HY-Plugins

Review of HY-MBMFX3 by HY Plugins (VST3 native Linux, MX Linux, Debian 12, X11, Bitwig, Pipewire).

As one of the beta testers for HY-MBMFX3, I had the chance to see it grow and refine into a solid, highly creative multi-effect tool. HY's developer was always responsive, open to feedback, and quick to address bugs or suggestions — a level of support that made the testing process smooth and productive.

MBMFX3 is a three-band multi-effect plugin, letting you split your signal into low, mid, and high bands. Each section features individual Mute, Solo, Bypass, Gain, and Mix controls, which provide precise control over the tonal balance and processing depth. The sound quality across the board is excellent — the effects feel clean, responsive, and well-calibrated for both subtle mixing enhancements and more experimental sound work.

Each band can load from a diverse selection of effects (41 FX), including Delay, Reverb, Filter, Distortion, Chorus, and buffer-style effects such as Repeat and Reverse, which are especially fun for glitchy or stutter-like sound manipulation. These additions make it easy to add motion and character to even simple signals.

The modulation system is another strong point. You can assign multiple modulation sources — like LFOs, Envelope Followers, Step Sequencers, Random Generators, XY and a MIDI Modulator — to nearly any parameter. Each mod destination offers an individual depth control for fine-tuning the modulation intensity. The 2D-LFO provides six XY-shaped waveforms for more complex XY transformations. Combined with up to eight macro knobs, it's straightforward to build deep, multi-parameter modulation patches that respond dynamically in performance or automation.

Despite its complexity, the interface feels structured and intuitive. Each control is logically placed, and you can easily follow your modulation routings and signal flow, making creative experimentation both accessible and rewarding.

HY-MBMFX3 stands out as a flexible, high-quality effect suite that encourages exploration without overwhelming the workflow. It's a polished, versatile tool that can handle anything from subtle tone sculpting to deeply modulated sound design.

A solid 5 out of 5 stars — highly recommended for producers and sound designers who enjoy modular-style control and creative FX possibilities and Linux Users.

appendix:

• minor lagging when i open the plugin, the GUI is loading a bit slow, what could be related to Linux x11.
• it is possible that version 1.0.2.2 is available later.
• there is a free version.
• translated and polished by an AI.

I am having a lot of fun with this generative MIDI plugin. The developer has been very helpful and responsive to my questions about MIDI routing, and I'm very happy with my purchase. There are multiple modulation sources and destinations, scale lock, etc. I really can't think of any features that I would add to the Euclidean sequencer! I probably would have sold it by itself, but in this plugin, the developer gives you an entirely second, grid-based sequencer as well (there is a toggle switch to choose which sequencer you want to use). I almost feel this was unnecessary and overkill for the developer. In future revisions of the Euclidean sequencer, it would be great if there were different skins and better graphics for a less-busy/intimidating looking GUI. There are three different layouts for the Euclidean sequencer, and this was confusing to me at first. I didn't know if each one provided a different function. But, they are simply different layouts for your preference. This also seems like a lot of extra work that was unnecessary for the developer. Personally, I would just stick with the default view (large orbital graphic).

This thing is excellent. I've tried dozens of gate sequencers (triggergates, trancegates etc), both paid and free, and this thing probably has the best combination of power, flexibility and ease of use I've ever seen. It has a mix knob (believe it or not, some don't!), a full ADSR (some have just AR), the ability to set the number of steps from 1 to 32 (many just have a small number of options, like 4, 8, 16 - many just have 16 by default with no option for anything else), the ability to set the number of pulses from 1 to 32 (number of pulses has to be lower than number of steps), and also a reset count that can be set from anything between 1 and 1,024, which is completely amazing. With the wide options available for step count, pulse count, and reset count, you can make some very intricate patterns, anything from really short to really really long (all the way up to 16 bars with a sixteenth note pattern, or even 32 bars if you set the step count to 32!). Use all of these things together, and set the wet / dry and attack / release values to something pretty subtle, and you could put this on a chord / pad track that would evolve subtly throughout essentially an entire track. Brilliant. You can also set the step duration to be a dotted value (16th dot, 8th dot etc), which is a pretty cool feature. Just be sure to set the reset count to a multiple of 3 (12, 24, 48 etc) if you want the pattern to regularly recur in a "normal" sounding way.

Suggestions for improvement would be:

Allow the user to set the strength / depth of pulses individually. This is something that many (probably even most) free gates already allow, so I'm not sure why they opted not to allow this. It would makes it more "fiddly" to use for the average user, but if you had to access this feature by deselecting the default, you could maintain ease of use for average users while still unleashing greater power for more advanced users.

Allow the user to select where in the sequence each individual pulse occurs. The pulse dial is great, and super easy to use, but it would be nice to be able to dive deeper. Again, you can still leave the current behavior as the default and allow advanced users to go further.

Overall, just awesome. I've been using Gatekeeper for years and it's my go-to for rhythmic gates, but with how easy and flexible HY-ESG is, I could see this supplanting Gatekeeper as my go-to for rhythmic gates.

Excellent! Five stars.

I have tested HY Slicer 2 in BETA and actively participated in the development. Unfortunately not all wishes could be considered like e.g. randomization of slices into the grid (similar to Slicer 1) or exporting the creation as audio. The slicing algo is unfortunately not very good, e.g. also one-shots are cut or it is not cut very accurately, nevertheless one can rework by hand. You can edit each individual slice in the grind again after you drop some into the Grid. There are no assignable modulations so far, this must be done externally (Bitwig is highly suitable for this). Due to the quite good control by mididata you can play your presets really complex and dynamic. The pattern can be played as long as the note is long, also there is a pattern stop via MIDI (some more options). The 5 tracks can be completely freely assigned with slices and each step can be changed by the effects matrix. Each track has 11 clocked modulation e.g. Tune, Reverse, Filter per step. Slicer 2 is incredibly flexible, you can change slices dynamically and keep the previous slices. So you can use different slices of the same sample in different patterns. You can play polymeters by the variable step length in the grid, single steps can be muted as well. The 17 built-in step effects are also rhythmically playable via a grid and can be different in each pattern, this allows very complex patterns and presets. Finally you can choose different Playback Speed in every Track in every Pattern.

greetings to Tadashi.

Cheers.

Great product and developers!Great product and developers! You can use it to do some rhythmic experiments with unexpected results.

This is a very flexible and fun sequencer. I am using it in Logic Pro and was having some trouble getting the Euclidean sequencer to send to separate tracks by MIDI channel. Shout out to Tadashi, the developer, who within 30 minutes, sent me brief notes and a link to a video to watch which had me up and running in about 10 minutes. Very straightforward. I am planning to use one instance of the sequencer for a multi-channel drum kit (Logic Drum Machine Designer Kit, or EZDrummer 3) and a second to play a stack of different synth plugins. Very excited to get into this...

Fantastic device. I would DEFO pay for a pro version of this with more features. Also would be amazing to have this updated. Great idea, real innovation. HY plugins do good stuff.

+ : easy to use.

+ : Good sounding.

+ : MIDI fx and build in fx.

+ : Low CPU usage.

+ : The price.

+ : Powerful !!!.

- : want more LFO.

- : ..... .....

HY use to make very good plugin for low price.

HY Poly is not for someone who s looking for analog sound.

Poly is a VERY good synth, usable for everybody and can cover a lot of type of sound (perc, bass, pad...).

A must have synth.