Google pulling games from the play store that run on Unity

[Arika]

According to a few developers (u/eboxrocks from reddit being the main source of the below information) a number of games have started being removed from the Google Play store that are created on Unity due to a dependency on an SDK called AliPay, the recent policy update prohibits the use of external payment gateways for any app published on the play store.

 

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Games built with unity (which accounts for many of the games on the app store) are getting pulled from the app store seemingly randomly as of yesterday. Only thing is that it isn't random.

Google updated their policies recently to remove apps that have certain external billing SDKs implemented in the app. All good and well and they have every right to do this, they also notified developers in advanced about the change in policy.

essentially any app that contains micro transactions must be processed through google play, if you want to publish your app on the play store.

 

A number of developers are not blaming Google for the removal, due to it being an automated system (because we all know how well google does with those) but i also don't think they should be given a free pass given how a lot of their algorithms have a whole bunch of "unforeseen consequences" that just so happen to benefit Google.

 

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The problem is that Unity pulls in one of these SDKs automatically even if it isn't being used by you as a developer through their internal in app billing SDK (which most games built on Unity do). The vast majority of developers had no idea that this was the case, so no action was taken when Google announced their policy update. The result is that tons of games are being removed from the play store. 

 

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Unity as a company has indicated that they are aware of the issue and are working to update their tools to be in compliance with the policy change. Of course the impact is you might see a lot of your games get removed from the play store (if nothing else it might help rid the store of a lot of the games that aren't maintained or kept up to date.

 

It seems Google is yet to release a public statement about this update, only contacting the developers that are affected.

 

 

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/AndroidGaming/comments/bze65a/psa_unity_games_being_pulled_from_play_store/

 

https://forum.unity.com/threads/google-bans-app-due-alipay-sdk.687451/

 

[imreloadin]

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

[PocketNerd]

23 minutes ago, imreloadin said:

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

Eh, can always put it on another android app store. Like Amazon or Samsung.

[Ja50n]

37 minutes ago, PocketNerd said:

Eh, can always put it on another android app store. Like Amazon or Samsung.

The vast majority of Android users aren't going to use an alternate app store unless it's pre-loaded on their phone, and even then they'll probably stick with the Play Store.

[dalekphalm]

1 hour ago, imreloadin said:

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

Their store, their cut. 

 

If devs don’t like it, they can use one of the numerous (if not overly popular) alternative android app stores. 

[DrMacintosh]

Good for Google. This is a great move on their part. They should keep cracking down on devs like this. It's their store, they should act like they care about it. 

[poochyena]

1 hour ago, imreloadin said:

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

If you opened up a retail store, would you allow random people to come in and sell their own merchandise in your store?

[Guest]

I use Ali-Pay a lot and have never had a problem, much quicker refunds than PayPal and great customer service, even though it won’t effect me, bit of a shame.

[ARikozuM]

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

Their store, their cut. 

I would call them a marketplace, like a farmer's market or auction lot. Otherwise, they would be curating everything on the store and stamping their seal on everything. 

 

They should only have a say in allowing or not allowing a product or vendor into the market. If the vendor wants to use Google's credit payment system, they can, but if they bring their own, that's it. 

 

I see this as double-dipping into the developer's profits if they're published by a larger entity and taking away from smaller devs that might not get enough to make their product foot another project. 

 

Google should be asking for less of a cut to entice the market to use their system rather than Unity's. 

Or we could break them up for monopoly on Android. 

[rockking1379]

2 hours ago, imreloadin said:

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

Literally the same thing Apple does with the App Store. Granted this has gotten Apple into their big lawsuit. But now that google does it will it change anything? Or as some others have said, you can use a different App Store. Will that be the magic shield that keeps google from having a similar lawsuit filed against them?

[williamcll]

For your information: Alipay is Alibaba (of taobao and aliexpress)'s equivalent of Paypal, and is mostly based on QR code payment rather than NFC.

[dalekphalm]

1 hour ago, ARikozuM said:

I would call them a marketplace, like a farmer's market or auction lot. Otherwise, they would be curating everything on the store and stamping their seal on everything. 

 

They should only have a say in allowing or not allowing a product or vendor into the market. If the vendor wants to use Google's credit payment system, they can, but if they bring their own, that's it. 

 

I see this as double-dipping into the developer's profits if they're published by a larger entity and taking away from smaller devs that might not get enough to make their product foot another project. 

 

Google should be asking for less of a cut to entice the market to use their system rather than Unity's. 

Or we could break them up for monopoly on Android. 

Not quite. It’s more akin to Amazon or even Walmart. Both often sell shit. And often times shit gets through that sometimes doesn’t. 

 

And I don’t see it as double dipping at all. People are free to use other stores. But if you put you wares into Walmart, don’t expect Walmart to allow you to use your own payment processor. 

 

Same with Amazon. Same with eBay too. Some of them might offer multiple payment methods, but they all control which methods are used, and also control the payment processor used. 

[wasab]

No worry, you don't need play store to install apps

[wasab]

4 hours ago, imreloadin said:

Forcing developers to only use Google's payment processing method, which I'm sure they get a cut of, seems a little anti-consumer...

Ah... You talking about Apple right? 

[wasab]

3 hours ago, Ja50n said:

The vast majority of Android users aren't going to use an alternate app store unless it's pre-loaded on their phone, and even then they'll probably stick with the Play Store.

Just get a phone that is preloaded and

Amazon app store is very popular and uses by many Amazon users and who doesn't have an Amazon account these days? 

 

Google gets a browser Monopoly this way as well. Chrome isn't preinstall on windows but who doesn't use Google search engine and who doesn't see that download chrome notification whenever they are on Google search homepage without a chrome browser? 

[lewdicrous]

This might help cut down the number of copycat games that are riddled with ads, if so, then good for them.

[HarryNyquist]

7 hours ago, wasab said:

No worry, you don't need play store to install apps

for now

[jdubya421]

11 hours ago, ARikozuM said:

I would call them a marketplace, like a farmer's market or auction lot. Otherwise, they would be curating everything on the store and stamping their seal on everything. 

 

That is the thing though - they are essentially putting their stamp on everything. That is the point of Google making sure all apps comply to certain guidelines. They put their stamp on it and it protects the consumer and the developer. 

[wasab]

3 hours ago, HarryNyquist said:

for now

It has been that way in all Chinese phones since Google' s banned in China. 

[HarryNyquist]

10 minutes ago, wasab said:

It has been that way in all Chinese phones since Google' s banned in China. 

No I'm aware.

 

I'm saying that at some point Google may decide (like Chrome's adblock bullshit) that sideloading is depriving them of revenue on many fronts, and decide to remove it from mainline Android. I can't imagine most phone manufacturers not just going along with such a change.

 

[wasab]

Just now, HarryNyquist said:

No I'm aware.

 

I'm saying that at some point Google may decide (like Chrome's adblock bullshit) that sideloading is depriving them of revenue on many fronts, and decide to remove it from mainline Android. I can't imagine most phone manufacturers not just going along with such a change.

 

Android is open source. It is separate from the propietary Google services. Google can't introduce code to prevent others from sideloading g because others can easily take the same code and remove all those Google garbage and make their own brands of Android that run apps without them. 

 

Think Android like the Linux distros. Open source project at the end is open source project. 

[HarryNyquist]

3 minutes ago, wasab said:

Android is open source. It is separate from the propietary Google services. Google can't introduce code to prevent others from sideloading g because others can easily take the same code and remove all those Google garbage and make their own brands of Android that run apps without them. 

 

Think Android like the Linux distros. Open source project at the end is open source project. 

Chromium is open source too. How many people will just continue using Chrome despite the adblocker change, instead of switching to Brave or Opera or Edge (all of which are based on the Chromium sources)?

 

This is my point; I don't think any mainline manufacturers are going to allow sideloading if Google says no sideloading, and most consumers are not going to flash a new rom to get sideloading back.

 

Plus if Google is stupid enough to disallow adblocking, I can easily see them disallowing sideloading too.

[wasab]

41 minutes ago, HarryNyquist said:

Chromium is open source too. How many people will just continue using Chrome despite the adblocker change, instead of switching to Brave or Opera or Edge (all of which are based on the Chromium sources)?

 

This is my point; I don't think any mainline manufacturers are going to allow sideloading if Google says no sideloading, and most consumers are not going to flash a new rom to get sideloading back.

 

Plus if Google is stupid enough to disallow adblocking, I can easily see them disallowing sideloading too.

You don't seem to understand Android too well. You don't need to plug in USB and sideload app from your computer to install anything outside the Google play store. You just need to download an installer(apk file) like how you would install stuffs on windows. 

 

Android is open source, I don't know how many times I need to emphasize this. You can root your phone and literally uninstall Google play store, Google drive, Google whatever from your phone. Android and Google are separate things. Android doesn't need to have Google. In fact, all Chinese phones do not ship Google play store and use mi store, Huawei store or whatever. The best OEM can do is lock the bootloader and it still doesn't prevent you from installing apps outside the play store because Android is built not to be lock by any app distribution platform. 

 

Google play store and Google play services are NOT part of the Android operating system. They are apps later added on by oems. 

 

You can download Amazon app store from Amazon's official website with or without Google preinstall. 

 

If you seriously hate Google, you can grab the code of vannila Android open source project from it's website and build your own custom rom for your phone. 

 

XDA website has plenty premade custom ROMs this way. You can say screw all the OEM and Google stuffs and just flash a rom that's to your liking 

[HarryNyquist]

11 minutes ago, wasab said:

You don't seem to understand Android too well. You don't need to plug in USB and sideload app from your computer to install anything outside the Google play store. You just need to download an installer(apk file) like how you would install stuffs on windows. 

 

Android is open source, I don't know how many times I need to emphasize this. You can root your phone and literally uninstall Google play store, Google drive, Google whatever from your phone. Android and Google are separate things. Android doesn't need to have Google. In fact, all Chinese phones do not ship Google play store and use mi store, Huawei store or whatever. The best OEM can do is lock the bootloader and it still doesn't prevent you from installing apps outside the play store because Android is built not to be lock by any app distribution platform. 

 

Google play store and Google play services are NOT part of the Android operating system. They are apps later added on by oems. 

 

You can download Amazon app store from Amazon's official website with or without Google preinstall. 

 

If you seriously hate Google, you can grab the code of vannila Android open source project from it's website and build your own custom rom for your phone. 

 

XDA website has plenty premade custom ROMs this way. You can say screw all the OEM and Google stuffs and just flash a rom that's to your liking 

1. Sideloading requires explicitly enabling a switch in developer options to allow it. Without that switch enabled you can't install anything outside an approved source.
2. Every solution you mentioned to this possibility involves increasingly advanced concepts that the average consumer will not be willing to undertake on their only working phone. Most people don't have the freedom of a device they can brick voluntarily.
3. Google has the ultimate final say on what devices are allowed to connect to & use their services. For example, if you root, you can't use Google Pay (without some additional advanced concept as above, anyway). It would be trivial for Google to say, right, we're not going to stop you from sideloading, but you can't use any Google-official apps now because your phone is a 'security risk' to your secure data.
4. It's such a mind-numbingly stupid idea that I can't imagine Android would willingly remove the one thing that makes their OS good, but with Chrome no longer supporting adblockers, I have zero faith that it won't be considered and executed to 'save' Google's revenue stream thru the Play Store.

[Misanthrope]

Bad Google! You can't just try to take it all back and go Apple on us and try to monopolize and control all profits going through your store!

 

Seriously though: external payments are fucking shit and probably just asking to get your CC fucking stolen anyway but I just don't know if google can basically un-ring the bell: everybody knows the Play Store is a fucking wild west of shady apps where most things go so taking back some control is going to negate a lot of what has made Android popular so far but we'll see.