A mild grumble+warning about IK Multimedia & Amplitube 5 Max

[Bruce]

Well…….at least they’re not Waves

 

[SwirlyMaple]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You couldn't make it up!!! Literally a month later, they've brought out AT5 Max v2 which includes all the stuff I wanted the first time round...

And the price??? 199EUR??

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!!

Think I might be done giving IK money too tbh.

@IK Multimedia Respectfully, I really do like IK’s products. They make a lot of great stuff. But please count me among those complaining here. I actually shy away from buying anything new from IK because every time I’ve bought bundles in the past, it’s felt like some kind of whack-a-mole trickery trying to figure out what *isn’t* included.

I actually quit buying any new IK stuff for several years for this reason, because your competition at Line 6, Fractal, and others never leave the consumer feeling tricked. I realize your marketing dept may not see it this way, but as one of your consumers, the proof is in the result: my mental association with IK is: “Good stuff, but buyer beware. Probably better to buy stuff from others instead.”

I’m not here to be mean or insulting, so hopefully you can just pass this up the chain as honest and constructive feedback from somebody who has spent quadruple digits on your products over the years. Buying IK stuff gives me a similar feeling as when I step into a car dealership… and that’s not a good association.

 

[paisleywookiee]

People: “man, the Helix and FM3 are expensive!”

Also People: “yeah, I’ll take all the Neural plug-ins, with a side order of Amplitube Max (twice) please!”

Suddenly, Fractal seems like a steal.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

IK Multimedia really bending the customer base over and sticking it in without lube. Great job, guys.

 

[paisleywookiee]

IK Multimedia really bending the customer base over and sticking it in without lube. Great job, guys.

You had to make it visual, didn’t ya.

 

[Orvillain]

That's usually my job!

 

[norminal]

ually quit buying any new IK stuff for several years for this reason, because your competition at Line 6, Fractal, and others never leave the consumer feeling tricked. I realize your marketing dept may not see it this way, but as one of your consumers, the proof is in the result: my mental association with IK is: “Good stuff, but buyer beware. Probably better to buy stuff from others instead.”

Go onto their website and try to figure out how to return a product for a non-warranty refund. Use their search feature even. Yep. You won’t find it.

They even make you go to their website to unsubscribe from their mailing list, unlike others who place an “unsubscribe” link at the bottom of their emails for immediate action. Their link makes you jump through hoops.

Everything this company does lies in a gray area. They are experts at threading the needle and people are quickly catching on.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

@IK Multimedia this is the type of stuff you’re going to run into, if you keep doing *****ery like this. I LOVE AmpliTube 5, but it’s stuff like this that gives me pause as well.

EDIT

Goddamnit, yeah it happened to me too. I bought AmpliTube 5 Max a few months ago, THEN had to buy Mesa/Boogie 2, and now it’s f*****g included. Jesus Christ, guys. Are you TRYING to become Positive Grid?

Positive Grid still exists? I thought the baby Fractal had been passed up for the much more worthy brands at this point (Kemper, Fractal, Line 6, and heck, even Boss to some extent).

 

[Rocco Crocco]

Even navigating their website is a pain in the a$$.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

You had to make it visual, didn’t ya.

It's the the skeumorphic UI that keeps people lovin' Amplitube!!

 

[Stone]

Having had a Helix and now Fractal FM9, i would not see any point for plugins, now would i even know what to do with them
or why use them

 

[paisleywookiee]

Having had a Helix and now Fractal FM9, i would not see any point for plugins, now would i even know what to do with them
or why use them

I use Helix Native quite a bit, which is one price for a Helix in your computer and that’s it.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

Having had a Helix and now Fractal FM9, i would not see any point for plugins, now would i even know what to do with them
or why use them

IK product is great and very useful. It's the licensing structures that suck.

 

[pipelineaudio]

Having had a Helix and now Fractal FM9, i would not see any point for plugins, now would i even know what to do with them
or why use them

When you are mixing and want to run several at once in realtime without your customers waiting for you to bounce them in realtime one at a time.

It actually seems silly that fractal doesn't have a plugin the way helix does. headrush sort of does

 

[Sascha Franck]

It actually seems silly that fractal doesn't have a plugin the way helix does. headrush sort of does

Huh? There's a Headrush plugin?

 

[MirrorProfiles]

Huh? There's a Headrush plugin?

guessing he means revalver and eleven, which were both quite good when released but both were essentially abandonware before headrush scooped up the remains. Not sure if they’ve been updated and modernised (presumably they have had some work).

 

[laxu]

People: “man, the Helix and FM3 are expensive!”

Also People: “yeah, I’ll take all the Neural plug-ins, with a side order of Amplitube Max (twice) please!”

Suddenly, Fractal seems like a steal.

Looking at what my Strymon pedalboard and everything else to run it costs, my Axe-Fx 3 is a steal. But of course bought one by one over time it doesn't feel so expensive.

I mentioned early on in this thread that IK would do well to revise their naming scheme. "Max" implies "all inclusive" when it might not be the case. "Max v2" just makes it weird.

My beef with IK product lineup is that I feel like I have to become an expert on their product lineup to understand what is included, what is not and how the limitations actually impact me. Or to figure out if some hardware + software bundle ends up being cheaper than buying just the software. Having to look at some massive feature comparison list doesn't help either when you might not even understand what most of the items mean.

Most of their packages are priced so that it makes more sense to buy some Max package than just what you really wanted - which is a sales tactic that leaves a bad taste in the mouth since you feel like you are deliberately pushed to buy the more expensive thing.

As for upgrades, $199 for upgrading to to Max v2 sounds like an awful deal for current Max v1 owners. The way to do this sort of stuff is "if you bought this within 1-2 months, you are automatically upgraded to v2 for free" and "would you like to upgrade your old Max to v2? We have a special <low price> to do so"

As an example, I haven't upgraded my ML Sound Lab MIKKO cab sim plugin to the v2 version because the 25% off for old users wasn't a good enough deal considering I've spent a good amount of money on additional cabs for v1 and mainly wanted the new UI rather than more cabs. I feel old users should be treated as "we won't get a lot of money from them to upgrade but it's better to retain them as fans of the product because they will recommend it to others."

 

[Orvillain]

My beef with IK product lineup is that I feel like I have to become an expert on their product lineup to understand what is included, what is not and how the limitations actually impact me. Or to figure out if some hardware + software bundle ends up being cheaper than buying just the software. Having to look at some massive feature comparison list doesn't help either when you might not even understand what most of the items mean.

This isn't really accurate.

They simply don't give you the information in the right places. It isn't a case of needing to be an expert. It's that they deliberately lie by omission.

I posted a link earlier in the thread saying "this page should say what is offered and what isn't" and Peter basically put the blame on marketing and said they wouldn't go for it. Which, if true, is a pretty myopic attitude for them to take.

This whole thing has stuck in my craw the entire night, and is still pissing me off. I'm done with IK.

 

[Sascha Franck]

The thing actually confusing me the most is that I don't think they're trying to rip customers off too badly. Sure, some parts of their decisions point into a "let's see whether we can gain a little more profit here" direction, but I wouldn't even bet on that.
What I happen to think is that they really have no clue about proper, stringent marketing. Add to this the ongoing horror of anything related to software management and they can have attractive products all day long - I still won't be interested.
And they don't seem to be willing to learn at all, either. Let's face it, pretty much everybody who has ever dealt with IK software management during the last 2 decades, will clearly know about whatever issue it might be. Sometimes it's just the sum of several smaller annoyances, sometimes it's got *WTF?" written all over it and sometimes it's both in the most effective combination.
It's almost as if they made a habit out of "Let's release this killer product but let's make sure it's not easy to deal with!"

 

[James Freeman]

I hate deceitful marketing and value manipulation with passion.
If the target customers are guitarists it ALWAYS backfires and leaves a bad public perception that lasts for years.
Don't they fucking learn?

*This post is not specific to IK.