Reason+ from a developer point of view

This forum is for developers of Rack Extensions to discuss the RE SDK, share code, and offer tips to other developers.
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pongasoft
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28 Jan 2021

Since the "main" thread is up to 67 pages long, it is hard to follow and have a constructive discussion. So I wanted to start a thread specifically for developers and get their opinion/point of view.

So I guess I am going to start:

* the announcement of Reason Hi Res is by far the thing that is exciting me a lot since this is something that we have been begging for so long (timeline still unclear but at least it is official it is coming...)

* in terms of Reason+ I am very worried for the impact on REs. I think for the people who stick to the full purchase price it probably won't change much. For newcomers that are going to shell $20 a month for the full Reason and 70+ devices built-in, it is going to be very hard for them to shell more money to buy REs that yes they own, but they become useless the day they stop paying for the subscription although they have bought and paid full price for them.

I can imagine a few avenues that in my mind could alleviate the concerns and help Reason+ subscribers buy REs:

* this is something I have already talked about and reiterate here: release a FREE version of RRP which contains nothing but the rack (and a mixer). That way the RE you have purchased have a chance to be usable if you cancel your subscription and decide to go with another DAW (like if you had bought a VST plugin...)
* if you have subscribed for "long" enough (example, paid for a full year) you should be able to fall back to the latest version of Reason Studio (and fine if you don't get all the 70+ REs that come with it but just the ones that would be included in a non subscription version). For example, I subscribe to Jetbrains toolbox yearly for their IDEs (~$140 a year), and if I stop my subscription, I automatically get a license for the last version of all their tools that was released before my subscription expires. Again that way, the REs you have purchased are still usable even if you cancel your subscription.
* somewhat a mix of both: if you cancel your subscription, you get a license to use RRP only, that way your REs are still valid
* release Reason++ which contains Reason+ and ALL REs (for a higher price obviously) and find a way to pay the developer a fair share... that way you never buy any REs nor Reason, you just lease all of it..

I would appreciate if only developers would chime in and please don't turn it into a flaming war...

Yan

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Billy+
Posts: 4157
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28 Jan 2021

I'm not a developer, but totally agree with the problem.
I was considering development and am registered, just not published.

If your subscription stops so does Reason and for me that makes buy extras pointless unless they really need it for a project that is ultimately going to return a revenue.

I can't see any causal user buying anything extra, I just can't.

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Billy+
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28 Jan 2021

This is not going to help https://help.reasonstudios.com/hc/en-us ... -the-Shop-

And it's berried in the support section
IMG_2459.PNG
IMG_2459.PNG (190.13 KiB) Viewed 22727 times

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nickb523
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28 Jan 2021

I made this post to my beta testers this morning -
So, i'm not normally in the tin-foil hat brigade but it's unfortunately looking very much like RS are phasing out third party content and focusing fully on the RRP.

Third party RE's are now replaced with all you can eat RS RE's and ReFills are getting killed off with the sound packs. They are wanting that 30-50% royalty for themselves by replacing all of our products with their own, either that, or they are going to assimilate existing third party products into the sub and pay us Spotify money.

I was all for the subscription model until I woke up yesterday morning to find out that us devs are apparently not part of the plan. Third party products aren't mentioned anywhere on the new website and the shop has been relegated to the last entry in the site footer.

I really, really hope i'm wrong but that is exactly how things are looking right now.
That's my 2p. Until yesterday morning I was making a modest living from sound design and RE development which has now completely changed overnight. Needless to say I'm really upset. I now have to weight up my options and figure a way off this sinking ship as I need to pay the bills.

Apologies for the negativity. I'm not exactly feeling very chipper about it. :?

Nick

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buddard
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29 Jan 2021

I'm guessing you all received the email about them being "committed to a thorough exploration as Reason+ gets off the ground"?
Which I guess can interpreted as that there is no imminent solution to this issue, other than "we'll see"...

DecafDreams
Posts: 159
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29 Jan 2021

Billy+ wrote:
28 Jan 2021
This is not going to help https://help.reasonstudios.com/hc/en-us ... -the-Shop-

And it's berried in the support section

IMG_2459.PNG
I think the reason for this is that their backend doesn't support it. A Reason+ license isn't really a license like the traditional way their backend works. A Reason+ license is like a perpetual 30 day trial with login only support that you keep paying £20 to top up and stay in the trial.

Having said that, the old Reason 30 day trial actually let you trial all REs in the shop...

I think they've really fukcked up with this new strategy for their flagship product...

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buddard
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29 Jan 2021

DecafDreams wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Billy+ wrote:
28 Jan 2021
This is not going to help https://help.reasonstudios.com/hc/en-us ... -the-Shop-

And it's berried in the support section

IMG_2459.PNG
I think the reason for this is that their backend doesn't support it. A Reason+ license isn't really a license like the traditional way their backend works. A Reason+ license is like a perpetual 30 day trial with login only support that you keep paying £20 to top up and stay in the trial.
Except that it’s already working for their own REs, apparently...

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Auryn
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29 Jan 2021

So I just develop refills, not re's, but I'm also pretty pessimistic about this. I already noticed a pretty big downturn in how many people were discovering or stumbling upon my refills after the last shop update. Now that's going to be even slimmer pickings. I'm not opposed to them offering some kind of subscription service, but the way this is implemented and marketed is just a low point for Reason Studios as far as I'm concerned. How the hell are developers not supposed to feel shafted by this move? What were they thinking (other than NEED MOAR MONEH)?
~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-
Quixotic Sound Design: http://www.quixoticsounddesign.com
Europandemonium Refill: https://gumroad.com/l/YxIGB

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nickb523
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29 Jan 2021

buddard wrote:
29 Jan 2021
I'm guessing you all received the email about them being "committed to a thorough exploration as Reason+ gets off the ground"?
Which I guess can interpreted as that there is no imminent solution to this issue, other than "we'll see"...
Yes, but it was received after the shit hit the fan at 16:31pm on Judgement Day. Which was nice of them but I would have preferred a heads up 6 months ago. I also noticed that any discussion of third party products in Reason+ was prefixed with "no promises".

They did indeed say that the shop is coming back as a streamlined Reason focused "Addon Store" but there is no timescale on that, which again, I'm sure we all could have done with that information 6 bloody months ago so we could prepare for the fact that our income has now pretty much stopped for the foreseeable future.

Giving RS the benefit of the doubt, I really hope this all this mismanagement is down to Covid-19 causing office issues and not a calculated plan to get us third parties out of the equation. I'd really like this clarified properly sooner rather than later so I can plan for the future.

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buddard
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29 Jan 2021

nickb523 wrote:
29 Jan 2021
buddard wrote:
29 Jan 2021
I'm guessing you all received the email about them being "committed to a thorough exploration as Reason+ gets off the ground"?
Which I guess can interpreted as that there is no imminent solution to this issue, other than "we'll see"...
Yes, but it was received after the shit hit the fan at 16:31pm on Judgement Day. Which was nice of them but I would have preferred a heads up 6 months ago. I also noticed that any discussion of third party products in Reason+ was prefixed with "no promises".

They did indeed say that the shop is coming back as a streamlined Reason focused "Addon Store" but there is no timescale on that, which again, I'm sure we all could have done with that information 6 bloody months ago so we could prepare for the fact that our income has now pretty much stopped for the foreseeable future.
Oh, I definitely agree!

When VST support was coming they let us know 4-5 months in advance, so I was really taken by surprise when the Reason+ announcement arrived since it will have a so much bigger impact for us.
And the more I'm learning about Reason+, the more problematic it seems for 3rd parties...

In light of this we will double down on VST/AU/AAX development for the time being, we'll see if we return to making REs further down the road. It just seems like a waste of time right now. :(

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QVprod
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29 Jan 2021

Anyone who is a refill maker, I’d recommend considering becoming a Pack creator. I am one. They’re looking for more creators. Not sure how much people were making off of discovery sales in the shop, but it’s not a bad deal.

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nickb523
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29 Jan 2021

QVprod wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Anyone who is a refill maker, I’d recommend considering becoming a Pack creator. I am one. They’re looking for more creators. Not sure how much people were making off of discovery sales in the shop, but it’s not a bad deal.
This is another point on contention for me though a bit off topic. How do I become one of these pack creators? I've been one of the most active bespoke ReFill developers (with solid sales - ReFills are NOT dead as far as i'm concerned) for the past couple of years and no one from RS has asked me if I fancied getting onboard nor is there any online system for submission.

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QVprod
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29 Jan 2021

nickb523 wrote:
29 Jan 2021
QVprod wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Anyone who is a refill maker, I’d recommend considering becoming a Pack creator. I am one. They’re looking for more creators. Not sure how much people were making off of discovery sales in the shop, but it’s not a bad deal.
This is another point on contention for me though a bit off topic. How do I become one of these pack creators? I've been one of the most active bespoke ReFill developers (with solid sales - ReFills are NOT dead as far as i'm concerned) for the past couple of years and no one from RS has asked me if I fancied getting onboard nor is there any online system for submission.
Send James Pember a PM on here. He’s the man in charge.

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Auryn
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29 Jan 2021

nickb523 wrote:
29 Jan 2021
This is another point on contention for me though a bit off topic. How do I become one of these pack creators? I've been one of the most active bespoke ReFill developers (with solid sales - ReFills are NOT dead as far as i'm concerned) for the past couple of years and no one from RS has asked me if I fancied getting onboard nor is there any online system for submission.
None here either. I haven't been as active as you, but generally I've had good dealings/collaborations with RE developers. Never with RS themselves though.
~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-
Quixotic Sound Design: http://www.quixoticsounddesign.com
Europandemonium Refill: https://gumroad.com/l/YxIGB

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nickb523
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29 Jan 2021

Auryn wrote:
29 Jan 2021
None here either. I haven't been as active as you, but generally I've had good dealings/collaborations with RE developers. Never with RS themselves though.
QVprod wrote:
29 Jan 2021

Send James Pember a PM on here. He’s the man in charge.
Getting back on the topic I think that this interaction highlights perfectly how us third parties feel neglected. All RS needed to do to find soundpack contributors was to check the accounts and see who is an active ReFill dev with decent sales and bit of character of their own (ie the people users would actually want free packs from!) - Auryn and myself have to be quite high up that list, but in order to even be considered we are expected to hang around in the forums or discord begging for inclusion despite being the very people who are making the company actual real money from soundware.

You see the issue? It's very frustrating. If they had simply asked me I would have been honoured to contribute a few packs to see how it all goes. Instead we are shunned. :?

DecafDreams
Posts: 159
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29 Jan 2021

buddard wrote:
29 Jan 2021
DecafDreams wrote:
29 Jan 2021


I think the reason for this is that their backend doesn't support it. A Reason+ license isn't really a license like the traditional way their backend works. A Reason+ license is like a perpetual 30 day trial with login only support that you keep paying £20 to top up and stay in the trial.
Except that it’s already working for their own REs, apparently...
I think they've just made the Reason+ versions of their own REs declassified, so they can always be installed and they aren't tied to the old licensing model. Kind of like the embedded REs like Europa and BeatMap have worked within the reason app in the past. It seems like they don't check the CodeMeter licensing. It doesn't look like the Companion app even checks any kind of file based license at all; I guess it wouldn't need to as if you're logged into it then you clearly will have a Reason+ account and thus will be covered to uninstall and reinstall these new Reason+ compatible versions of the Props REs as you see fit...

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QVprod
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29 Jan 2021

nickb523 wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Auryn wrote:
29 Jan 2021
None here either. I haven't been as active as you, but generally I've had good dealings/collaborations with RE developers. Never with RS themselves though.
QVprod wrote:
29 Jan 2021

Send James Pember a PM on here. He’s the man in charge.
Getting back on the topic I think that this interaction highlights perfectly how us third parties feel neglected. All RS needed to do to find soundpack contributors was to check the accounts and see who is an active ReFill dev with decent sales and bit of character of their own (ie the people users would actually want free packs from!) - Auryn and myself have to be quite high up that list, but in order to even be considered we are expected to hang around in the forums or discord begging for inclusion despite being the very people who are making the company actual real money from soundware.

You see the issue? It's very frustrating. If they had simply asked me I would have been honoured to contribute a few packs to see how it all goes. Instead we are shunned. :?
Frustration understood. They did do this to some degree. There are other known refill makers that have made many of the packs. Something to note though, this was operated separately from other Reason operations and kept pretty small before expanding later. James, being new, may have just wanted to keep things manageable from that standpoint.

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joeyluck
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29 Jan 2021

nickb523 wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Auryn wrote:
29 Jan 2021
None here either. I haven't been as active as you, but generally I've had good dealings/collaborations with RE developers. Never with RS themselves though.
QVprod wrote:
29 Jan 2021

Send James Pember a PM on here. He’s the man in charge.
Getting back on the topic I think that this interaction highlights perfectly how us third parties feel neglected. All RS needed to do to find soundpack contributors was to check the accounts and see who is an active ReFill dev with decent sales and bit of character of their own (ie the people users would actually want free packs from!) - Auryn and myself have to be quite high up that list, but in order to even be considered we are expected to hang around in the forums or discord begging for inclusion despite being the very people who are making the company actual real money from soundware.

You see the issue? It's very frustrating. If they had simply asked me I would have been honoured to contribute a few packs to see how it all goes. Instead we are shunned. :?
I understand the feeling, but I wouldn't think of it like that. They have been working with a selection of pack designers to get R+ off the ground. They actually also asked testers for suggestions as well.

Maybe they'll do an announcement of some sort or reach out out at some point... But it's simply very early—it is day 2 of R+ release. They very likely have a good amount of content planned for the near future. And this isn't like we are seeing names we don't know as patch creators. These are familiar names.

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Auryn
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29 Jan 2021

joeyluck wrote:
29 Jan 2021
I understand the feeling, but I wouldn't think of it like that. They have been working with a selection of pack designers to get R+ off the ground. They actually also asked testers for suggestions as well.

Maybe they'll do an announcement of some sort or reach out out at some point... But it's simply very early—it is day 2 of R+ release. They very likely have a good amount of content planned for the near future. And this isn't like we are seeing names we don't know as patch creators. These are familiar names.
Maybe maybe... I've never had any steady line of communication with RS outside of the bare necessities so I'm certainly not betting on it. You are right they are familiar names, the same people they always work with, while selectively ignoring the rest :| I don't begrudge those other patch designers their work/income, but it really feels like we're left out in the cold by these developments.
~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-~-.-
Quixotic Sound Design: http://www.quixoticsounddesign.com
Europandemonium Refill: https://gumroad.com/l/YxIGB

jamespember
Reason Studios
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Joined: 05 Feb 2020

29 Jan 2021

Auryn wrote:
29 Jan 2021
joeyluck wrote:
29 Jan 2021
I understand the feeling, but I wouldn't think of it like that. They have been working with a selection of pack designers to get R+ off the ground. They actually also asked testers for suggestions as well.

Maybe they'll do an announcement of some sort or reach out out at some point... But it's simply very early—it is day 2 of R+ release. They very likely have a good amount of content planned for the near future. And this isn't like we are seeing names we don't know as patch creators. These are familiar names.
Maybe maybe... I've never had any steady line of communication with RS outside of the bare necessities so I'm certainly not betting on it. You are right they are familiar names, the same people they always work with, while selectively ignoring the rest :| I don't begrudge those other patch designers their work/income, but it really feels like we're left out in the cold by these developments.
Hi there! James here. I can assure you we haven't intended to shun anyone and I apologise if it came off that way. We've worked with a very small group (2-3) of creators during the beta so we could iterate on the Pack concept (it has evolved a few times over the past few months) before launch.

DM me and let's setup a time to chat next week. Would be keen to share more details about Pack development and the business model etc.

Have a great weekend!

jamespember
Reason Studios
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Joined: 05 Feb 2020

29 Jan 2021

Auryn wrote:
29 Jan 2021
So I just develop refills, not re's, but I'm also pretty pessimistic about this. I already noticed a pretty big downturn in how many people were discovering or stumbling upon my refills after the last shop update. Now that's going to be even slimmer pickings. I'm not opposed to them offering some kind of subscription service, but the way this is implemented and marketed is just a low point for Reason Studios as far as I'm concerned. How the hell are developers not supposed to feel shafted by this move? What were they thinking (other than NEED MOAR MONEH)?
If I may add a little perspective here. I spoke a little about this on the stream, but I think Reason+ Sound Packs are a really compelling biz opportunity for you as a Refill developer. It's far less risky for developers (we don't have to rely on people buying them) and allows developers to focus more on quality over quantity. I hope I was clear on the stream that if you want to be involved in Reason+ Pack development, please reach out to me. DM me and we'll talk!

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Billy+
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29 Jan 2021

jamespember wrote:
29 Jan 2021
If I may add a little perspective here. I spoke a little about this on the stream, but I think Reason+ Sound Packs are a really compelling biz opportunity for you as a Refill developer. It's far less risky for developers (we don't have to rely on people buying them) and allows developers to focus more on quality over quantity. I hope I was clear on the stream that if you want to be involved in Reason+ Pack development, please reach out to me. DM me and we'll talk!
As someone interested in the creation of Refills this sounds promising but after spending several days potentially developing a collection what revenue could I expect in return from Reason Studios.

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Loque
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29 Jan 2021

Billy+ wrote:
29 Jan 2021
jamespember wrote:
29 Jan 2021
If I may add a little perspective here. I spoke a little about this on the stream, but I think Reason+ Sound Packs are a really compelling biz opportunity for you as a Refill developer. It's far less risky for developers (we don't have to rely on people buying them) and allows developers to focus more on quality over quantity. I hope I was clear on the stream that if you want to be involved in Reason+ Pack development, please reach out to me. DM me and we'll talk!
As someone interested in the creation of Refills this sounds promising but after spending several days potentially developing a collection what revenue could I expect in return from Reason Studios.
If you are really interested, you should ask James private, so DM him. I mean, if you are REALLY interested in providing content.
Reason12, Win10

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Billy+
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29 Jan 2021

Loque wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Billy+ wrote:
29 Jan 2021


As someone interested in the creation of Refills this sounds promising but after spending several days potentially developing a collection what revenue could I expect in return from Reason Studios.
If you are really interested, you should ask James private, so DM him. I mean, if you are REALLY interested in providing content.
I understand the need for privacy, but I think it might be valuable to all to see open honest discussions.

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joeyluck
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29 Jan 2021

Billy+ wrote:
29 Jan 2021
Loque wrote:
29 Jan 2021

If you are really interested, you should ask James private, so DM him. I mean, if you are REALLY interested in providing content.
I understand the need for privacy, but I think it might be valuable to all to see open honest discussions.
They get paid for their work upfront. That is one of the things that makes it great. What is your question?

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