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Comment by lrae | Hacker News Reader

Can somebody explain their numbers to me? That person claims 100M installs/downloads a year with 1M revenue? By install numbers that would be a top 10 mobile game?

E.g., according to a quick google search, a FIFA Mobile and a Garena Free Fire has about the same amount of downloads in 2022. (Both in the top 10.)

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I'm not sure if this developer is drawing the same distinction, but Unity seems to count updates to the game on app stores as a new install for those users, as well as things like initiating the web version of a game. So if you have a few million downloads and you push out even a token update a week, I can see the numbers getting that high - at least as far as Unity is concerned.

Or rather, Unity's initial Q&A responses said that. They've half-backtracked and started muddying the waters so I think they actually just didn't think it through at all.

Wait wait wait — you’re saying that at first the rule was written so every time someone visits a webpage with the Unity Web Player on it, that visit may cost the dev $0.01-$0.20 USD?!

Yes they specifically confirmed that the web player is included and works the same.

This whole thing is such a completely nonsensical shitshow that I would be surprised if Unity the company even lasts long enough to enact this policy, what the hell is going on there?

They have 100mm installs but 130mm uninstalls, so I don't know if those numbers are reliable.

Perhaps they have multiple games? "Our studio focuses in mobile games [emphasis mine] for kids".

They clarify in the comments that it's a single game they're talking about. (Otherwise the whole math wouldn't make sense in the first place.)

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