You also feeling ripped off upgrading?

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guitfnky
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13 Feb 2020

joeyluck wrote:
13 Feb 2020
guitfnky wrote:
12 Feb 2020


yeah, it’s a great deal, and a great (though unfortunate) “buyer beware” lesson. I think they kind of shot themselves in the foot because of it. it’s worth it for lots of folks, but wasn’t the most customer-friendly way to go about it.
I mean hey...if folks want to wait years for something to potentially be included in a bundle... I just buy stuff I want and need and try my best to time the sales. We all want to catch a sale. But the use I have gotten out of some REs far outweighs what someone gets waiting up to 6 years or so...
I’m more talking about their overall approach not being particularly customer friendly. as an example, it’s not a good look to charge $130 for the standard upgrade, and then charge $250 for the upgrade from standard to suite, when you could have just gone straight to the suite for $130 less.

and they could have made the Suite more appealing to a broader range of users if they’d given the option to choose from some devices, instead of offering a fixed package, with lots of devices many users already may have had. (I get that they’re a bit limited in what they could do here, since they’re not third party devices, but I’m just trying to illustrate that maybe they could have done a better job if they’d given it some more thought)
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Kategra
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13 Feb 2020

I don't feel ripped off upgrading because I didn't upgrade. I have R10 and R11 doesn't add enough for me.
I'm interested more in workflow and innovative features and probably in innovative devices that are not available anywhere or at least not in Re format, so it's easy to skip 6 workflow features and one possibly interesting device (Sweeper Modulation Effect).

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moneykube
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13 Feb 2020

hoping they release Sweeper Modulation Effect as a rack
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zoidkirb
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13 Feb 2020

orthodox wrote:
13 Feb 2020

How many companies in the DAW market have yet adopted the flexible pricing standards you're appealing for?
Steinberg do. For example if you already own Groove agent 5, you are eligible for a crossgrade price to the Absolute 4 bundle. Don't worry though, users are still salty over there too, as you are restricted to crossgrading from only ONE product at a time.
And then then of course there is the DAWs themselves that give discounts when upgrading tier but not version numbers ie going from Ableton Live 10 standard to Suite is cheaper than going from 9 standard to 10 Suite.

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jam-s
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13 Feb 2020

orthodox wrote:
13 Feb 2020
How many companies in the DAW market have yet adopted the flexible pricing standards you're appealing for?
The first few that come to my mind are: Waves, Rob Papen, Arturia, KiloHearts. But there are far more that offer good crossgrade deals.

kitekrazy
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13 Feb 2020

jam-s wrote:
13 Feb 2020
orthodox wrote:
13 Feb 2020
How many companies in the DAW market have yet adopted the flexible pricing standards you're appealing for?
The first few that come to my mind are: Waves, Rob Papen, Arturia, KiloHearts. But there are far more that offer good crossgrade deals.
This is not the case with DAW developers.

Proboscis
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13 Feb 2020

Yonatan wrote:
13 Feb 2020
The thing is that the Suite did not take into any consideration all those who have bought quite a few of the devices already. NO way to upgrade to Standard and get extra good deal on the ones in the Suite that one may not own, as a good gesture. No, it is all or nothing.
While I think RS making the whole Suite thing an offer in the first place is stupid (like - why not stick to the 'rig' style bundles?), how do you think they should handle it for people who own some of the inclusions.

The Suite page claims 16 extra devices. And the (upgrade) price difference between standard & Suite is $120. FOr ease, let's say each device is valued equally, at $7.50 per device.

Do they simply subtract $7.50 from the upgrade price, for each device a person owns ? Seems a batch to manage. Maybe segmented by quarters, of 25/50/75 or nearest to.

So let's say you own half of those devices. You'll get an upgrade to the suite for only $189. Only $60 more than someone getting the suite.

Can you imagine how pissed off people will be, who upgrade only to standard R11, when they realize that you have gotten (potentially) Complex 1, Parsec, Electric Bass, Polar, Rotary, Scenic Hybrid, both Layers Devices FOR ONLY $60 !??!?!!?

Doesn't seem fair across the board, does it ? But neither does it seem fair that a person should be paying for a bundle (sorry SUITE licence) when they already own some of the components. That's why its a dumb fucking idea from the start, and little more than a fast money grab from a company whose only interest is in making money, not music.

Proboscis
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13 Feb 2020

And what's going to happen when Reason 12 rolls around ? Will they throw more devices into the Suite ? Seems like a big win for those who didn't take it up the first time. They get 'all that and more'. Or if the Suite contents remain the same, how does a Suite licence holder upgrade to R12? They would then revert back to a standard licence ? It's all complete nonsense, the lack of forethought that's given to just about everything they do at Reason HQ.

Proboscis
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13 Feb 2020

And Yonotan, I think you mentioned you are on R9, thinking about upgrading to R12. Might I suggest that you hold off. There's no need to reward stupidity and glacial development rollouts. You've already missed out on six month of using it, and since it's all about a shameless cash grab for the parent company of Reason Studios, I would not be at all surprised if we saw an R12 in late 2020/early 2021. And just think, upgrading from R9 to R12 will buy you a HEAP more features, and some devices. Three pathetic releases = one pretty good one.

Of course I deny any responsibility for your choice, should Reason Studios announce a subscription only model or a tired-pricing structure based on where you upgrade from. We might well say 'no, never!' but a lot of the 'no nevers' over the years have come into being with this company.

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jam-s
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13 Feb 2020

kitekrazy wrote:
13 Feb 2020
jam-s wrote:
13 Feb 2020

The first few that come to my mind are: Waves, Rob Papen, Arturia, KiloHearts. But there are far more that offer good crossgrade deals.
This is not the case with DAW developers.
With their Rig bundles, lots of REs, and the Rack plugin the ReasonHeads are more of a plugin maker/seller than a DAW company today.

Yonatan
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14 Feb 2020

Proboscis wrote:
13 Feb 2020
And Yonotan, I think you mentioned you are on R9, thinking about upgrading to R12. Might I suggest that you hold off. There's no need to reward stupidity and glacial development rollouts. You've already missed out on six month of using it, and since it's all about a shameless cash grab for the parent company of Reason Studios, I would not be at all surprised if we saw an R12 in late 2020/early 2021. And just think, upgrading from R9 to R12 will buy you a HEAP more features, and some devices. Three pathetic releases = one pretty good one.

Of course I deny any responsibility for your choice, should Reason Studios announce a subscription only model or a tired-pricing structure based on where you upgrade from. We might well say 'no, never!' but a lot of the 'no nevers' over the years have come into being with this company.
I am actually on R10.4 so even less inclined to punch out € 129. From R9 would be a good enough deal.

I already have Parsec 2, RDK, Reason Bass, Polar, Rotary, Quad player, Drum Seq player, Layers, Radical keys.

Dont have Complex, Scenic, Oumph, Layer Waves, Processed Pianos, Step player.

189 would actually be a fair price as RS tempted me to upgrade Parsec for 39 more than already full price, RDK and RBass at 80 when already got refills. Luckily I skipped the Piano upgrade. Nothing of my REs was in another bundle. Layers they had a 49 deal..

But it is not as if all other ppl pay blindly 129 and just me getting a cut in Suite. It is meant to be a fair deal, taking into account what I already bought. It is meant to be a smarter system.
How can anyone be pissed off then mesmerizes me. Its just to make as many as possible the sense it is a crazy good deal and get as many longtime supporters also on the Suit bundle boat as many tutorials will make combinators etc with stuff from stock Suite.

I am not die hard in need for the missing devices in the RE collevtion as I think 249 is not justified when going from R10.
All on R9 and below can easily justify Suite even if they almost own most of them but Scenic and some other RR, because they get all the R10 devices and improvements of workflow and gets up to date to use latest RE, and gets Vst optimation and a Rack Plugin and whatever comes along next. It is a no brainer for those.

RS made a huge amount of REs and pushed them very very hard and had several Deals of the week. And now after Suite they have slowed that down. So, obvioulsly RS hade Suite in the pipeline all allong and that made their marketing very cynical. And it was not years after that they put them in bundle or Suite.
Peocessed Pianos was very near the release date and still they wanted is to upgrade. I passed that one as I tjink 39 is not a good deal if owning the refills. And anyone could use that code.
So, as much as I like the platform with Reason and REs, I still stand ny my opinion that it is cynical way to go about business the way they made so many RE and doing hard marketing to get as many as possible to buy them, while tjey knew they made them all to put in a crazy deal called Suite. Thus excluding and making ppl feel like being tricked and fooled by smart marketing. And not a single thought on how to make as many as possible feeling it was not in vain to buy their upgrades and REs.

They as decent company would offcourse tjink out a way to compensate and make as many as possible to complete their collection of what is now Stock devices in Suite. It is simple math. They could go the road of honest goodwill (business of 2020s) or create a bad vibe.
The bad vibes are valid no matter how many users feels like winners in the lottery. You can create win-win or win-lose situation, where the latter makes for conflicts and distrust. It is same with politics. So I call win-lose both marketing and politics, something of the past and not of the future. Then ppl can say its just ordinary capitalist market. Well...in absurdum I would say and see where it brought us today...more polarization and less unity and goodwill. Within the market you can see users as supporters of development or just plain as customers that you need to nudge to buy more just because profit no matter the loyalty or trust or good will in the long run. And I say it is bad business even from strict economic sense, in the long run. That is what I try to express.
My personal horizon, well I surely can get by without the missing devices, and I do praise that they have an subscription service on RE.
So it is not black or white. Just that many more than me react to the heavy marketing strategy as of lately, where they push hard just to suddenly exclude you from a way better deal.
So in long run it tells us to never trust them and never buy any more of their devices if not in a super deal. One day maybe Suite owners will get pissed off because of an even better deal which excludes them, even if hard to see now.

Proboscis
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14 Feb 2020

jam-s wrote:
13 Feb 2020
With their Rig bundles, lots of REs, and the Rack plugin the ReasonHeads are more of a plugin maker/seller than a DAW company today.
There seems like an enormous opportunity for Reason Studios to position themselves as this sort of business. And they already have TONS of assets, a working shop, and a new technology to target 600%+ a greater market than just Reason users.

Let me explain (which I have done on another thread).

The "Reason Rack" shows that bridging into the 'other DAWs' world where VST is the standard. SO all they need to do is strip out everything from that wrapper, make it 'invisible', and bam ! You can sell a Rack Extension as a VST, the end user experience is no different to loading any other VST.

Suddenly, every instrument is a VST. Launch this with some marketing $$ spend, a 50% off everything in the shop sale, and breath new life into their existing customer base. The third Party Developers will reap some rewards for the hard work they've put in to supporting the RE format. "Other DAW' users get a chance to use some new toys. Everybody wins

Would FX Rack Extensions be deliverable the same way ? Invisible wrapper, no back panel. Maybe. Probably. I don't know.

Utilities won't work, and Players won't work, but that's still hundreds of 'new' products, in which they would have spend almost no development time on, since the REs exist, and the VST wrapper exists (in the form of the Reason Rack, requiring only a code modification to hide stuff and disable the 'rear of rack')

And then........ those VST customers can be offered Reason Lite for free, give them a chance to use the 'VST's" they bought in a whole new way , as a Rack Extension with all the CV and audio fuckery that comes with it. ALl they need to do is go to their account page, and their purchased products, and choose to 'download Rack Extension' rather than 'Download VST'.

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ShelLuser
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14 Feb 2020

blaasvaer wrote:
12 Feb 2020
Now, I've bought various Rack Extensions and ReFills over time ... even paid for the Reason Drum Kits and Reason Electric Bass AGAIN in the form of a shiny new plugin.

Now, staring at the 'new' version ... I can't help feeling I get ripped of paying €249,- for getting basically just a few (I can count nine compared to what I already own) extra things of which I would never use most of anyway (especially Umpf and Layers Waves Edition) ...

This would mean that I'd pay €249,- for the few new (minor) interface features and a few extra 'plugins' ... I don't get it. Maybe it's me ... but when my gut tells me somethings rotten – there usually is.
It's called marketing, and I can raise you.... When some investments and a lot of hard work started paying off I pursued deep into my true passion: sound synthesis, which meant a full upgrade (and new hardware) for my home studio. Live 9 went to 10 (and Push got added to replace my APC40), Max 5 went to 8 and.... Reason 6 became Reason 10 and I also bought into a dozen of rack extensions. Knowing very well that I might have gotten a better (discounted) deal during the Holiday season.

And then Suite happened :twisted:

But the thing is: I never felt ripped off and I also don't quite understand why you would be? This is simply the way things sometimes go. You buy a new refrigerator and 3 months later you could have gotten it for 100 less. It happens all the time. Keyword being marketing. To me personally this was full proof that R.S. had to make Reason 11 "work" by promoting it to what I'd consider absurd ways.

And this is also happening all over the place... I'm a huge fan of Ableton Live and around 8 there was one thing I wanted to have more than anything else: the Ableton Live Orchestral Instrument Collection ("OIC"). But it was waay out of my budget. Then Live 9 happened, which included... the OIC. How would those license owners have felt? :shock:

Thing is: there are always caveats to consider. My "suite" version if you will is working on Reason 10 and I am very happy about it. I'm currently experimenting with Scenic which I'm playing on my Ableton Push; this works because Reason is rewired into Live.

One of the huge advantages of rewire vs. a VST is memory management. A VST can do a lot, it can only do so much and its memory and CPU usage is tied into what the DAW has reserved for it. Live is a good DAW for that matter but... it has its limits. Stand alone usage with Rewire otoh makes sure that the Reason process gets its own share of memory (and resources) from the OS.

Meaning that all my CPU cores will be put to good use, something which simply can't always happen when you use a VST with a complex setup. Simply because an application such as Live is limited to the amount of resource control which it can do.

I ended up paying a lot more, true, but I also got a ton of extra value out of it.
--- :reason:

danc
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15 Feb 2020

I don't feel ripped off ... Because I got Reason in a rack VST. Which for me is the best feature Propellerheads have had for years (I wont stop calling them PH.. because I grew up with that name.)

Whilst using another DAW... I have...

NN-XT - nearly always used as my preferred sampler even though I have plenty of other VST samplers. Layering is so easy and creative in NN-XT

And built into my create a new track template are a few SEND/RETURN buses with the rack connected.. so that I can build some fantastic FX chains. THE ECHO leads the FX list. Along with many other Reason FX racks.

Reason rack VST made the upgrade 100% worth every penny.
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Yonatan
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15 Feb 2020

danc wrote:
15 Feb 2020
I don't feel ripped off ... Because I got Reason in a rack VST. Which for me is the best feature Propellerheads have had for years (I wont stop calling them PH.. because I grew up with that name.)

Whilst using another DAW... I have...

NN-XT - nearly always used as my preferred sampler even though I have plenty of other VST samplers. Layering is so easy and creative in NN-XT

And built into my create a new track template are a few SEND/RETURN buses with the rack connected.. so that I can build some fantastic FX chains. THE ECHO leads the FX list. Along with many other Reason FX racks.

Reason rack VST made the upgrade 100% worth every penny.
A good move with the Rack plugin. I have yet to try it in real work, may become hooked on it. :)

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Lempface
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15 Feb 2020

How do you feel ripped off when you could have trialed all of those devices and everything included in the upgrade is clearly stated? Sounds like buyers remorse which IS NOT ripped off.....
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PhillipOrdonez
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15 Feb 2020

Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020
How do you feel ripped off when you could have trialed all of those devices and everything included in the upgrade is clearly stated? Sounds like buyers remorse which IS NOT ripped off.....
He didn't buy it. He just feels ripped off by the prospect of upgrading.

danc
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15 Feb 2020

PhillipOrdonez wrote:
15 Feb 2020
Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020
How do you feel ripped off when you could have trialed all of those devices and everything included in the upgrade is clearly stated? Sounds like buyers remorse which IS NOT ripped off.....
He didn't buy it. He just feels ripped off by the prospect of upgrading.
Some people feel ripped off having to pay for any software, upgrade or otherwise. I sat in a pub once with a friend who believed that every piece of software should be free..... My response to that was .. when you go into work tomorrow... tell your boss that you no longer want to be paid. You'll do it for free. Forever. He didn't understand the logic.... Which made me conclude that his daft ideology was total nonsense. Someone has spent ages making the software... And deserve to be paid for it . However... Many people think it just grows on trees and has no hard working human behind it.

My point being... Ok.. It has nothing to do with upgrading Reason. But more to do with... You can't please everyone when it comes to buying software... However great the upgrade is or not. Someone will complain. Everyone is entitled to (whacky or not) ideas about paying for software.
Last edited by danc on 15 Feb 2020, edited 1 time in total.
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Lempface
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15 Feb 2020

PhillipOrdonez wrote:
15 Feb 2020
Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020
How do you feel ripped off when you could have trialed all of those devices and everything included in the upgrade is clearly stated? Sounds like buyers remorse which IS NOT ripped off.....
He didn't buy it. He just feels ripped off by the prospect of upgrading.
What in the world? How do you feel ripped off and you didn't make a purchase?

Really what he means is he its not a good enough value for him but he wants to complain anyway. Just skip it if you don't want it?
Reason 11 Suite | Bitwig Studio 3 | Native Instruments Komplete 13 Ultimate Collector's | Komplete Kontrol M32 | Maschine Mikro MK2 | Maschine Jam

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MrFigg
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15 Feb 2020

Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020
PhillipOrdonez wrote:
15 Feb 2020


He didn't buy it. He just feels ripped off by the prospect of upgrading.
What in the world? How do you feel ripped off and you didn't make a purchase?

Really what he means is he its not a good enough value for him but he wants to complain anyway. Just skip it if you don't want it?
What are you so angry about? 😂😂😂
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orthodox
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15 Feb 2020

MrFigg wrote:
15 Feb 2020
Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020


What in the world? How do you feel ripped off and you didn't make a purchase?

Really what he means is he its not a good enough value for him but he wants to complain anyway. Just skip it if you don't want it?
What are you so angry about? 😂😂😂
That was a clear consumer fraud.

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MrFigg
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15 Feb 2020

orthodox wrote:
15 Feb 2020
MrFigg wrote:
15 Feb 2020


What are you so angry about? 😂😂😂
That was a clear consumer fraud.
What?? I don’t get it 🤣. I’m sure it’s funny man. But I don’t get it hahaha.
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orthodox
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15 Feb 2020

MrFigg wrote:
15 Feb 2020
orthodox wrote:
15 Feb 2020


That was a clear consumer fraud.
What?? I don’t get it 🤣. I’m sure it’s funny man. But I don’t get it hahaha.
When someone talks about feeling ripped off without actually having been ripped off, it's a fraud. I would also be angry if I was about to buy it.

PhillipOrdonez
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15 Feb 2020

Lempface wrote:
15 Feb 2020
PhillipOrdonez wrote:
15 Feb 2020


He didn't buy it. He just feels ripped off by the prospect of upgrading.
What in the world? How do you feel ripped off and you didn't make a purchase?

Really what he means is he its not a good enough value for him but he wants to complain anyway. Just skip it if you don't want it?
I think it's a language thing. Maybe he meant he felt the upgrade was a ripoff?

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MrFigg
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15 Feb 2020

orthodox wrote:
15 Feb 2020
MrFigg wrote:
15 Feb 2020


What?? I don’t get it 🤣. I’m sure it’s funny man. But I don’t get it hahaha.
When someone talks about feeling ripped off without actually having been ripped off, it's a fraud. I would also be angry if I was about to buy it.
Aaa. No you misunderstood. I was more interested in why Lempface seemed so angry 😂
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