The "Blowing Druster" unity of the Yuan universe: the crazy expansion, the suspense still exists

When the popularity of the Yuan universe gradually cools down, some enterprises and institutions that claim to be "founders" have begun to speak intensively, trying to rectify the name of the "Yuan Universe".

Among them, Unity can be said to be one of the most active players.

At the 2022 Augmented Real World Expo held in June, Unity CEO John RicCitiello was high -profile in the speech in the speech: "The Yuan Universe is a new generation of Internet, which is characterized by real -time real -time, 3D, highly interacted, high social and continuous continuity. Stablize."

Zhang Junbo, president of Unity Greater China, also frequently stated in the media interview: "In the future, the Yuan universe will penetrate into all aspects of life. It should assist ordinary people to better participate in the creation of the Yuan universe. "

As the "selling shovel" in the Yuan universe industry, why should the unity of half of the gaming engine market occupy half of the country? Perhaps the original intention of the driving industry is also hidden with the "selfishness" of diverse revenue.

01 Begins Apple, develop quickly

Unity's history can be traced back to 2004. The three young people who love the game make a game called Goobile in a basement in Copenhagen.

It is said that because of the deep experience of the difficulties of independent game development, in the face of the predecessors such as the illusory engine, the three young people have a bold idea of ​​the three young people -let the game development engine be popular, and turn around and put it into Unity. R & D version 1.0.

In Unity's growth history, Apple has always played an indispensable role, and even said that the two have been tied in depth for a long time.

At the 2005 Apple Worldwide Developers Conference conference, Unity was released as an extension tool on the MAC side, and at the same time won the MacOS Best System Screen Design Award. With Apple's endorsement, UNITY got the investment of Sequoia Capital and moved the headquarters from Copenhagen to San Francisco.

In October 2007, the new generation of iPhone was born, and Apple officially developed into the era of mobile, but new products still lack a game development tool for taking advantage of them. In just one year, Unity officially supports the iOS platform, and for a long time, it has been the only available game development tool for iOS platforms.

In 2010, Unity's registered developers had reached 100,000. In the same year, they supported Android, which had just been born for two years, and successively added support for platforms such as PS and Xbox. In contrast to the enemy's illusion engine, the agility of Unity on the mobile end is much higher than the opponent. The illusion engine only supports iOS at the end of 2010. The support for the Android platform will wait until 2014, leaving a rare time window for Unity.

As of the end of 2021, the APP Store and Google Play top 1,000 games were made by more than 70%. The overall market share was nearly 50%, and the second -ranked illusion engine was only 9.68%. Well -known games including "Hearthstone", "Glory of the King", "Broken 3" and "Original God" are all developed through Unity.

The unity of the later show quietly defeated veterans and other veterans such as Quake and Unreal Engine, and had absolute right to speak in the game engine industry. The incentives do not rule out the ingredients of luck, but also have the inevitability in the meditation.

At present, in the mainstream game engine on the market, Unity is the only general engine that has not been developed based on initial game products, and has no burden on multi -platform support. At the same time, it is different from the litigation lawsuit between EPIC and Apple developers. Unity maintains a harmonious relationship with Apple, Google and other channels.

Compared to Epic's strong game company color, Unity is more like an Internet platform. This is the favorable factor of its rapid rise, and it has also laid a foreshadowing for the later commercialization.

02 Baobao Advertising, disappointment in revenue

Compared with the outstanding performance of market share, the commercial performance of Unity can only be said to be unsatisfactory, and the market share is far from transforming to revenue and profit margins.

According to the financial report of the first quarter of 2022, the revenue in the first quarter was US $ 320.1 million, an increase of 36%year -on -year, and the loss was about $ 1712 million in the same period, accounting for 53%of the revenue. Unity simultaneously lowered the expectations of fiscal year in fiscal year. The estimated income growth rate was between 22%and 28%, losing to 44%of 2021.

If you want to clarify the cause and effect logic in the middle, it seems necessary to answer what is the game engine, and what is the main revenue channel of Unity?

Before the emergence of the game engine, the game production must write code from scratch, which not only has low development efficiency, but also a large number of repetitive work. The game engine provides developers with a set of repayable frameworks, which uses the general code to modularize the developer to call, and then "spell" the game like "building blocks".

From 2007 to 2012, Unity's energy was mainly on market expansion. At that time, the entire mobile game market was still on the eve of the outbreak. In 2013, the former EA global CEO John Riccitiello joined Unity and was appointed as Unity's new CEO in the following year. Then Unity ADS officially launched, trying to share the advertising income in the game through the built -in advertising system. Under the leadership of John RicCitiello, Unity's business model has gradually established, forming the current three major sources of income, namely, the development solution, operation solution, and strategic customization scheme.

Among them, the development solution mainly provides creation and development platforms to developers. The profit model is paid subscriptions, including Unity Pro, Unity Plus, Unity Enterprise and other products. The operation solution is designed to help developers perform game content, such as Unity ADS, and Cloud custody service, etc., Unity can make profits from it, or charge service fees on a monthly basis.

This time it was an illusion engine.

In 2014, the market share of the Unreal Engine was as low as 3%. Tim Sweeney, the soul of EPIC, was forced to sound the Counterattack. , All source code, complete items, example content, conventional updates, and BUG fixes, only the copyright fee is charged for works with more than 3,000 US dollars after the application of the application.

As a result, the market share of the illusory engine is not high, but it has seized the hearts of many big development teams; the Unity's advertisement is divided into the topic, but for many major game factories, advertising to a certain extent is equivalent to sacrificing users to sacrifice users to some extent. In the end, the customers of Unity ADS are mainly long -tail games. Although they occupy half of the game engine, their revenue capabilities are not as good as a mobile game of a million active users.

03 Crazy expansion, water storage fish and fish

Unity's business model is not lacking in logical self -consistent. As long as the developer's volume is large enough, profit is only a matter of time, and it does not rule out the possibility of brewing other revenue methods.

Therefore, Unity has a deep love for the "Yuan Universe". Once the concept of the "Yuan Universe" landed, the service target of the game engine will no longer be limited to game products, construction, automobiles, industrial, smart cities ... All need 3D need 3Ds. The content of the content will be the target customer base of Unity.

In the days when the concept of the Yuan universe, Unity quietly completed the transformation of identity, and gradually transformed from the game engine to "digital productivity tools".

An important node is 2020. The previous Unity did not lack mergers and acquisitions, and successively included Multiplay, vivox, Deltadna and other income pockets, but they were all to strengthen the ability of the game engine itself. After 2020, Unity's mergers and acquisitions were getting faster and faster, and the spear was directly pointed at the Yuan universe.

In 2021, Unity acquired 3D data processing software Pixyz, vegetation and natural environment generation software Speedtree, remote desktop and streaming supplier Parsec, artificial intelligence audio chat analysis platform OTO, film and television special effects company Weta Digital ... The product has been included in the UNITY development solution, hoping to run again in the layout of the Yuan cosmic technology.

On January 24, 2022, Unity announced the acquisition of Ziva Dynamics. The latter's core technology was to create the most realistic 3D character dynamics by imitating the physical properties of soft tissue such as muscle, fat, and skin. At the same time, use deep learning models to train various creatures and characters, and drive real -time expression drive through the Zivart plug -in. Then Unity put the dynamic publicity of Ziva virtual humanity on its official website and bowed into the battle for the "virtual human" application.

Is the unity that is expanding crazy on the Yuan universe track to accelerate the synchronization of commercialization? On the financial report in the second quarter of 2021, some analysts asked similar questions, but the reply given by Unity management is that the first or two years of strategy is not the price increase, but to let more users use Unity.

Just as Unity CEO John Riccitiello's point of view: "The Yuan Universe will release large -scale real -time real -time 3D content requirements, which will drive the company to continue to grow outside the game." Zhang Junbo, president of Unity Greater China, also said: "If the game market is said It is the trend of steady linear growth, so the non -gaming market is an indexed growth. "

Compared to price increases and income, Unity is still insisting on storage of fish and fishing. Especially under the east wind of the Yuan universe, if you can serve as a "digital productivity tool" creator in the era of symbiotic life, waiting for the market prospect of Unity is by no means comparable Trequently told new visions and new stories to the capital market.

04 path dependencies, suspense still exists

As far as the current market structure is concerned, Unity is likely to get the first chess chess of the Yuan universe. The integrity of the product and ecology may exceed the old opponent's illusion engine. For example, the number of developers of Unity has exceeded 1.5 million, in addition to the game, it has gradually achieved the coverage of construction, automobiles, retail and other scenarios; Unity Asseest Store provides thousands of free or charged material plug -in collection, which helps to save developers Time and energy; Unity Connect is looking for suitable positions for games, artists, and XR developers; Unity's developer community has a lot of scarcity resources such as answering questions and interpretation documents ...

The uncertainty of the Yuan universe is also an indisputable fact. It may take three or five years, or it may not be able to land for ten years. The suspense left to Unity still exists.

On the one hand, multiple external pressures. Not only did the Unreal engine see the opportunity window of the Yuan universe, but some unprecedented self -developed engines were also eager to try. Among them, the EPIC of platforms such as "Fortress Night" frequently opens well -known IP linkages such as concerts in the "Yuan Universe", and also extended the scene to architecture, film and television, live broadcast and other fields. Even if the layout is not as aggressive as Unity, depth and breadth are not lost to Unity.

Moreover, in the understanding of the capital market, Unity has been bound to the Yuan universe. Unity completed two financing in 2016 and 2017. The background was the boom of VR. It is said that 70%of VR and AR contents were developed using the Unity engine at the time. The rise is closely related, so that UNITY's stock price is directly linked to the popularity of the "Yuan Universe".

On the other hand, the internal path dependencies. Unity's business ability has always been the object of criticism. A large part of the reason is to blame the advertising business. However, in the Q1 financial report of 2022, John Riccitiello reiterated its confidence in the growth of the game advertising business at the performance meeting: "TV is advertising for about 18 minutes per hour during the golden hours. At present advertise."

Then Unity announced the merger with the mobile advertising platform, Ironsource, Unity's game engine and editor, Unity ADS, Unity Gaming Services, and the game analysis services with IRonsOnoce's SuperSOnic, Levelplay, and game analysis services. , The full -category of the game and the huge platform of the upstream and downstream links, thereby enhancing Unity's profit space.

This is exactly here.

Unity's courage and courage in the layout of the Yuan universe are admirable, but it is not the only choice for developers, and it has not given a new plan in the business model.

Although advertising is the most common monetization method on the Internet. In the user experience of the game and the Yuan universe, immersion accounts for a considerable proportion. Developers are willing to sacrifice the user experience and impose advertisements? Different choices correspond to different market endings.

At least the game market has been verified. The main source of revenue is still user payment. Even some games that use the advertising system often launch the version or function of payment -free advertising. The living space of game advertisements is mainly concentrated in long tails and long tails Leisure games with insufficient willingness to pay. Will users in the Yuan Universe fall in love with advertisements instead of experience first?

I hope Unity is not wrong this time.

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