Extremely Disappointed, Existing Customers must Purchase Affinity V2

[_fluffy]

In the US, Photoshop+Lightroom is $120/year, and they lock you into an annual contract (charging an early termination fee if you want it for only a month or two). You have to keep on paying this in perpetuity while you continue to use the product.

In the US, Affinity Photo V2 is currently $40, and normally $70. Both of those are cheaper than a year of Photoshop+Lightroom.

The entire Affinity Suite (Photo+Designer+Publisher) is $100 now, or $170 normally. The equivalent Adobe software is Photoshop+Illustrator+InDesign, which costs $60/month, and I believe that's also locked to an annual contract, so you're going to be paying at least $720 for it. And, again, that's per year.

Pricing does vary by country but it's extremely hard to argue in good faith that Affinity ever costs more than anything Adobe produces.

[_fluffy]

2 minutes ago, Jimo said:

A Reaper licence is good for TWO versions. So if you purchase version 6, you get free updates all the way up to the final update for version 7.

You are correct, it takes slightly longer to have to pay again than it does for most software. But you still have to pay again, which is the point I was trying to make.

Ongoing software development costs money, and there's only so many people who are going to be buying the software to begin with. You can't rely on a continuous flow of new customers to finance the improvements to the software you rely on.

It would be nice if Affinity had upgrade pricing for loyal customers, but this 40% discount is pretty massive.

Here's an analogy which might make some sense: Many years ago I bought a Mazda vehicle. They had two incentive programs: a discount for loyal Mazda customers, and a discount for new Mazda customers to entice people over.

The discount, as it turns out, was the same for both.

You can see the 40% pricing for Affinity the same way: either you're being rewarded a 40% discount for your loyalty, or you're being rewarded a 40% discount for giving Affinity a try. Either way you're saving 40%.

[Jimo]

3 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

The equivalent Adobe software is Photoshop+Illustrator+InDesign, which costs $60/month, and I believe that's also locked to an annual contract,

You can pay on a month-by-month basis (and cancel any time), but it also costs more per month that way.

[Artsketch]

8 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

In the US, Photoshop+Lightroom is $120/year, and they lock you into an annual contract

In Europe you usualy buy a 1 year Photoshop + Lightroom subscription code for €89 from Jeff and its wise not to provide billing information to adobe, so the subscription ends automatically until you decide to buy a new subscription on next Black Friday again.

[_fluffy]

Just now, Jimo said:

You can pay on a month-by-month basis (and cancel any time), but it also costs more per month that way.

I could never find those pricing options, probably because Adobe likes to make things seem cheaper than they are to entice people in.

Anyway, regardless, the entire Affinity suite currently costs less than two months of the equivalent products from Adobe.

[Jimo]

18 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

You are correct, it takes slightly longer to have to pay again than it does for most software. But you still have to pay again, which is the point I was trying to make.

Oh for sure. I wasn't trying to be contrary (well, apart from maybe on that one aspect :p). Otherwise I agree with everything you're saying.

16 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

Anyway, regardless, the entire Affinity suite currently costs less than two months of the equivalent products from Adobe.

Yep. I agree entirely. Like I said in another thread - I think some people must have never had to pay for software before if they think they're getting a raw deal. A 40% discount is massive for something that hardly costs anything to begin with. Even at full price, it's cheaper than almost ANY other viable alternative AND cheaper than the upgrade for some software.

[debraspicher]

I still remember when I was bummed about Clip Studio Paint announcing sub plans for 2.0. This was around the time of the Serif survey that had the question about potential subscriptions. Celsys faced massive backlash over their 2.0 announcement. What ended up being announced was that their 2.0 upgrade for current users would be $20 said and done for 2.0. Feature updates in 2.x family after that point beyond maintenance fixes would be $10/YEAR to support development. I thought OK that's not unreasonable, yes I hate subs, but that's something I can justify. 3.0 would eventually include those updates and be one-time as well. I see the meltdowns people are having here over the fact the pricing doesn't make them feel special enough and I can't help but feel embarrassed for them when we don't even have to worry about the slippery slope of a sub. It's also literally 6-7 extra programs for people who only bought v1 on one platform. They're literally throwing money away to fawn over their base and yet they're scamming users somehow? We can't have nice things, apparently.

[copyguy]

I don't have a problem with the price especially coming from Adobe Creative Cloud suite. I am a little bummed about the fact that I just purchased the Affinity suite on Sept 28th of this year. I asked before I purchased if I should wait for a little bit because there was skuttle butt that a newer version should be getting close. They emailed me and told me they really couldn't say when a new version was coming out, but they did offer me a 20 percent discount. I took it and am starting to get the hang of Affinity. I did retire awhile ago and am fixed income so spending the extra is a little bit of a hit ... but I Just Gotta Have It! Haha!

Mark

[SpiffinJay]

3 minutes ago, debraspicher said:

I still remember when I was bummed about Clip Studio Paint announcing sub plans for 2.0. This was around the time of the Serif survey that had the question about potential subscriptions. Celsys faced massive backlash over their 2.0 announcement. What ended up being announced was that their 2.0 upgrade for current users would be $20 said and done for 2.0. Feature updates in 2.x family after that point beyond maintenance fixes would be $10/YEAR. I thought OK that's not unreasonable, yes I hate subs, but that's something I can justify. 3.0 would eventually include those updates and be one-time as well. I see the meltdowns people are having here over the fact the pricing doesn't make them feel special enough and I can't help but feel embarrassed for them when we don't even have to worry about the slippery slope of a sub. It's also literally 6-7 extra programs for people who only bought v1 on one platform. They're literally throwing money away to fawn over their base and yet they're scamming users somehow? We can't have nice things, apparently.

People are overreacting.

Serif has always done it this way.

All non subscription software at one point did it this way.

The launch discount is the discount you get as a loyal customer and new customers get the same discount at the same time because they are new customers.

People seem to hate the idea that everyone gets the software at the same price but in reality this is good as more users mean more bugs are found and fixed and more of other creative software adds support for the affinity suite.

[deeds]

37 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

In the US, Photoshop+Lightroom is $120/year, and they lock you into an annual contract (charging an early termination fee if you want it for only a month or two). You have to keep on paying this in perpetuity while you continue to use the product.

In the US, Affinity Photo V2 is currently $40, and normally $70. Both of those are cheaper than a year of Photoshop+Lightroom.

The entire Affinity Suite (Photo+Designer+Publisher) is $100 now, or $170 normally. The equivalent Adobe software is Photoshop+Illustrator+InDesign, which costs $60/month, and I believe that's also locked to an annual contract, so you're going to be paying at least $720 for it. And, again, that's per year.

Pricing does vary by country but it's extremely hard to argue in good faith that Affinity ever costs more than anything Adobe produces.

It's impossible to compare Affinity Photo with Photoshop + Lightroom - unless you're only using the limited feature set of Affinity Photo... the Adobe offering is at least a 5x the product and environment for serious, professional work with imagery. Just Lightroom is an entirely different league of endeavour, before getting to Photoshop.

[NewInBoston]

14 minutes ago, deeds said:

It's impossible to compare Affinity Photo with Photoshop + Lightroom - unless you're only using the limited feature set of Affinity Photo... the Adobe offering is at least a 5x the product and environment for serious, professional work with imagery. Just Lightroom is an entirely different league of endeavour, before getting to Photoshop.

It's possible to compare price, which is what the cited quote was explaining - not feature set. Affinity Suite is a much better deal. Which software is better is entirely subjective. 

The conversation pivoted to this because one post stated they were switching to something more expensive rather than paying for something less expensive despite being happy with V1. 

 

 

[_fluffy]

1 minute ago, NewInBoston said:

The conversation pivoted to this because one post stated they were switching to something more expensive rather than paying for something less expensive despite being happy with V1.

Also if someone's happy with V1, nobody's forcing them to upgrade.

[_fluffy]

35 minutes ago, deeds said:

It's impossible to compare Affinity Photo with Photoshop + Lightroom - unless you're only using the limited feature set of Affinity Photo... the Adobe offering is at least a 5x the product and environment for serious, professional work with imagery. Just Lightroom is an entirely different league of endeavour, before getting to Photoshop.

The only reason I even mentioned Photoshop+Lightroom is because you can't get one without the other. I personally don't use Lightroom at all; Apple Photos.app is more than sufficient for my photography processing needs.

[Burrows]

I have the V1 for desktop and iPad (minus Publisher of course) I only bought the desktop version about a year ago and recently started working on iPad too so bought Photo and Designer for them about three months ago. 

I bought the V2 full licence yesterday. 119 euro outright at a 40% discount for a licence across desktop and iPad is a no brainer for me. I’m not someone with wads of cash to throw about but for that same money or just over,all you get from Adobe for their most basic photoshop package is a measly 10 months of their subscription model. Pffffft, I don’t think so!

I don’t begrudge Affinity a single penny frankly. I’ve just spent the afternoon on V2 Photo on iPad and couldn’t be happier.  

Sure, there’ll be bugs, but since when does upgraded software not have a few bugs to iron out? They get flagged up and mostly eventually they get sorted. 

 

[NewInBoston]

1 hour ago, Artsketch said:

It is approximately $120-130 for some extra features and bugs.

$99.00 to turn my workstation into a turbo charged creative powerhouse with no subscription and fantastic support. 

 

[NewInBoston]

20 minutes ago, _fluffy said:

The only reason I even mentioned Photoshop+Lightroom is because you can't get one without the other. I personally don't use Lightroom at all; Apple Photos.app is more than sufficient for my photography processing needs.

I was going to mention exactly this, glad you did. Apple Photos is getting better with every release. Whatever edge Adobe has left is being eroded on all sides by competition which is probably why they rely on acquisition rather than innovation. The AI masking does look cool, though. 

[PaoloT]

3 hours ago, Old Bruce said:

Consider though how much Apple makes from its phones, they are awash in cash.

Apple software is, in fact, paid when purchasing hardware. You get a Mac or an iPad, because it is full of great software, that you either don't pay, or pay just once.

Serif should start selling computers and tablets!

Paolo

 

[jmwellborn]

2 hours ago, NewInBoston said:

I will probably make copies of everything until V2 has my full confidence. 

Makes sense.  For the time being, I am keeping V1.10.5 on my Mac as well in case I need to get into those old files and save them in the old version.  Especially complete book files!  The nice thing about V2 is that we get an immediate prompt when we open a V1 file, asking us whether we want to open it, or make a copy.  

[LunchMoney_Matt]

I’m happy to pay for quality feature complete software, that of which v2 is not. It might be fine for the average home user, but for professional use (which its marketed as) there’s still too much functionality missing, and unfortunately development is too slow.

[Le Minh Thanh]

+ 1

[Burrows]

14 minutes ago, LunchMoney_Matt said:

I’m happy to pay for quality feature complete software, that of which v2 is not. It might be fine for the average home user, but for professional use (which its marketed as) there’s still too much functionality missing, and unfortunately development is too slow.

The simple answer to that is don’t buy it if it isn’t suitable for you and your profession. I’m a professional and although I’m a relatively new user V2 will work  perfectly well for me. 

Equally, what exactly is an ‘average home user’ in your eyes?

 

[AiDon]

Well if you look in context … $99 for 3 products for 6-7 years, a darn good deal at which is $5.50 or $4.70 per year per product, without mentioning  that it includes all 3 platforms.

And it was clearly stated when we purchased v1 the updates were free to v1, but the next version would have to be purchased.

[Kemelvor]

I also have my little disappointment over V2 - and good surprises too, I expected some features for a long time now and they delivered.

However I did not buy the V2 for its immediate features, but for the support it will get over the year.  And Serif was always pretty good with updates. The current discount + the universal license is good enough for me to buy it immediately and wait for further features. I do hope for some more, especially a better warp ! I consider V2 as a baseline for their future improvements.

If you don't like Affinity 2's current state, just wait. Serif is pretty generous with discounts and another one will come by later. 

Edited November 11, 2022 by Kemelvor

[Gianni Becattini]

Surely they made a giant marketing mistake: they gave no acknowledgment to existing users. Something like to say: I don't care you, you simply don't exist. Even the most convinced user feels now despised.

They say also that they will no longer upgrade the 1.0 version. It's like to say that you loyal customer no longer exist (anyway the upgrades were always so inconsistent that remaining with the previous one will not be a big problem).

They could have a far better approach, instead of despising old customers, they could have make us feel important and we would have payed the update with joy and proud.

Also the approach of a different policy from the Apple Store seems not very serious. I have not clear if buying from them will allow me in the future to manage the App exactly like the others that I buy from Apple Store (they distinguish professional and private users in a way that is not clear to me). Serif is going to become a small Adobe, but sure not in the product quality/number/level.

I will add the choice of Affinity to my personal error list...

[Tia Lapis]

40% off. What more do you want? A personal belly rub? x_X