E-Phonic Invader 2 v1.0.11 (WIN / OSX)

[steb_osc]

If you love the core sound of any synth why wouldn't you want to expand the range of sounds it can make? As just one example wouldn't you like to be able to route the Oscs through their own Filters instead of both through the same filter? I can already think of patches I would make if this feature were added and so on. I could easily find uses for more Oscs, more FX etc etc...

Once again I would be more than willing to purchase an Invader Pro version because I really do enjoy the core sound.

I totally agree

[Vortifex]

Edited

[Teksonik]

Can we get a new version of Drumatic before we go all "Invader Pro?"

Well since I don't own Drumatic at least yet obviously my vote would go towards Invader Pro but any progress is progress so wherever development goes gets my support.

[Teksonik]

Invader 2 certainly has a high quality sound but its range of sounds is too limited in my opinion.

I don't agree that it's too limited. It's a VA so obviously it's not going to be able to do everything, but with the sync and ringmod it's plenty capable of making a wide range of interesting and usable sounds.

Then we have a very different definition of "limited" and "wide range".

For just one example I would love to be able to route Osc1 through one filter and Osc2 through another filter each with their own envelopes and of course more Oscs, FX, etc etc would be welcome.

It succeeds at what it's meant to be, a simple great sounding synth.

Sure it does but wouldn't it succeed even more if it wasn't simple? We both agree it sounds great we just disagree on whether the range of sounds it can make should be expanded.

I hope the range is expanded since I've owned simple synths since the 1980's and after a few decades they begin to get a little boring.

Of course E-Phonic is driving the bus and he decides on what direction it goes. If he decides it should remain a "simple great sounding synth" then at that point I'll jump off the bus and hope everyone else has a pleasant journey.

All I can say is I would be a customer for a more advanced synth from E-Phonic. Whether it happens or not is out of my control but I wish him success no matter what the future holds.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

My big wishlist items for the current state Invader 2 would be:

1. MIDI Learn.
2. Slop - on a per-voice basis, would loosen up envelope timing, filter freq, res depth, env depth, tuning. Could be a single macro knob or maybe Filter Slop, Env Slop, Tun Slop.
3. Key-tracking on LFO1 - for more Prophet-5 style Polymod.

...I think the latter 2 would require a rewrite of the voice engine, so if there were to be an Invader Pro, then maybe that's where they could go.

[e-crooner]

My big wishlist items for the current state Invader 2 would be:

1. MIDI Learn.
2. Slop - on a per-voice basis, would loosen up envelope timing, filter freq, res depth, env depth, tuning. Could be a single macro knob or maybe Filter Slop, Env Slop, Tun Slop.
3. Key-tracking on LFO1 - for more Prophet-5 style Polymod.

...I think the latter 2 would require a rewrite of the voice engine, so if there were to be an Invader Pro, then maybe that's where they could go.

Please no slop in Invader 2

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

Please no slop in Invader 2

That's the nice thing about having the ability to set levels for the slop. You can keep none, and I could have some. Win-win!

[e-phonic]

Invader 2 certainly has a high quality sound but its range of sounds is too limited in my opinion.

I fully understand that it might not be for everyone. It depends on what you are looking for. Invader was always meant to be an easy to use / understand classic VA style synthesizer. I purposely kept away from complexity like modulation matrices, layers, routing, multi page UI's.
It's fairly easy to think of a 1000 more features that could be added, but the current features are carefully chosen to give a lot of range for the amount of knobs

I might create the mother ship one day

2. Slop - on a per-voice basis, would loosen up envelope timing, filter freq, res depth, env depth, tuning. Could be a single macro knob or maybe Filter Slop, Env Slop, Tun Slop.

The drift feature already affects the oscillators tuning and filter cutoff per voice. I might tweak this to add more later.

[BONES]

This is just one example in one synth....

But it's not the synth we are talking about here, so I fail to see your point. But I'm sure whatever synth that is also allows you to add modulation from whatever note you play, which means it will work just as well with an external arpeggiator. So it still doesn't make your point.

Your problem has always been that you are incapable of understanding that your reality isn't reality for everyone else.

There is only one reality and I understand it intimately. That you think that everyone can have their own reality just shows how far gone you are.

Your way of working is in no way superior to the way other people work. You will simply never understand that fact.

Of course it is because if I see someone else working in a better way than I do, then I start working in that way. My way of doing things is built on seeing what works and incorporating it into what I do over 40 years, as opposed to trying to force everything to work the way you arbitrarily decide it should, to make it fit into your distorted view of reality. (That's a general "your", not necessarily aimed at you , personally.)

Once again you fail to understand that not everyone is as talented or clever as you are.

There, fixed another one for you. And it's true, I do tend to forget how limited normal people are.

Are you trying to tell me talented people like Kevin Schroeder who has done sound design for major motion pictures can't also make great music? Sound designer is in the credits of almost every movie.

Yes, hence the term "misappropriated". Because a sound designer in film isn't someone who sits down and makes patches for synths, it's the team who do all the sound effects - foley and all the rest of it - that makes a film sound the way we expect it to. I've never heard any of Kevin Schroeder's music so I have no idea how talented he is. I do know that I don't find his presets very useful most of the time.

You can't understand anything that's outside of your little box. I use built in Arps all the time. The fact that you don't is irrelevant. The salient point is having an onboard Arp allows me and others use it all the while allowing you to simply ignore it....win win.

No, the salient point is that they are far more limited than the tools available to you every time you load a VSTi into a host application., It's duplication of effort for no benefit, beyond the marketing opportunities it presents to show off the factory patches.

That's the problem, your definition of "complex" it far too primitive, too simple, too unrefined.

Is it? So, oh great one, where are all the truly complex timbres you've made for DUNE? Your problem is you see a patch as an end in itself, something that should stand alone. Those kinds of patches are useless for people who actually use them in songs, which is what synthesisers exist for. I'll go through a few factory patches to get a feel for an instrument but the real test is always when I try to put it into a mix and that's where the vast majority of factory presets, in the vast majority of synths, fall down. They just aren't made with their true end purpose in mind. And I'm not immune from falling into that trap. e.g. When we were doing the Obsession beta, I made a nice patch with Hard Sync generated/modulated by both an envelope and and LFO. It sounds terrific on its own but when I tried to use it in a Stranglers' song the other night, it was way too busy and it distracted from the song. I had to get rid of the LFO modulation to make it fit into the mix. That sort of stuff happens all the time and it's the chief reason I don't like working with DUNE - I spend so much time going through a DUNE patch to switch off all the things that stop it working in a mix that it's easier to go and find something else, where getting to the stuff and turning it off is a lot less hassle or, Dog forbid, making my own patch from scratch.

I was talking with Rich (Synapse) the other night and he said he can spend a whole day on a single patch, which surprised me because I never spend more than about 10 minutes. It shouldn't have surprised me, though, because Rich makes some very good patches that often sound great on their own, yet are usable in a mix right out of the box. His Carpet Bass patch in Legend is a good example.

It's not possible to get the same complexity out of a simple 2 Osc VA synth as a competent user could get out of more complex synths with Wavetable, Multi-Sample, FM, etc forms of synthesis or VA synths with more features.

Well of course not. But the thing is, it needs to be usable complexity, not complexity for it's own sake. Complexity with a purpose, if you like, and I can get that out of something as simple as Uno Synth if I want to. In fact, there is a part I play in one of our songs that requires a long, evolving lead/pad kind of sound and there is a patch in Uno that does a better job than any of the half-a-dozen complex synths that I have tried over the years. I had been using aftertouch to put some extra movement into the sound I'd settled on (Pigments was the latest thing I'd tried) but Uno does a better job all on it's own, thorough a combination of nicely detuned oscillators and a well modulated high-pass filter. I can't even get Uno Pro to do it better. It's just a sweet spot and it works. Those are the things I seek when I am pathing synths - the sound that you can't possibly believe is coming out of whatever it is you're using. (That Uno patch is not one of mine.)

The synths that always work best for me are the ones with lots of sweet spots, not the ones with lots of options. And Invader 2 has so many sweet spots, they practically fall out of it every time you tweak a patch. Adding a million new features will just obscure that, make them harder to find.

The point would be to make allow it to compete with other synths.

How does it not compete now? What better synth can you download for $5 or less? Vital is the only one I can think of that comes close but the two instruments are very different and I can't see too many people cross-shopping them. If they were charging $149 for Invader 2 I could see your point but they aren't, so I can't.

[Teksonik]

Invader 2 certainly has a high quality sound but its range of sounds is too limited in my opinion.

I fully understand that it might not be for everyone. It depends on what you are looking for. Invader was always meant to be an easy to use / understand classic VA style synthesizer. I purposely kept away from complexity like modulation matrices, layers, routing, multi page UI's.
It's fairly easy to think of a 1000 more features that could be added, but the current features are carefully chosen to give a lot of range for the amount of knobs

Ok fair enough if that's your vision for Invader.

Seems a shame to stunt a great sounding synth just to cater to simple but it is what it is.

I might create the mother ship one day

I'll keep an eye out for the mother ship. Until then I wish you good luck.

@Bones....I have you blocked. I won't read or respond to any of your posts.

[dellboy]

Seems a shame to stunt a great sounding synth just to cater to simple but it is what it is.

Invader is not simple. If simple was easy every one would be doing it. The genius of this synth is how the dev has made it look simple,which shows how clever the dev is.

[Teksonik]

Invader is not simple. If simple was easy every one would be doing it. The genius of this synth is how the dev has made it look simple,which shows how clever the dev is.

Of course it's a very simple synth if you have the proper frame of reference. Compare it to Parawave Rapid or DUNE 3 or Zebra 2. The difference being those synths are also great sounding, can be simple but can be quite complex as well especially Rapid.

Of course the price points are different and no one expects to get complexity without the cost but still compared to other synths Invader 2 is simple. Great sounding but simple none the less.

But again I'd be a customer for a more feature rich synth with the same high quality sound at a competitive price.

Ok I'm done with this thread. I've made my point and the developer has made his. I'll keep an eye on development at E-Phonic and see what the future holds.....

[e-crooner]

Simple synths is what a lot of the great music of the 70s and 80s was made with, i.e. Minimoog, Oberheims, Junos, Jupiters, etc.

There is room for refinement, but I see no point in adding major new features. Else sooner or later all synths will offer everything, what's the point of that...

[LeVzi]

I dunno what all the flexing is here, but as regards Invader, it's a great sounding synth, and obviously for the price a no brainer.

Im one of these synth users that when looking for nothing specific, will load a synth that at the time catches my eye.

Invader fits this narrative perfectly, but the more familiar I get, it will probably fit in as a go to for xyz sounds. I said that about Saurus and Vital, now they have roles.

[yzcoruhT]

Even I don't own this plugin, in my opinion it is pretty good and also sounds good. I don't know why, but for me it is like TyrellN6 but much CPU friendlier. I'm not talking about the sound, but about layout and features. It is nice plugin, resizable, VST3, stable on WIN10 in FLStudio, but for me... there are still too much mouse clicking (for example swithing between Filters/Filter types) and other things. But I'm lazy. I like using mainly mousewheel when I shape a sound, so I still preffer u-he synths. But this one is great. Good job! Maybe is e-phonic able to make it better with more osc and features, but I like it how it is. Small, simple, easy to use, CPU friendly, stable and has really nice UI.