I think the "Is the Reason 3rd party market going to die with VSTs" question is answered.

[fotizimo]

Honestly, it seems to me that the market for Reason-specific devices and instruments is as strong as ever. Propellerheads seems firmly behind the continued development of the RE market and still are pushing forward with what the platform can do. I personally am over the VST segment, and use a few, but honestly, REs make a much larger portion of my projects.

But I am not sure I see as many refill makers working on the newer devices. If i look back at the refills for REs that were developed earlier for instruments like VK-1, and Parsec, I see some of the big names all brought products out pretty quickly. Now I am not seeing as many refills whenever a new RE comes out. There have been a few for Europa and Grain, but I am surprised that the big names have gone away. As an example, I can only find a single commercial refill for VK-2, and one for Expanse. If they had been released a few years earlier, there would be a dozen refills for them.

To me, the question of whether there is still a need for Reason REs and RE specific refills is a firm "yes"! I love using refill sounds as a primer for my work, so I really wish the big names would continue to build out refills for us Reason users.

I would love to hear from the refill builders out there, why they are no longer creating content, and what would bring them back?

[Loque]

I smell some easy porting of RE->VST->AU->WhatEver so the RE market will become aline soon.

And Refills i am not really interested in. I have plenty of samples and content and i can make my own patches pretty fast. I just would buy a refill if it is part of a RE+Refill bundle maybe. The last VSTs i bought wer bundles with a bunch of libraries which i never had bought, but they were quite cheap with the instrument itself, so why not...think of this Refill makers

[MrFigg]

I certainly prefer REs Over VSTs but I’m warming to the latter.
Refills? The last I bought was WBS 1 and 2 (which I wanted for ages) and I think I’m set now. No more refills. Got 90GB already around 70GB of which are unused.
Got a cool bunch of samples for cheap cheap on Black Friday and so feel pretty set with them as well.
I don’t know...I’ve got so much of everything I feel as if I don’t need to buy anything ever again. And yet still stuff comes out which I buy :):). It’s a full time job ha ha.

[ltbrunt00]

If given the choice I still buy the RE over the VST.
I don't know the technical parts of the Rack Extension but I thought there would have been another DAW product would do something bold and start supporting Rack Extensions.
Before I get attacked by the community I would love to be able to use my Rack Extensions in my other DAW products.

[aeox]

I'm not a refill maker but from what I've read on the forum here, it seems like not a very lucrative business. I think most people coming to reason have a certain mindset, playfulness, and creativity so they find much joy in learning and creating their own sounds.

[Exowildebeest]

If given the choice I still buy the RE over the VST.
I don't know the technical parts of the Rack Extension but I thought there would have been another DAW product would do something bold and start supporting Rack Extensions.
Before I get attacked by the community I would love to be able to use my Rack Extensions in my other DAW products.

I wouldn't be surprised if Propellerheads released a VST that hosts a small rack, from within which you can use RE's.

[chimp_spanner]

If given the choice I still buy the RE over the VST.
I don't know the technical parts of the Rack Extension but I thought there would have been another DAW product would do something bold and start supporting Rack Extensions.
Before I get attacked by the community I would love to be able to use my Rack Extensions in my other DAW products.

I wouldn't be surprised if Propellerheads released a VST that hosts a small rack, from within which you can use RE's.

^ That, would be amazing. With a host automation/MIDI CC to CV section at the top or something, so you can get a little interaction between the host and the rack still.

[VariableX]

RE all day for me - fed up installing and upgrading and licencing VST, its such a pain.

[joeyluck]

Not third-party, but in regards to REs... A thread regarding an update on Reason VST performance posted 5 days ago by Mattias himself has about 100 less replies and 2000 less views than the thread about Complex-1 posted yesterday.

[guitfnky]

Not third-party, but in regards to REs... A thread regarding an update on Reason VST performance posted 5 days ago by Mattias himself has about 100 less replies and 2000 less views than the thread about Complex-1 posted yesterday.

true, but in fairness, there’s less to talk about with a performance update than a new instrument with approximately seven billion shiny buttons and knobs.

[Oquasec]

I wouldn't be surprised if propellerhead was somehow doing better than REAKTOR, not sure yet : /

[Boombastix]

Well, from that Juice presentation I got the feeling that they plan to lure VST developer over to RE development once the have the RE->VST converter available. If that comes true my guess is RE will see several new entrants coming on board. Imagine making future proof plug-ins that work in Mac/PC and VST/RE, all from the same code.

[antic604]

Well, from that Juice presentation I got the feeling that they plan to lure VST developer over to RE development once the have the RE->VST converter available. If that comes true my guess is RE will see several new entrants coming on board. Imagine making future proof plug-ins that work in Mac/PC and VST/RE, all from the same code.

Yes! That's what I've been saying all along since Europa VST came out, which - in my opinion - wasn't meant to be a product for people to buy, but most importantly a proof of concept for the development community to see.

If some "big small" developer (I mean like Steve Duda, Lennar Digital, Madrona Labs, etc.) came out and released a RE+VST that was sold via Props store with one-click install, authorisation, update, piracy-protection, subscription & rent-to-own options; that would've been an awesome publicity win for Props and could trigger an avalanche of smaller devs who'd like certain things taken care of for them - files hosting, marketing, I hear even the development process is much better for RE.

[danc]

Regarding buying refills... now that we have sample librarian tools like LOOPCLOUD and ADSR Sample Manager... I seriously regret buying refill versions of sample packs as I can't include them in the tagging process.

And as for RE's... I don't want the RE market to die... but do I prefer VST.

- VAST choice of world-class instruments and FX.
- VAST array of retailers - shop around and save money.
- KEEP OPEN button - really useful if you are referencing/tweaking multiple VSTs at once.
- ZOOM - the new generation of VSTs allow me to zoom to full-screen.;
- ANYWHERE - plug into any other DAW or audio-tool (Audacity, RX7 etc).
- FUTURE-PROOF - unlikely to be deprecated, as not relying on one company.

RE advantage:
- NO CLICK to see control panel.
- ONE CLICK to see patch panel
- FANBOY community.
- MANAGED trial/licensing/install/update.

Which isn't enough for me to prefer RE.

[EnochLight]

I noticed that my Refill purchasing went from "very likely" to "almost never" as soon as RE's appeared. I just prefer the customized interface and instant "Sync All" feature is all. On an aside, I've longed wish devs like Bitley would migrate his Fairlight stuff to an RE/IDT (though I understand the amount of work that would need to go into something like this).

And as for RE's... I don't want the RE market to die... but do I prefer VST.

- FUTURE-PROOF - unlikely to be deprecated, as not relying on one company.

Not sure how long you've been using VST, but they are certainly NOT future proof and deprecation has happened in the past. There have been so many VST devs that have gone bust or disappeared, it's not even funny. At least when RE devs disappear, your purchased RE's keep on working forever in Reason, no matter what version comes along.

But yeah, having all that tied to 1 single company is always a risk. Worth it, for me though!

[danc]

And as for RE's... I don't want the RE market to die... but do I prefer VST.

- FUTURE-PROOF - unlikely to be deprecated, as not relying on one company.

Not sure how long you've been using VST, but they are certainly NOT future proof and deprecation has happened in the past. There have been so many VST devs that have gone bust or disappeared, it's not even funny. At least when RE devs disappear, your purchased RE's keep on working forever in Reason, no matter what version comes along.

Was referring to the format rather than individual developers going bust. VST as a format is extremely unlikely to disappear... far too much support from users and dev community to be left hung out to dry.

Yes - VST 4, or whatever version comes next, might cause legacy headaches... but less likely than RE being put to rest. Be clear - I do like RE, just don't want to be restricted due to using a less standard format which is locked to one DAW. Ok - it might not be in the future if our guesses are right and RE is opened up to other DAWs via a VST host... but it will always be a minor player.

[JiggeryPokery]

At least when RE devs disappear, your purchased RE's keep on working forever in Reason, no matter what version comes along.

Several VSTs and REs by devs who've not disappeared, and users of said VSTs and REs, will have found that statement to be factually incorrect in just the past few weeks. Versions of Reason absolutely did come along that stopped them working. And amusingly enough, it really mattered to those devs and users!

That those devices now work as expected again is only by dint that subsequent versions of Reason came along! I put a smiley or laughy icon there, but actually, it's not a laughing matter, or something you should be so casually dismissive of. Devs can also invest a lot of time, effort, money in building these things. Users also spend a lot of money on products, and cock-ups like those particular two bugs were easily preventable from going live if those Reason builds were being properly tested as—unlike "rare" hard-to-trigger bugs that understandably get into the wild—these two weren't obscure bugs that were hard to trigger: there were both very front-facing issues. I think both were found by users within 24-48 hours of the respective updates going live. These were "Microsoft deleting users' files" obvious.

For all any of us know the next version might break them again, and the time after that they might never work again.

So it's a brave person who despite knowledge of that still insists on the mantra of "RE's keep on working forever", when several did fundamentally stop working as intended, and there is no guarantee such issues will get fixed. That those problems were resolved, and resolved fairly quickly, is great of course, but as the old adage correctly notes: past performance is not indicative of future results. It's the RE equivalent of a gamblers' fallacy. Any OS provider (coughapplecough) could make a change at any time which could force Reason to need an update that might require PH to break the RE format, because between the choice of not making the update and thus stopping future development (read, earning future income) of Reason, or breaking old REs, I can tell you now the choice will not be to be beholden to the needs of old third party Rack Extensions. (To an extent, that's actually already the case for SDK1 devices.) I believe PH have future-proofed REs as best as they likely could, but that's still only true from the viewpoints of 2011 to present. Any plugin will only work as long as the host or hosts they're built for supports it on the current version of the OS they're hosted under.

[danc]

Whilst you are popping your head around here Mr Jiggery-Pockery. I have to say... although I am pretty much VST driven in my studio... I do have a few select RE's that I do rely on... and a lot are under your label - namely:

- JPS Harmonic Synthesizer - stunningly quirky sounds from this.
- Chenille BBD Chorus Ensemble
- Steerpike BBD Delay Ensemble
etc.

Just saying - thanks - as I like them... a lot.

[EnochLight]

At least when RE devs disappear, your purchased RE's keep on working forever in Reason, no matter what version comes along.

Several VSTs and REs by devs who've not disappeared, and users of said VSTs and REs, will have found that statement to be factually incorrect in just the past few weeks. Versions of Reason absolutely did come along that stopped them working. And amusingly enough, it really mattered to those devs and users!

Oh? Which RE's? I'm not aware of any in the shop currently (or that were previously in the shop but are no longer for sale) that have stopped working in the latest version of Reason, but I certainly don't own all 500+ RE's.

Oh wait..

That those problems were resolved, and resolved fairly quickly, is great of course

This is good to hear!

[antic604]

Oh? Which RE's? I'm not aware of any in the shop currently (or that were previously in the shop but are no longer for sale) that have stopped working in the latest version of Reason, but I certainly don't own all 500+ RE's.

He surely means the "knob-gate" that affected d16' and Synapse' REs in 10.2.1

[EnochLight]

Oh? Which RE's? I'm not aware of any in the shop currently (or that were previously in the shop but are no longer for sale) that have stopped working in the latest version of Reason, but I certainly don't own all 500+ RE's.

He surely means the "knob-gate" that affected d16' and Synapse' REs in 10.2.1

If he does, then that's a tad hyperbolic. The issue was addressed (quickly), and my statement still stands. I realize it's only been 6+ years since RE's appeared, but Propellerhead has given no indication that one of RE's biggest selling points (future proof) would cease. Anything's possible I suppose, though.

[djs]

RE are so much smoother and compatible with Reason than VSTs. Since Reason is the sole DAW that I use, RE are enough for me even though I use VST's from time to time. For someone who uses multiple DAWs or rewires may prefer VSTs over RE.

[QVprod]

There a few refill makers still hanging around but it's just really not as strong a market as it used to be. Sample based refills are a harder sell now that they have to compete with both RE and VST, which are clearly superior in what they can provide compared to a refill. Refills for specific RE have a market but it's a limited one as only owners of those RE can buy compared to the hey day of refills where any Reason user could buy them. Also RE and VSTs nowadays come with so many patches that buying additional ones isn't as needed whereas the the old Reason Factory bank had a fairly limited selection of presets. Nonetheless there are plenty of Refills that seem to be regularly added to the shop.

[Crumbfort]

I wouldn't be surprised if Propellerheads released a VST that hosts a small rack, from within which you can use RE's.

^ That, would be amazing. With a host automation/MIDI CC to CV section at the top or something, so you can get a little interaction between the host and the rack still.

Yessss.... this is the dream. That would be so dope. I have a lot of non-Reason using friends/colleagues who would be all over this in a second.

[avasopht]

Any OS provider (coughapplecough) could make a change at any time which could force Reason to need an update that might require PH to break the RE format, because between the choice of not making the update and thus stopping future development (read, earning future income) of Reason, or breaking old REs

They can't - not unless they were making their OS not be an OS any more. The RE format is strict in ways that make it nigh impossible for it to not be able to execute on a target platform. At the very most an OS might not allow Reason to sandbox plugins so easily, but that's highly unlikely because that OS will never gain traction. Well. Maybe Chromebooks take over, and still the worst that can happen is not being able to sandbox. That's it.

Bugs in Reason can arise, but they will always be fixable bugs, and they will never have to choose between supporting older REs and bringing the format forward, because they will always have the option to do both. There's nothing in the spec that would require an all or nothing between supporting old ones and supporting a completely new RE spec. Nothing.

REs are dependent on two external technologies: Lua, which is coded in ANSI C meaning it can be ported everywhere, and LLVM bytecode, which will be supported on every major platform long after our grandchildren are in nursing homes - especially since WebAssembly focuses on C++ via clang/LLVM.

Long story short, the Propellerhead ship would have to be sinking for them to not be able to support an RE, otherwise we'll be fine.