January so unable to get steam keys. Consequently I am eager to start writing my game but will have to wait.

ok I don't know for how long is this going on but if from 3.0 to 3.1 is in few months I guess 3.0 should get 3.1 free.

 

it's what we did support on Kickstarter 3.1 is already payed off double.

 

Well I'm new user and even if it was already payed off I gladelly payed for preorder 3.1 few days ago.

 

Also those people that earn money with games will easily afford 199$/month.

 

who's complaining - People like me - that don't have any games published yet from witch to earn money.

 

BUT I'm also 1 that's not complaining at this and if release is comming only 1 per year I wouldn't mind paying another 199$

 

ALSO for my programming habbit I probably wouldn't buy it for few years as I mostly don't care about graphics but about designing game play and that takes loads of time programming learning and adjusting.

 

Also what's wrong with the old one?

there's an old saying don't fix what aint broken.

 

but even if till next year payable update I won't get any profit I'll still buy it because I support products that are made for Linux.

 

ALSO IF in the kickstarter there would be more than max 2k missing I would give that 2k so I'd get it to linux.

 

but the budged is doubled.

 

But I have some else idea if Josh will listen to OFC I'll give it ONLY IF I will like the engine when 3.1 is released.