Someone said that the price model is similar to other engines? Hmm
Wrong!
Unity charges $35/Month which equals to the pro Version minus a bit. Unity 2019 proposes to reach more to Designers and Artists as mentioned in the last GDC. Therefore becoming much more present in the indie scene. Then Game Maker Studio 2 which is looking sweet by the minute. Personally I dislike how GM2 works though, but Unity is by far more organized.
Pricing for C3 is quite elevated taking into account no major game saw a big release with it. Now, I don't have a particular issue with the pricing, but hey, for a bit more I can get better.
So if Scirra would ask me for $99 per years or one time payment of $400 I would pay. If they would ask for royalties as Unreal do, heck I would pay!
But! ...
C3 is so far just a designer ala Apple version of C2 with not much substance. many of the changes could've been done on C2 for a price. Heck I would've paid for those changes.
Cosmetics changes and a few addons aren't enough to be worth the price asked for it. Seems to me Scirra is riding the ''easiest game engine'' around.
Yet, where are the awesome games made with it?
There's always mention of the same game and yet ironically the dev is going with another engine.
So in all respect, no, C3 can't compete with other engines by just changing minor things. Please just add the description: C3, game engine for mobile clones exclusively.
There is no formula where big profit game= engine worth. It might equate to an inflated price at some point, but if it started out that way nothing would ever get made.
On the other hand, charging royalties just does not work unless you do have a bunch of hugely profitable games. No one could afford to pay collections to chase after hundreds of flappy bird clones that don't make that much to begin with.
Lastly $99 a year beats $35 a month by my figuring, but Im not saying all game engines are alike either.
In the end it all comes down to what you think its worth.