Hello.

I like your article. I was hoping you could list all the free solutions you tried before settling with Unity3D - I'm almost decided to use it as well, but I always welcome alternatives even if they might be obscure.

Regarding the following thought in your article:

No source – time consuming. Developing for a black box can be a pain as free engines don’t provide you with their source code.

I would have that assertion revised. Most of the free engines you can think of (Maratis3D, Panda3D etc.) are not only free but open-source as well; These attributes are often associated.

Hello.

I like your article. I was hoping you could list all the free solutions you tried before settling with Unity3D - I'm almost decided to use it as well, but I always welcome alternatives even if they might be obscure.

Regarding the following thought in your article:

No source – time consuming. Developing for a black box can be a pain as free engines don’t provide you with their source code.

I would have that assertion revised. Most of the free engines you can think of (Maratis3D, Panda3D etc.) are not only free but open-source as well; These attributes are often associated.

Thank you for your observation, I have revised the beginning of the paragraph to reflect that only the closed ones are the problem.

Neither you can integrate other free technology sometimes, like it happened to me when...

That should be "can you" and "like what" (even better would be "which is what").

Game development middleware provides you with a platform abstraction layer, which is great, but on the other side if you find yourself in need to implement...

"On the other hand" and "needing"

These being said, deciding upon weather to use such an engine vs a free solution (or your own) should come based on the given skill set you have in the various areas of game development and based on the nature of your project

It's "whether", and you should removed the second "based" entirely.

The content of the article is good though.

Thank you, fixed :)

The way it's currently phrased, it seems almost an absolute that free software = no source. Not having the source is 30% of the time vs 70% of the time where you have access to the source, with truly free software. "Occasionally, you can't integrate with other free technology..."

The article says, "No source – time consuming. Some free engines are also open source which is great, but some are completely black boxes and developing on top of them can be a pain.". The majority of truly-free software is open source - I typically aim for MIT or LGPL software. Freemium software is usually closed-source.

The article should be, "Hidden costs when using middleware", because most of what's mentioned apply to both paid and non-paid middleware, and the main point of the article should be, "Do your homework before setting on a piece of technology, whether it's free or not". Many non-free technologies aren't open source, but many free technologies are. And the real issue with many open source projects is the lack of support and continuing development and bad design decision and occasionally bad licensing (like GPL) - things that can also happen (but less likely) with using paid-for technology.

The specific example of the free version of Unity isn't the best example to choose from because it's a free version of commercial software, meaning companies usually intentionally cripple it in some ways to get customers to purchase the non-free version, something that doesn't happen at all with free-as-in-free-as-in-it's-actually-really-free open source software.

Kryzon hints at this above by mentioning a few really free open source engines - I could mention another dozen or so well-known open source engines as well.

Free software has a different set of problems that weren't really addressed in this article, as you seem to have had an bad encounter with freemium software. Freemium is a different category of software than free software, with a different set of problems, but you're accidentally applying the problems of one category to the other category - at least, that's my initial impression!

@Servant - thanks for the insights, I'll try to rethink some of the paragraphs to reflect more that the article is mainly targeted at what you are calling freemium software vs open source one.

Indeed, you have understood very well the purpose of my article, which is "don't fall into the traps I fell in" when adopting something with a "free" label on it. I still plan to continue using Unity for other projects, it's just that I wasn't expecting additional costs. On the other hand, most of the costs didn't come from the Unity being crippled, but rather from hiding some platform specific things I needed and making it difficult to access (involuntary since they don't provide any paid or free solution for it, it's just a combination of being multi-platform and closed source).

LE: fixed some of the paragraphs, also changed the disclaimer and added a new paragraph to emphasize the article is dealing with freemium engines.

it's just that I wasn't expecting additional costs.

Yes, definitely - and it's an important experience to share with others, so thanks for sharing it!

I tend to highlight the weak points of something, and forget to compliment the good parts, so don't let me discourage you!