Prev/Next Blog
by date

Plan for Jeff Tunnell

Name:	Jeff Tunnell
Date Posted:	Mar 15, 2004
Rating:	4.0 out of 5
Public:	YES
Comments:	YES
RSS Feed:	or Subscribe with .
Profile Page:	View profile page for Jeff Tunnell

Blog post

Two years ago when we launched the Torque Game Engine source code to Indies for $100 per programmer, it was pretty revolutionary. In retrospect, that move has changed the face of how a lot of gaming technology has been released, licensed, and priced. Now we are in the process of moving the bar even lower for Indies. As long as your company does not make more than $250,000 in annual revenues, and you finance your own game, you can publish it ANYWHERE for ANY AMOUNT of money. No purchase of the $10,000 Commercial License, no ties to GarageGames, nothing. Just sell it and make money. This is again, revolutionary! But, it is not the complete story...

Part of our original plan was to sell the Torque cheap and make money on the back end with $10,000 commercial licenses. Torque was (is) a very good deal at $10,000, but It turns out that selling $10,000 commercial licenses is a long lead time, very buttoned down corporate business model that is not well suited to the mentality of the GarageGames founders. We wanted to push high end gaming technology (engines) into more of a shrink wrap box type of product, so we decided to change the way they are sold and licensed.

Starting today, the new Torque Commercial Product License is $495 per seat, no royalties. No matter what the size of your company is, no matter how much you are going to make from your product, the price is $495 per seat. So, using the Torque Comercial is just like using Photoshop or Visual C++ .NET or Maya.

How can GG do this? Well, we think there are entire markets out there that need 3D visualization or simulation that can't afford to try it at $10,000 per title. So, we are going for the strategy of breaking the market wide open, rather than getting a lot of money from a specific company.

So, there you have it. If you are an Indie working on your own game and funding your own development, you can use Torque for $100 per programmer, and publish your games anywhere, no royalties, no strings. If you grow larger than $250,000 per year in annual revenues, or want to do contract work for large companies or government entities, or are a large company or government entity, then you need to upgrade to the $495 per seat Commercial License, make your product and make as much money as you want with no royalties or ties to GarageGames.

Let me know what you think.

-Jeff Tunnell GG

Recent Blog Posts

List:	10/17/08 - Don't Fear the Economy 06/13/08 - The "Better Assholes" Clause 06/09/08 - Working For Big Publishers 06/02/08 - First Day Of The Rest Of My Life 05/29/08 - Make It Big In Games Call For Help 05/15/08 - An Itch That Can't Be Scratched 12/20/07 - Blog O Fix 10/09/07 - Acquisition Fun!

Submit your own resources!

Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr (Mar 15, 2004 at 22:17 GMT)

Jeff: This is some of the best news I've heard from you in a long time! :-)

Justin Mette (Mar 15, 2004 at 22:37 GMT)

A game engine that you buy off the shelf
Edited on Mar 15, 2004 22:41 GMT

Ben Swanson (Mar 15, 2004 at 22:53 GMT)

Just when I think y'all have done about all you can, you outdo yourselves once more. Exciting stuff!

Mark Frohnmayer (Mar 15, 2004 at 23:06 GMT)

Justin, the answer to your question is yes. The Indie Game License is not applicable to government contract work. This would not apply only if the entity you are doing contracting work for has an existing (pre-$495 change) commercial source code license from GarageGames.

Justin Mette (Mar 15, 2004 at 23:14 GMT)

Ok, that makes sense - thanks for the clarification Mark.

Peter Andersson (Mar 16, 2004 at 00:12 GMT)

Although the new license is very nice, isn't it unfortunate to radically drop the price of the commercial license of torque 1.2 shortly after announcing there will be a new exciting version around "shortly"? To me it seems like I should be wary of the potential shift. Even though I see that you're probably just trying to open up to a larger part of the market.
Maybe I'm just being a tad paranoid, but the $495 is THAT cheap! The new license is a step in the direction of increased freedom which is never a bad thing (for me). Another thing, the $495 is per seat while the $100 is per programmer. So if you as a company where to purchase a number of licenses the $495 per developer would mean that the license stays with the company instead of moving with the programmer?
If no skip
-
I guess this would increase the attractivity of a project if you were to have licenses for the engine when bringing in developers. Is there already a system for this kind of license transfer set up? Will there be? Just thinking of how the current CVS system is set up.
-

Cheers,
Peter

Sebastien Bourgon (Mar 16, 2004 at 00:17 GMT)

My question would be does the $100 you've spent go towards a commercial license or could a company just go straight for the $495 license and in the end save $100.

Jeremy Alessi (Mar 16, 2004 at 05:56 GMT)

Very interesting. I think it's a good move. If you can get the documentation and put this on the shelf I'd imagine it could be like Photoshop or any off the shelf, fairly expensive but not ridiculously priced piece of software to do business with. $500 is great and I do think it's the right time for this sort of thing to go mass market. There are so many good engines out there now that the days of people selling engines for hundreds of thousands should be over. The technolgy is all over the place and Torque should be able to take a few leaps and bounds passed the competition at that price. Heck, now you could do a full on commercial title with the engine for so much less money. Find an investor (mainly for marketing) and you're there.

Jeff Tunnell (Mar 16, 2004 at 13:59 GMT)

@Peter: You've seen through our devious plan to make Torque better than it has ever been with new documentation, better organization, more resources, etc. then LOWER THE PRICE. Torque has shipping games, it works, it is a great game development engine, it is practically free. What more do you want?

Brett Fattori (Mar 16, 2004 at 15:03 GMT)

That's an amazing offering. I'm happy that GG is moving forward like this. It's always going to be the case that someone feels "screwed" in the short term. Especially those who JUST bought the commercial license... However, in the long term, this could lead to a huge potential market. I see great things becoming a possibility with the TGE that cannot be done with other engines.

I, for one, am very happy with this. Does this mean that (if we wanted) we could buy the commercial license and be done with it? Does the commerical license still carry the support and such?

Thanks, Jeff and Crew, for everything you're doing!

- Brett

Greg Findlay (Mar 16, 2004 at 15:07 GMT)

@Peter: I think your concern is that GG is about to release a new version of Torque that you'll have to pay extra for. Just as a disclaimer, I have no inside information of this and I'm not a GG employee. However, making a product to compete against your own product does not make sense. My bet would be that it's going to either be an add-on or an update you can grab through CVS. You can relax, there here to help us. Considering you can now buy 19 for the price of 1, that's one hell of a deal (although that does depend on the number of licenses you buy for one title, it also depends on the number of Torque games you make). Even if the new toys are an add-on that you have to buy, it's not something you HAVE to buy to make games. If you really wanted to you could code it yourself. I would recommend getting the update though. GarageGames is known for taking a quality product and making it incredibly affordable. Ridiculously affordable infact.

Peter Andersson (Mar 16, 2004 at 15:24 GMT)

Jeff, I'm not disputing the usefulness of Torque. It's a great engine and most importantly a proven one. I'm not questioning the pricing either, it is cheap which is hardly a bad thing. I'm asking questions out of curiosity, not to try and down your work. I guess what got to you is the fact that I questioned your motives, which really wasn't why I posted so I'll stay away from that can of worms. Hell, I thought it was a great deal even with the license it was first introduced under and bought it on the same day it was available.

Greg Ellwood (Mar 16, 2004 at 15:49 GMT)

Excellent news! I really like the new licensing deal and can't wait to see what GG comes up with next.

Thanks GG! :D

-Greg.

Cisor (Mar 16, 2004 at 16:39 GMT)

Really good news, GG!! You're making it even easier for small companies to get their products out there.

Eric Forhan (Mar 16, 2004 at 17:23 GMT)

[i]"You

mm (Mar 16, 2004 at 17:29 GMT)

This is really exciting, the new changes to the licensing agreement will really help out the indie developers. Probably even convince more to sign on.

Matt

[EDIT]
Did anybody else notice that in the products it still has a graphic that needs changed?

Edited on Mar 16, 2004 17:32 GMT

Mark Frohnmayer (Mar 16, 2004 at 17:34 GMT)

Peter, to answer your question about per-seat licensing, you are correct - a company can buy a number of seats, for the number of programmers that will be working with the code. Those licenses can be transferred as new programmers are hired or moved off the project, whereas the indie license, since it is licensed to an individual, is not transferrable.

Jeff Tunnell (Mar 16, 2004 at 19:46 GMT)

OK, the new commercial license is up again. It is sweet! Very clean, easy to understand, and cheap. Here is my favorite part under the License Grant:

Quote:

(a) Licensee may publicly sell, distribute, release, publish, transmit and/or exploit any Products created hereunder.

Nothing more, nothing less. Just buy it, make your product and sell it.

-Jeff Tunnell GG

Jorgen Ewelonn (Mar 16, 2004 at 20:46 GMT)

Jeff, I have followed your responses here and in the forum regarding this matter and I must say you tend to be a bit nervous about the changes GG has in store for TGE.
It is understandable since these changes affect both the technology and the spirit behind your product in a major fashion.

Altough, now is the time to remain calm, to rise above those who don't see the bigger picture and not to take negative opinions personally.

You and the rest of the team at GG are indies yourself and will therefor always look out for the community you've created, I am not worried and I believe that the majority of the TGE users aren't either.
Take a ride on your bike, let the wind rush trough your hair, I wish you the best of luck at the GDC, you guys will probably tear down the house. :-)

Regards,
Jorgen Ewelonn, Sweden

Steven Jackson (Mar 16, 2004 at 23:04 GMT)

A wee bit off-topic of the nice new license change, but are you guys gonna be posting screenshots and all the goodies shown at GDC for all us slackers who don't go? I can hardly wait till GDC and I'm not even going because you guys keep tempting us with "you ain't seen nothing yet" and stuff.. its horrible I say. Evil.

Ken Finney (Mar 17, 2004 at 00:44 GMT)

It's a beautiful thing!

Gilles Jr Lafrance (Mar 17, 2004 at 13:24 GMT)

You (GG) guys are crazy ! :) This is really great and much appreciated ! Thanks GG !

A Willy Beamish fan :)

Pat Wilson (Mar 17, 2004 at 22:49 GMT)

Quote:

You (GG) guys are crazy ! :)

Oh man, you don't know the half of it... They're mad, I tell you! Mad!

I called them mad, and they called me mad, and, damn them, they outvoted me.

Paul Dana (Mar 18, 2004 at 14:08 GMT)

Hey...I thought it was a great deal when it first came out. It just keep getting better and better!

So my extrapolation show that at this pace by 2005 you be paying *me* $100 if I buy torque and by 2006 you'll be writing my games too! Awesome!

Eric Forhan (Mar 18, 2004 at 14:15 GMT)

Paul, your tinfoil hat is looking a little ragged these days. You might want to upgrade to alluminum cookware. ;-)

You must be a member and be logged in to either append comments or rate this resource.