UJAM Releases Beatmaker 3
by The Press Desk   1 week ago

i have 6 beatmaker plugs and have spent more than $100 on them... now one can get all 10 plus the update for $99.

this update should at least be free for those with a certain amount of bm plugs.

and maybe a reasonable upgrade path to the whole collection.

i think i understand tho... as with pa and uad, it's not about loyalty anymore, but about getting new customers.

i've got a lot invested in ujam plugs at this point, and this just feels like a kick in the...

the update does look cool tho.

lol

This is what I see on their website as far as upgrading goes:

“Upgrade
Step into the new era of Beatmaker
$19.00
Upgrade all of your owned titles to Version 3
Buy and keep forever.”

So for $19, all of my current Beatmaker titles will be upgraded to version 3. That is a very good deal, in my opinion.

I see also that u can buy one new beatmaker and all ur old titles gets upgraded automatically. So I could buy k pop for 19 usd and all my other 6 beatmaker titles get upgraded.

Beatmaker 3 may be the most tremendous step backward in UI/UX I have ever experienced in a product.

1) Moving away from the standard MIDI drum layout to "white key-only" is not even remotely user-friendly. Hoping they give users the option to utilize a layout that's familiar to everyone who's ever used practically any MIDI drum-related product (like all of their customers prior to this product release).

2) Mapping was labeled clearly in V2. Now, mouseover is required to even see the mapping, and there is no option to display it permanently? This literally makes no sense for anyone, from beginner to professional.

3) Piano keys from V2 are now buttons in V3. Even if you aren't a musician, the black-and-white piano keys in V2 are easier to differentiate than the uniformly grey buttons against a black background in V3. I can't visually orient to the V3 buttons at all.

4) Labeling buttons "Fi", "Br", "En", etc., rather than typing actual words like "Fill, "Break", or "Ending" is just absurdly dedicated to minimalism over basic usability. The full words aren't even long to begin with, and there was absolutely nothing wrong with displaying them in V2.

5) Even the thinnest fonts in V2 are still readable. In V3, the fonts are thin to the point of aliasing and unreadability all over the place. The extremely thin grey text against the black background in some spots is especially bad (e.g. the footer text in the My Titles page).

6) I get what they're trying to do with the Loop Browser icon, but there is no world where a bunch of dots is representative of a loop. This is just one more example of what feels like "clever" over universally understood design.

7) Loading from the My Titles page is extremely laggy.

8) Sample preview and switching completely breaks (obviously a bug rather than a UI issue).

9) Displaying less information and fewer controls on the main page would make sense if the V2 was cluttered. But it wasn't, and the V3 UI is mostly empty, wasted space

10) Everything is SO dark. V3 is dark mode to the extreme. Looking at how all the colors of Idol now have a wash of dark grey across them is depressing, and everything in V2 is much easier and more exciting to look at.

11) For a product that's bringing multiple sample sets together, it's absurd that it launched without the ability to even mix-and-match the sounds.

I trusted this update would be fantastic, as I enjoy the Beatmaker V2 range of products, but I fully regret giving them any money for this.

thanks for the review, think i'll stick with v2 for now.

While all your complaints are extremely valid, this one is the absolute killer for me.

Other drum plugins have non-standard layouts, but many also offer a "standard" option as well (as you suggest for Beatmaker 3), and I've pretty much stopped using those that don't (that I'd gotten before I realized what a pain in the butt it is).

Now that you've pointed this out--and I'm embarrassed I didn't notice myself--there is no way I'm getting this until it's fixed / updated.

Which is a shame, because I like the Beatmaker line. But v2 is still perfectly functional for the moment, of course.

Yeah I came here to say this, the UI is terrible. I regret upgrading but too late now. I'll be sticking to the previous versions of the Beatmaker plugins.

Here are some before-and-after examples. Berserk is what loads by default for me (they should add an option to default to a particular title), and I think it's a great example of how eye-strainingly dark things get.

Whenever I do graphics-related work, I always do the "thumbnail test" to zoom out and determine whether I can generally see the main elements, if there's enough contrast, etc., similar to turning your monitors way down during mixing. In V2, your brain immediately interprets the important elements, and there's a natural order to where your eyes are directed. That is missing entirely from V3; it is visual sludge.

And here is the musically same thing mapped in V2 vs. V3. Also, the presets don't always sound the same between V2 and V3. Have fun with that.

thx alex!

appreciate the info.

at this point, i'm a bit disappointed in ujam... as everything previous to this seems to be pretty decent in the ui department.

maybe they hired a new guy and gave him the keys. lol

it'll be interesting to see what they do about this... if anything.

Wow this is pretty eye opening about what Ujam have changed and how it has messed with usability.
I was reading the product web page the other day and it took a while to understand just buying the new Chrome BM would upgrade every previously owned kit. Should have been more obvious IMO.

I think I also read that they have changed the drum kits keys layout and they say that will be used for all BMs going forward. They said they have done extensive interviews and testing/research and they decided this was the way to go.
I completely missed that in the previous versions drums were mapped to the typical midi drum mappings.

Personally I loved the look of the V2 interfaces, but apart from the slight bugs/issues with presets/sounds not continually playing during previews I like having all the BMs in one interface so it’s swings and roundabouts at the mo.

Changing midi note assignment kills backward compatibility and giving beatmaker version 3 titles that are incomplete midi files and not consistent with version 2 titles make this upgrade not worth the 19 dollar upgrade price. I simply can’t use this, sticking with version 2 titles. Great idea poorly executed, very disappointing.

Sad to see the UI/UX falling below standards. Waiting for an update that adresses this issue before I can upgrade.

If they had at least given the option to keep the original midi mapping in version 3 this upgrade would be useable for longtime customers such as myself. As is, it makes no sense to use version 3 because there’s no workflow advantage if version 2 titles midi can’t be used in the version 3 app without editing. I don’t understand breaking compatibility and forcing the use of two or more apps.
Also they say all midi files are included in version 3 titles but trying to find them is definitely a workflow killer.

Yeah there are definitely midi patterns missing in v3. There used to be multiple variations for verse, chorus, fills, endings, etc. but in v3 there are only one or two variations of each. That along with the poorly designed and laggy UI make me regret purchasing the upgrade. Luckily all my v2 plugins still work after being "upgraded" to v3.

I was playing with a trial of V3 the other day. There are still multiples of different song parts, but you have to go into the loop browser to see them. You can then load different ones onto the keymaps.

I like having more than one library available at a time (would really like this with their Virtual Drummer plugins too) but I did find it a bit clunky overall. Not sure yet how to pull a MIDI part from one library to use with another kit, or mix kit elements for example.

And the mapping not being backwards compatible is a problem. Hopefully they'll address it in an update.

When the product launched, I assumed this was the spotlight feature, but it's actually not a feature at all.

[QUOTE=stew 71;17470653]I was playing with a trial of V3 the other day. There are still multiples of different song parts, but you have to go into the loop browser to see them. You can then load different ones onto the keymaps.

That’s a step backwards to me from having them all laid out in front of you to easily audition. It breaks my workflow and wastes time for me.
I hope they bring back the version 2 keymap at least as an option for compatibility with version 2 titles. Hopefully an update will address these concerns.
I like the version 3 update and think it great, but breaking backward compatibility seems just fundamentally wrong if they want to keep previous customers in the loop by considering how we’re already using the product.

Saw a video yesterday where mix and match of the sounds was possible.

That's not what's happening there. That's a sound selection within the title he's using, not a selection from multiple titles.

Does v3 use the same blob files as v2? My v2 folder is 120gigs already.

I agree about having to dive into a different menu/page to find the alternatives. Better to have them all available as you say.

To be honest, the more I think about this, the more I'm struggling to see any advantages to V3 vs V2, aside from not having to load multiple instances to trial different packs (=Circuits, Rico etc) and maybe the mixer.

I might pay the £16 to upgrade just to have the swap function, but I hope they sort out some of the current niggles and limitations.

The only advantages are having all titles available, and the extra mixer options (individual pan and send). They are a step forward and would be helpful, but everything else compatibility wise negates those additions and will keep me from using v3 even after already upgrading.
Still I see no problem with upgrading and hoping Ujam understands they actually downgraded the v3 app from v2 and need to correct.
New users may not notice, but previous users like me will not be buying any new titles that are not backwards compatible (they are not because of different keymap) if the app remains limited as is.

I love ujam products and use them a lot... but totally dislike the V3 UI. So I would just stay on V2

I don't know if anyone cares but I'll post this in case anyone is interested regarding the previews in the loop browser. I discovered a ton of .mp3 "preview" files stored in the location below in Windows (I'm assuming they also exist somewhere on Mac). It appears this is how they play the loop preview in the browser and it also explains why it is a fixed BPM and doesn't match the project BPM. So there's some disk space wasted and I also kind of doubt they will be providing a way to preview loops that match the project BPM (I might be the only one that cares about that though). Anyway </complaint>, just wanted to share that in case anyone was interested.

Each Beatmaker has a previews folder with mp3's for each loop here:

C:\Users\Public\UJAM\BEATMAKER\titles\BM3-HUSTLE\assets\previews

I never got a reply on this but I did upgrade and they do seem to use the same blob files, as the download and install on a mac for V3 took just moments.
Now to figure out what mapping they're using. The interface doesn't bother me that much. I'll jus have to learn to use it anew, I like that you can assign other parts for the key binds as I never find much use for the intro/outro parts.

In other news Strike and Structure are updated apple silicon native (finally) VSt3.

I have issue with the loops going dead after playing back for some time, so mp3s might solve that. At least fir previews.