Unity5 released

In hindsight, I should have waited with before creating that GitHub repository yesterday, especially as I knew that Unity would be making a major announcement today. It turns out that Unity5 is now entirely free!

The main takeaway is that the Personal and Professional versions of Unity have exactly the same features. Previously, the Indie version of Unity had less features available, mainly in the areas of graphics and optimisation tools. For instance particular, the RenderTexture component, occlusion culling and the Profiler were not available to Indie users. For me, none of this has been a problem: Valentine’s Day Escape was my largest project to date, but I implemented a very simple form of culling by simply turning GameObjects and and off, and I had previously bought Benchy Profiler for profiling. I’m still going to use Benchy, just because it’s a damn good asset, and I had no need for RenderTextures because I wasn’t adding mirrors or live TV screens to my games.

But now, those are included in Unity Personal, along with the long-requested 64-bit editor (being able to use more memory means less potential for crashing), LightProbes and a new audio system. And it’s free. Granted, there are still parts I won’t have access to like access to future betas, their built-in analytics system or the Team Licence for collaboration with another team…but since I’m literally a one-man team, lacking these just isn’t going to affect me that much.

I’m not going to download it yet, since traffic is going to be high for a while. Also, my current projects are being built using Unity 4.6, so I’d rather not upgrade them just yet, particularly the pathfinding system. But I will definitely get it.


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