Maybe it's just me, but I find that every time I got out to the Reaktor UL these days it's hard to find a really good new ensemble that blows me away. I've found a few from time to time, but it used to be that there were some really good ones written.

Too many out there now are things that have been done before. I think I'd rather see new snaps for some of the really great ones that have been out there for years.

Anyone else think this?

once there was a guy, called HeavenInHell, i believe, who did interesting stuff

LOL! I was thinking about starting a spam-a-thon thread related to that subject in 'everything else', but my fear is that KVR would collapse under the weight!

I do agree with OP, it's somewhat fallen out of favor these days

i haven't tried much from UL lately, because i'm already overwhelmed by the love of the pets, i have to tame yet.

Agreed. As a technology gets mature, people often move on. I'm (still) just learning Reaktor, and wonder if the investment's worth it.

I think it's still quite capable of competing (sound-wise) with most modern synths/effects (look at Razor), but it needs a shot in the arm - a new release would energy the community.

Building interfaces is still clumsy - it's DIY skinning or use the very limited built-in customization; a nice starter library of widgets and panels would be good. It's well documented but deep, and some better tutorial videos, etc. might help.

In any case, I hope NI sees fit to release a major update before the community fades.

Maybe user library uploads have slowed down and out of all the ones that are added very few of them seem very worthwhile but in the past year or so I have seen the most impressive and advanced user uploads yet.

+1 for JoeCat's arguments.

I just started to dive into Reaktor and it can be fun - but you have to be the "technical guy" for that. Otherwise I do not see much future for Reaktor in the developer community.

The market is in a rapid progress, and Reaktor just did not keep pace. It has been very much the same since several years now, while we saw a huge progress in commercial (and often quite affordable) instruments and effects. Just look back 5, 7 years what was considered a "great plug-in" at that time, and how dated this stuff can look today. Simply put, there is no need for a Reaktor compressor or reverb anymore. Dito for VA synths.

Don't get me wrong, Reaktor still sounds very good, but it is simply missing the little extras.

It possibly will keep its niche as a tool for prototypes and special designs, but apart from that it seems to fade away.

It is a sad thing, because todays fast computers could run very complex esembles with ease.

"Amateur designers" don't want to hassle with the interface and prefer a good (semi-)modular VSTi for their experimental stuff. Anyone serious about DSP programming uses C++ in the end, to make the software marketable. And the ones that can't program but want to sell use Synthedit/maker.

I could only see a future for it in the community if NI supplies it with a big number of "ready made" up-to-date modules (filters, oscillators, controls, you name it), and better UI design templates; make it more like a modular synth.

"Core" is amazing stuff, but I guess that less than one percent of the users understand/need/use it.

Georg

Sorry but I don't agree at all. Some of the latest Reaktor synths such as Spark, Razor and Prism are amongst the best synths to come out in recent years. And the effects still hold their own very well, I use Spacemaster and Laserbrew for example all the time, both great reverb/effects with a capability to go further than a lot of plugin reverbs in terms of special effects.

Some recent additions to the library are also amongst the best I've seen, Herw's great modulars for example, MF Auralis by Jim Hurley, the amazing stuff made by Twisted Tools, or Aries 2 (which is outstanding) and Modulator (http://salamanderanagram.wordpress.com). You might also want to try the Gauger mod Don made (and I made the snaps for):

http://vrooom237.com/sickle/reaktor/Gaugear_Mod_v616.ens.zip

Thers is a lot of great stuff in the library. There is also still a lot of potential! Even if NI wouldn't update Reaktor anymore there would stil be a lot to discover!

One of the more recent uploads (it's been a while since I last checked the user lib though) definitely is Nod-E by Antonio Blanca: http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?id=userlibrary&L =1&type=0&ulbr=1&plview=detail&patchid=10627

Cheers
Dennis

Reaktor is still cutting edge in lots of ways for what it offers. I mean Razor is pretty much next-gen as far as synthesizers go so it clearly capable of amazing results and IMO is very much worth the price they are asking.

Throw in the fact you can build stuff like custom sequencers, live setup controllers etc and its value increases even further.

I mean it is a self-contained environment, but it still a lot to work with.

This ties in with what aMUSEd stated - there have been some fantastic Reaktor ensembles (I could probably quit my job to play with RUHR!), but less overall maybe, and less activity in the UL.

With Core, it's more complex to do innovative things with Reaktor, and you probably won't use it to make a delay effect, etc., especially with so much out there free and cheap. So maybe it's a natural progression to more intensive development.

The new stuff holds up because Reaktor hasn't fallen behind in sound capabilities.

I still don't think anything's as much fun (or sounds quite like) Newscool, and Photone and Carbon 2 are two of my favorite synths. There's still value in the beast.

Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of good stuff out there and even recently I've found a few keepers, but I just don't find them as often and they're not always as innovative as the older stuff.

There's also a few on my list of things to investigate further but I'm not as interested in some of them as I am in the old ones that I play with a lot.

Seems like there's a lot of good reasons above why things have slowed down though.

It may be that the few people that are capable of really digging in deep and experimenting with Reaktor have done all they are able or motivated to do within the current Reaktor specifications or need some new fundamental additional features to draw their curiousity again. But really, is there any chance of exhausting the fun factor of the existing ensembles?

Not really, but I iz a UL junkie...