Just to clarify, I never said it was an ‘abusive’ monopoly. And I certainly didn’t say anything about RL ‘dominating’ anything.
My point was that they had a pretty unique ecosystem of products that no other company had at that time, and that also appealed to the industry as something to be taken seriously as a pipeline tool. And no, I wouldn’t put Daz anywhere near that last statement.
If we ran a survey I’m sure we would find that the majority of 3D artists that might otherwise consider it wouldn’t even consider it because of the price. I’m talking a use case (like my own in the past) of using CC4, for example, as just another tool to help get that job done, but maybe only used for 5-10% of the work, or whatever.
The difference I’m trying to point out here is in relation to existing 3D pipelines that don’t ‘need’ to use CC4, but might see the time vs cost benefit of using it as just another helpful tool.
The survey would likely include tools like Zbrush, Substance Painter and 3ds Max and Maya. Unlikely it will include Reallusion in any significant capacity. The other tools are all much more expensive.
I won’t argue that Unreal Engine isn’t a big complicated piece of software. But you very much can use it on extremely low budgets or as a single developer. I’ve done it for years, an advantage that UE has is a massive community of artists who create and sell assets on the marketplace. UE has free rotating assets every two weeks from these creators who voluntarily put their assets up during these periods, additionally you can get large bundles of assets really cheap on humble bundle for $20-$30, for environment design, vfx, SFX, music, etc. Not including the perpetually free assets already provided by epic. There is often 2-3 various game design bundles up at any given moment.
Getting into the UE ecosystem is very accessible for solo devs or small teams with absolutely no budget.
Fair enough, but you seemed to be celebrating
the end of Reallusion’s so called “monopoly”
at the hands of Epic/UE /Metahumans
True business monopolies ,by nature ,tend to be harmful to other competitors in the market as well as the consumers who lack any alternatives
which is why the governments in western, capitalist economies are so keen to regulate and even break up companies with such monopoly power.
I contend that Reallusion never had any such “monopoly”, in the general 3D character & content market, but just a very specific niche with a dedicated base of loyalists who frankly
rarely ventured outside of the the Reallusion ecosystem comfort bubble despite RL’s recent efforts to make it so easy to connect with many other 3DCCs via their free export tools.
The survey would likely include tools like Zbrush, Substance Painter and 3ds Max and Maya. Unlikely it will include Reallusion in any significant capacity.
Indeed ,even without a formal survey ,one need look no further than the “career opportunities” section of any major AAA 3D/CG studio’s website.
Or any pro job board such as ArtStation.
The required candidate software experience listed is always
Zbrush, Substance Painter and 3ds Max and Maya.
and perhaps Houdini.
Two softwares you NEVER see mentioned are Reallusion and Daz.
They have developers and other employees that need to be paid, ever thought of that? And, if they weren’t profit-driven, they would go belly-up, like a number of companies that made creative software have in the past.
You can have good consumer practices/policies and still make a profit. They are not mutually exclusive. The updated EULA and license that RL just released are a good example and a step in the right direction from a consumer standpoint. The issue is with companies that put profits before consumers, which is what most corporate entities do or eventually evolve to do.
Look, I don’t agree with everything RL does and sometimes they are downright clumsy, but compared to many companies that bring out yearly paid updates with perhaps a few new features, a major release cycle of RL products has a duration of several years and brings new features without a pricetag. So I believe they provide value.
Also, compared to some creative companies, they are responsive to input from users regarding new features. Sometimes it takes a long time (even too long), but users are not ignored.
That’s how I see it and you are free to disagree of course.
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your take really. In my original post I certainly did, but seeing them change the EULA and taking a step in the right direction is good for everyone, it’s why I used it as my example in my reply. I’m newer to this pipeline than you are, so you obviously have your own reasons for sticking around. I’m just looking at this from the standpoint of a low budget indie developer. The old licensing model was very restrictive to creators. I’d love to see further improvements as well.
Technically, this isn’t true. You CAN create your own in-game character builder using a CC base model, but you have to sculpt your own morphs if you want to change things, like the face or body. Completely defeats the purpose of having CC, but if you want the same layout for textures and UVs, it’s a way you could go.
I didn’t make this thread to start some kind of rebellion. In fact quite the opposite, I just wanted to point out there are new tools in this industry which offer much better incentives.
RL, to their credit, have been making a lot of changes recently that I personally see as an improvement. Their licensing policies are still a little restrictive but it is improving with each update. I still have qualms with the software, but it’s getting better. Ultimately you have to understand they’re a business, and they need to make money to keep updating this software. I don’t expect them to make CC5 free like metahumans are, Epic is a much bigger organization with the funding to provide them free for UE5 users.
All I want to see is RL be more supportive of indie developers, and with the recent subscription model changes along with perpetual licensing for things like AccuPose, it’s improving little by little. Not everyone will agree with these changes, but it’s hard to argue that their cheap subscriptions are not more affordable for indie devs than a perpetual license.
All this to say, please don’t brigade here, it’s not contributing to the discussion. They have a 14 day refund policy, it is explicitly stated. There’s no cover-up. I’m glad you got your money back though.