Wish OchenK would come back!

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motuscott
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24 Sep 2018

Jesus Jig, I have a ton of your stuff and think it's awesome (OchenK's too).
Had no idea returns were this bad.
Thanks for your service‼️
Who’s using the royal plural now baby? 🧂

madmacman
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24 Sep 2018

motuscott wrote:
24 Sep 2018
Jesus Jig, I have a ton of your stuff and think it's awesome (OchenK's too).
Had no idea returns were this bad.
I'm more worried by the ignorance and treatment shown by the Props here. :shock:

Another tiny nail in my coffin. If this is general behavior, then these are not the best prospects for Reason's future. :?

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normen
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24 Sep 2018

madmacman wrote:
24 Sep 2018
I'm more worried by the ignorance and treatment shown by the Props here. :shock:

Another tiny nail in my coffin. If this is general behavior, then these are not the best prospects for Reason's future. :?
With all love and respect to Jiggery but he does tend to paint things in dark colors sometimes. Let's just say it's one - certainly valid - snapshot from a situation that is probably more complicated.

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JiggeryPokery
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24 Sep 2018

normen wrote:
24 Sep 2018


With all love and respect to Jiggery but he does tend to paint things in dark colors sometimes. Let's just say it's one - certainly valid - snapshot from a situation that is probably more complicated.

madmacman
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24 Sep 2018

normen wrote:
24 Sep 2018
Let's just say it's one - certainly valid - snapshot from a situation that is probably more complicated.
Indeed, hence my "if this is general behavior" grain of salt.

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rcbuse
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24 Sep 2018

JiggeryPokery wrote:
24 Sep 2018

Ahhh hah.. this video makes me laugh.

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Faastwalker
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24 Sep 2018

JiggeryPokery wrote:
24 Sep 2018
I released Steerpike 3 last month.

It's sold 3.
WHAAA?!!?!? :shock: That's shocking. I'm a bit depressed myself now :(
normen wrote:
24 Sep 2018
Hey, since I'm a fan of conspiracy theories how about this one.

Lets say the low sales on REs are taken as a reason to scrap first the RE format and then the rack in Reason. From what I see thats such a tempting solution right now.. Let it bleed out and then remake Reason in the image of all other DAWs. It would solve the resolution issue - which is bigger than some might realize, esp in relation to REs - and it would allow them to shake off the "toy" image they still have. Although maybe for that they should drop the name Propellerhead altogether? ;)

And they could actually pull this off relatively elegantly by simply making RE a VST development platform (Europa VST, nudge, nudge). The devs could basically use their existing RE code and compile VSTs from that so they wouldn't completely lose their investment (or shit for that matter).
That's pretty elaborate ......... but who knows?! Anything is possible I guess. I remember when VST support was announced for Reason & they talked about it on SonicTalk. Reason rarely gets a mention on the show, but I guess this was seen as a noteworthy topic, which speaks volumes in itself. Gaz Williams commented that it felt like Reason had lost it's identity following this announcement. He couldn't understand where it was going to fit in as it was no longer unique. It would just end up being like everything else.

Maybe for Reason to appeal more it would need to be like everything else. A sad & sobering thought. But maybe the idea is to make it like everything else so it appeals to ......... everybody else! Kids these days are funny. They don't seem to like interesting stuff. They all like the same thing, look the same, dress the same, listen to the same shit. EDM is popular for fuck sake. Pop culture has created a monster. Everything is watered down and crap. Nothing has an edge. The kids think it's great! They think Justin Beaver (sic) is 'edgy'. Twats! They're being played & they don't know it, they think they're so fucking cool. They don't know shit about shit ................ sorry, went off on a bit of rant there! :x

Anyway, It seems to be all about selling as much stuff as possible now. It's a business so obviously it has to make money. But are Propellerhead loosing their soul in the process? I was extremely nervous when that investment company got involved. They obviously didn't sign up because they loved Reason. Their interest will be making money. That's it! The focus would have shifted without a doubt. What does this mean for Reason? Who knows. But things are changing & it feels like not all of it for the better. Reason is still the best thing since sliced bread for me. But if it all goes tits up .......... there's always Bitwig I suppose :(

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chimp_spanner
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25 Sep 2018

That's a real shame JP! I like your stuff a lot. I trust you've done better with other REs though? When it comes to VST I mean...there was absolutely no way Reason could continue without it (IMO). So from a composers perspective I'm incredibly grateful that I get to use a handful of plugins that are essential to my work. Of course I can understand why this would be an issue for rack developers though.

Still, I use REs waaay more than VSTs. I just prefer them. My hope is always that people will be tempted over to Reason by VST support and then realise how damn cool REs are. But maybe that hasn't been the case. Who knows?

Anyway I really hope you guys find a way to continue your work. I'm still an avid rack fan; I check the store every day (even though I really should stop now haha). I think/hope that the coming year will be revealing in as much as the direction Reason will take. It feels like there's been a lot more activity this year than previously. All these partnerships with big players, showing off rack extensions outside of Reason, mobile, the coming .2 and VST performance updates. I really hope it pans out well for everyone involved!

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Loque
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25 Sep 2018

I am curious how big the market is and also compared to VST...

Making JPs bill, 750 at 20 sale price means at least 40 sold license to get the costs back. Nothing you can live from.
Reason12, Win10

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Zac
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25 Sep 2018

I agree with chimp.

REs are undoubtedly better in Reason. Thing is betamax was better than vhs.

Fingers crossed.

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Loque
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25 Sep 2018

Zac wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I agree with chimp.

REs are undoubtedly better in Reason. Thing is betamax was better than vhs.

Fingers crossed.
And some ppl want the tape sound or vinyl crackles :-P
Reason12, Win10

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Zac
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25 Sep 2018

Loque wrote:
25 Sep 2018
Zac wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I agree with chimp.

REs are undoubtedly better in Reason. Thing is betamax was better than vhs.

Fingers crossed.
And some ppl want the tape sound or vinyl crackles :-P
Some people are vegetarian.

Some people are cellebate (spelling?)

It's a hodgepodge world.

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motuscott
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25 Sep 2018

I like a little horseflesh with my cellebating
It's a pokery world innit?
Who’s using the royal plural now baby? 🧂

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Zac
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25 Sep 2018

motuscott wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I like a little horseflesh with my cellebating
It's a pokery world innit?
I eat canned meat so probably already have my horseflesh staple.

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JiggeryPokery
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25 Sep 2018

Loque wrote:
25 Sep 2018

Making JPs bill, 750 at 20 sale price means at least 40 sold license to get the costs back. Nothing you can live from.
Absolutely spot on.

In agreeing with a price for a coder, I try to base it what I feel is a realistic expectation of units that will sell.

So of course I never expected Steerpike 3 to sell an extra 100 units at full price, that'd be fantasy-land: but I figured 20-30 units wasn't an unreasonable estimate. So 25 full price units, coder is paid off, I defer my own income until maybe 50 units in the subsequent sales. That's how I've done it in the past and it's worked ok. I've sold enough at full price to pay Pitchblende or Scuzzy, and I get roughly the same amount back for myself a few months later in the next couple of discount periods.

But three units sold, though... now, that I wasn't expecting even at this point in the RE lifetime.

I guess few users will now buy anything at full price ever because the PropShop is now effectively a year-round sale, what with DotW, Rewards, and four annual sales. Every day, there's a sale of something in the shop.

And it gets worse, as you rightly note, because it's now so bad I can't make up the shortfall in those later discounts either. Since my income effectively would have come from 40-60 half-price units down the line, that income also now goes just to fulfill the original £750 outlay (and that only covers external coding; that doesn't include my time in updating the GUI, so the cost of Steepike 3 is effectively £1,500).

Of course I can't compare any other devs experiences here: others who have full-time work outside of REs and/or who can code C++ themselves are somewhat less sensitive to lower sales, so in some sense my situation is a little more particular, and perhaps this is why I'm a little more vocal.

As I wrote to a colleague recently, it was a lovely basket when it was new, but it's tatty now, my eggs keep falling out, and there's no-one else selling baskets I like.

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MrFigg
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25 Sep 2018

I’ve not really got much to contribute to this but reading what JP has said here has opened my eyes. Wide. I really never thought about what goes on behind the scenes in RE development. Yeah, I wait until sales so I can save MY money but now I see that doing that affects the developers more than I could have imagined. I’m not being sarcastic when I say I really am torn. Not good.
🗲 2ॐ ᛉ

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Loque
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25 Sep 2018

JiggeryPokery wrote:
25 Sep 2018
Loque wrote:
25 Sep 2018

Making JPs bill, 750 at 20 sale price means at least 40 sold license to get the costs back. Nothing you can live from.
Absolutely spot on.

In agreeing with a price for a coder, I try to base it what I feel is a realistic expectation of units that will sell.

So of course I never expected Steerpike 3 to sell an extra 100 units at full price, that'd be fantasy-land: but I figured 20-30 units wasn't an unreasonable estimate. So 25 full price units, coder is paid off, I defer my own income until maybe 50 units in the subsequent sales. That's how I've done it in the past and it's worked ok. I've sold enough at full price to pay Pitchblende or Scuzzy, and I get roughly the same amount back for myself a few months later in the next couple of discount periods.

But three units sold, though... now, that I wasn't expecting even at this point in the RE lifetime.

I guess few users will now buy anything at full price ever because the PropShop is now effectively a year-round sale, what with DotW, Rewards, and four annual sales. Every day, there's a sale of something in the shop.

And it gets worse, as you rightly note, because it's now so bad I can't make up the shortfall in those later discounts either. Since my income effectively would have come from 40-60 half-price units down the line, that income also now goes just to fulfill the original £750 outlay (and that only covers external coding; that doesn't include my time in updating the GUI, so the cost of Steepike 3 is effectively £1,500).

Of course I can't compare any other devs experiences here: others who have full-time work outside of REs and/or who can code C++ themselves are somewhat less sensitive to lower sales, so in some sense my situation is a little more particular, and perhaps this is why I'm a little more vocal.

As I wrote to a colleague recently, it was a lovely basket when it was new, but it's tatty now, my eggs keep falling out, and there's no-one else selling baskets I like.
Hmm....i guess since the VST market is available, a lot more competitors are out there. RE need to have something unique apart from VSTs and the dev need to sell VSTs today too. Sad, that PH is not investing in the uniqueness of Reason atm - there are actually a lot of DAWs, modular things and synths out there... And on the other hand does not listen to the devs or customers, well, maybe they actually start to do it since we have VST, since they seem to understand that "moooaaar content" is not a way to get new or satisfy old customers.

The VST market is also heavily competitive, sales over sales everywhere and prices down to $1-$5 or >90% discount. But the market is bigger.

Not sure, what the right answer for your business is here... I hope for you and other devs, that PH sold a lot of new Reason licenses and in the near future they gonna buy RE. The actual customers are sated with almost everything - not only RE, but also VSTs.


Here on Reasontalk was a discussion about how there could be more promo things to increase sales, involve more customers and so on...I actually saw, that Rob Papen does some regular talks, but only a few ppl joined. I watched it, was a bit bored, gambled around with Go2, found bugs, decided to not buy anymore from him...So it can also go into the wrong way :-D So in the end, not sure what really would work and also promo stuff needs to be payed.

I wish you good luck for your future sales and good luck for us, for new cool products from you!
Reason12, Win10

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Loque
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25 Sep 2018

MrFigg wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I’ve not really got much to contribute to this but reading what JP has said here has opened my eyes. Wide. I really never thought about what goes on behind the scenes in RE development. Yeah, I wait until sales so I can save MY money but now I see that doing that affects the developers more than I could have imagined. I’m not being sarcastic when I say I really am torn. Not good.
Yea. Maybe the strategy needs to be changed.

1. Get the device for 30€. Only maybe 70 patches
2. Pay for a update or a subscription
3. Pay for more patches (man...creating patches can be quite time consuming)
4. Create tutorials, maybe payed or just for marketing
5. Update the device regularly with new cool features and get payed for it. Update only, if it sold good. Create patches only, if it sold good. Invest only, if it sold good
6. Let ppl cry about update prices
7. Sales are good, but maybe not every sale. And i personally just laugh about the ridiculous start-prices of some products, just to discount them heavily or have them always discounted. A too high price tag can destroy the reputation easily, a too low price let the ppl think the stuff is cheap crap
8. Nothing is for free in live. I pay the price if i think its worth it for me.
Reason12, Win10

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Zac
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25 Sep 2018

JiggeryPokery wrote:
25 Sep 2018
Loque wrote:
25 Sep 2018

Making JPs bill, 750 at 20 sale price means at least 40 sold license to get the costs back. Nothing you can live from.
Absolutely spot on.

In agreeing with a price for a coder, I try to base it what I feel is a realistic expectation of units that will sell.

So of course I never expected Steerpike 3 to sell an extra 100 units at full price, that'd be fantasy-land: but I figured 20-30 units wasn't an unreasonable estimate. So 25 full price units, coder is paid off, I defer my own income until maybe 50 units in the subsequent sales. That's how I've done it in the past and it's worked ok. I've sold enough at full price to pay Pitchblende or Scuzzy, and I get roughly the same amount back for myself a few months later in the next couple of discount periods.

But three units sold, though... now, that I wasn't expecting even at this point in the RE lifetime.

I guess few users will now buy anything at full price ever because the PropShop is now effectively a year-round sale, what with DotW, Rewards, and four annual sales. Every day, there's a sale of something in the shop.

And it gets worse, as you rightly note, because it's now so bad I can't make up the shortfall in those later discounts either. Since my income effectively would have come from 40-60 half-price units down the line, that income also now goes just to fulfill the original £750 outlay (and that only covers external coding; that doesn't include my time in updating the GUI, so the cost of Steepike 3 is effectively £1,500).

Of course I can't compare any other devs experiences here: others who have full-time work outside of REs and/or who can code C++ themselves are somewhat less sensitive to lower sales, so in some sense my situation is a little more particular, and perhaps this is why I'm a little more vocal.

As I wrote to a colleague recently, it was a lovely basket when it was new, but it's tatty now, my eggs keep falling out, and there's no-one else selling baskets I like.
I greatly appreciated the free update to Steerpike 3. Thanks.

I've always assumed making rack extensions must be a hobby or side-line for you.

Having to pay for coding on top of what the props take etc I'm surprised you've made any profits despite your quality. I own a lot of your REs and would have loved to see that update to Harmonizer Synth.

It's a sad tale for RE devs. I still feel bad for being hard on Ochen K but he was never interested in ironing out faults and that's where my criticism came from. I said 'but' so don't feel that bad it seems but would still like to see him back.

I love your racks JP. Attention to detail is important to me.

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ScuzzyEye
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25 Sep 2018

Zac wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I own a lot of your REs and would have loved to see that update to Harmonizer Synth.
It's still happening. Maybe not as quickly as I'm sure everyone would have liked, but can't let that new anti-aliasing code go to waste. ;)

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Zac
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25 Sep 2018

ScuzzyEye wrote:
25 Sep 2018
Zac wrote:
25 Sep 2018
I own a lot of your REs and would have loved to see that update to Harmonizer Synth.
It's still happening. Maybe not as quickly as I'm sure everyone would have liked, but can't let that new anti-aliasing code go to waste. ;)
That works on multiple levels ;) Good to hear.

Undistraction

26 Sep 2018

I just don't understand Propellerhead's strategy. It seems like they make things as hard as possible for RE devs to make money whilst at the exact same time claiming that REs are what make Reason unique.

djadalaide
Posts: 234
Joined: 11 May 2018

26 Sep 2018

JiggeryPokery wrote:
24 Sep 2018
Faastwalker wrote:
23 Sep 2018
When VST was introduced a lot of us felt it would spell the end for RE's. That hasn't happened. Not yet. But from what OchenK is saying here they were scarcely worth the effort in terms of financial return & offering something genuinely new for Reason users. I still prefer to buy an RE over a VST any day of the week. But as I thought at the time when VST support was announced - if we reach a point where it's no longer worth developers making RE's then they will stop making them. RE's will become the beta max of plug-in formats, which is a real shame as it's so so good for Reason. Hope it doesn't happen. But clearly it's happened for OchenK :(
I released Steerpike 3 last month.

That's one of the two high-end delay devices in Reason. It's now absolutely Reason's equivalent of say, the classic PSP85 VST, but it's far more versatile and easy to program than that.

It's sold 3.

(And it cost me £750 to have done, and that was effectively mate's rates, so... but still that's a huge loss if I can't make that up come Black Friday).

The fundamental problem is that Propellerhead simply refuse to see RE devs as businesses and acknowledge and respond to our needs. We're a nuisance. (Or at least, maybe just I'm a nuisance :lol: ). But self-deprecating jokes aside, at the end of last February PH asked for feedback on SDK3. I wrote a detailed business case as to why Players needed a folded view. The response I got was that that they didn't want that sort of feedback, and I was "hostile" for even asking and "they" knew what Reason users wanted and I didn't. So they both effectively told me I'm not a Reason user because I need something they don't think Reason users want (huh?!) and confirmed in writing that they won't listen to or understand the needs of developers. I can't say more because of NDA (they'll perhaps say even that oversteps the line).

But this is important. They don't owe anyone a living, but they've created a system to supposedly support that possibility, then consistently undermine it. So this is my livelihood and thus the impacts of PH decisions are important to me and the refusal to acknowledge and understand the implications of their decisions speaks volumes.

Scuzzyeye and I spent nearly 18 months creating a potentially awesome Player device, and PH effectively rejected it before it even got finished because they weren't even willing to discuss our needs. They were, in their words, willing to discuss their reasons for doing it their way. That's not the same thing as offering devs support to produce products in the way we need to produce them to offers our users a useful an exciting tool. Six months on from that I'm still really upset about the way I was spoken to and I've been pretty damn depressed again ever since.

So as a format, I'm afraid RE are moreorless done. I've got a couple of things I'm working on something now but neither is going to make enough money to pay the mortgage.

Scuzzy and I have spent the summer doing Harmonic Synthesizer 2 (I reckon Scuzzy's saved up to 25% CPU in a revised AA-algo!) and remarkably Propellerhead don't want this released either: I asked PH to implement a really easy bug fix a few months back so I can offer the changable panels. An over-zealous check in the build tool stops it building. It was dismissed as "not a bug", even though the design guidelines clearly state what I'm trying to do is allowed. I quite reasonably pointed this out and like with the folded Players, made the business case for why it needs to be fixed not just for me, but for all developers.

I never heard back.

I can't pay Aron or Scuzzy for their brilliant work if these things aren't in the shop, so I end up feeling even more upset and guilty that I've wasted their time. :puf_unhappy:
Let me know if the situation changes, i will boycott buying any propellerhead products until they adjust their attitude. Who is with me?

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ScuzzyEye
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26 Sep 2018

djadalaide wrote:
26 Sep 2018
Let me know if the situation changes, i will boycott buying any propellerhead products until they adjust their attitude. Who is with me?
Rather than trying to hurt the Props (because RE developers need Reason users), if you want to do something to support the developers you like: buy, don't rent, their devices.

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Auryn
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26 Sep 2018

djadalaide wrote:
26 Sep 2018
Let me know if the situation changes, i will boycott buying any propellerhead products until they adjust their attitude. Who is with me?
Although I understand your feeling of anger at reading Jiggery's account of his dealings with the props ( I share them) I think it would probably be more productive if we (reasontalk community) petition them in some way. I'd be happy to write a thoughtfully worded mail/document urging them to be more respectful and cooperative towards their long-time RE developers.

A boycott would probably go largely unnoticed IMHO. For myself at least, I hardly buy any of the props RE's (the last one was classic drummer, last christmas) so my joining a boycott would not affect their bottom line much. Also, I agree with ScuzzyEye that it's probably too aggressive a measure and will possibly only foster hostility.\

Edit: for what it's worth... I own almost every JP RE, outside of his organ series (which are nice but not that useful to the music I make) and Steerpike and Animus. I skipped those because I already own a lot of delays and reverbs and I don't really need any more ATM. I'd be all over a new synth though.
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