Godot Co-Developer Clarifies Burning Unity Logo Slide Was Not a Slam on Unity
The misunderstanding spread because only the photo circulated, when the slide was part of an explanation of Unity's withdrawn Runtime Fee decision and the lecture slides were not even made by Manzur.
Reporting from 1 source: Automaton.
Ariel Manzur, co-developer of Godot and a board member of the Godot Foundation, spoke at the Busan Indie Wave Conference on August 14. A photo of a slide showing the Unity logo on fire spread on Reddit, and some viewers read it as Manzur disparaging Unity. Attendees and Manzur denied that reading. Manzur said the slides came from Emilio Coppola, the Godot Foundation's executive director, and the image illustrated Unity's missteps behind Godot's rise.
The lecture was titled "Godot Engine: Open source in the videogame industry." Local media PNN reported that it covered how the Godot Foundation, together with the community and companies, is advancing development and maintenance of the engine. The photo that spread on Reddit showed Korean subtitles translating Manzur's remarks. In that scene he was explaining that companies are generally not expected to make decisions that harm themselves, and Unity made such a decision. The "bad decision" is believed to refer to the Runtime Fee, the installation-count pricing system announced in September 2023 and withdrawn in September 2024. Archived footage of the lecture has not been released, so the details cannot be confirmed.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.