KICK3 Beta First Thoughts

BETA Tester Area KICK 3 BETA
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Setup:
Windows 10, 64gb ram, Ryzen 9 3590X, Cubase Pro 13 and Ableton Live 11

I’ve been a Kick 2 user for a few years now so I know it pretty well, I use it a lot.

So Kick 3 - first impressions. I’m going to be totally blunt and go through my first thoughts. New UI…it’s clean and slick, the text is a bit small to read but it scales nicely. I think scaling and HD/4K resolution should be default for all plugins now so it’s nice to see. I didn’t mind the UI scale option in Kick 2 but I think I prefer drag to scale. It would be nice if I could make the text a little bigger though, there are some sections that are pretty small unless I rescale the whole UI.

So what is different? Hmmm. It looks mostly the same. Ok, we have import sample…which seems to split the transient and sub into separate parts. That’s useful but it’s clunky. I have to drag the file in…no browser? It splits into parts, transient and sub, ok, that’s good, but it doesn’t give them a name? I drag the sub part into the sub section. Oh that just overwrites what is already there, it doesn’t import it. It just sits there, it doesn’t even change the name. And it’s using the same pitch settings as the sub that was there previously so it sounds nothing like the kick I just imported.

If I import a sample, splitting it works well. I like that part. But then I’d like those parts to show up in the Sub and Click menus with the name of the imported sample. Not just for it to ghost over the previous part without even changing the name.

The new patch browser - it imported my patches from Kick 2 automatically after asking. That’s good. I like it when software does that. The browser is nice and clean. Easy to use. Though I’d like to be able to rename or delete files in the browser…as well as drag and drop and to be able to create folders in the browser without having to drop into Explorer. And being able to tag favourites is something I’m seeing in a lot of VSTs now…even multiple favourites.

Selecting a sub/click. Oh, it’s gotten rid of the browser for this part. I only have left and right arrows. That’s definitely a downgrade. I do not like that! Please put a browser back in those sections.

Macros - not a single preset seems to use them. If you include new features, 100% include them in some new presets. Ok, quick play, I can only assign a macro to an effect parameter? Better than nothing I suppose but if I can automate a parameter via my DAW I doubt I’m going to ever use macros. Other VSTs use macros well, esp when you can assign multiple parameters to one macro. Otherwise I wouldn’t bother.

Effects - ok, some I’ve seen before, some I haven’t. More controls though, that’s good. The bitcrush is really nice, being able to select different tubes, that’s nice.

Presets - Kinda lacking at the moment, I think you’ve got to have some classic drum sounds in there, 808, 909 etc. No techno. Nothing really EDM. Nothing experimental, noises, FX, basses etc. With the pitch tracking and portamento this could absolutely do gnarly pitched 808 stuff. I mean, it can double as a bass synth. Definitely want to see some bass synth presets. Again, nothing showing off the macros or new effects. With the ‘click’ section, you could in theory add a techno sub layer that comes in on the offbeat…that would be useful but again, no presets that show that off.

Overall - it feels more polished but there are definitely improvements that could/should be made. If I was going to upgrade, would I pay for an upgrade? I don’t think I would. It doesn’t really offer anything new or different to what Kick 2 does, and if anything the presets are actually weaker.

1 Like
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thanks for the feedback :slight_smile:

there is a browser - just not obious, click the arrow in the centre to open system browser

that doesn’t sound right, it should overwrite the sub AMP and PITCH with the one you’ve just imported
this section isn’t for importing curve shapes, it is for importing the sub and click.
if you want to save the individual sub pitch or amp shape you could do that afterwards using the curve browser for each section, but this area is primarily for just importing the kick / and dropping the sub and click into your preset.

once your save your new preset you’re imported click will be available in your user clicks.

we could maybe expand on the browser capabilities in the future, but at the minute any additional file management beyond creating new click folders etc. during imports has to be done using the system browser.

favourites is definitely something we could look at

there was never a browser for sub, there is a curve browser? this is still where it originally was at the top of the sub area
the click browser is available from the within each click area - clicking on the sample name

the factory content is not yet finalised / macros are a fairly new addition - factory content will have macros assigned in the release

again, this is just the beta, these are not the release presets

that’s entirely up to yourself of course, i personally feel the work we’ve done on kick 3 is a massive upgrade on kick 2.

you cannot import your own kicks into kick 2, QOL improvements such as zoom, linear scaling, expanded fx - reverb, sub phase shift, expanded harmonics to name a few.

and again, please be aware this is the BETA version meant for testing out bugs, it’s not the final product. presets in various sections are not complete or final.

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Ah. That’s definitely useful. But as you said, not obvious, I guess at this point we are going in blind. Just imported a sample, then cleared the sample and re-opened the browser. Could it stay in the last used folder instead of going back to it’s default location? That would definitely be useful as my kicks all live on the sample drive.

Hmm. It seems a bit odd, it’s not doing the thing with the pitch envelope from the previous preset now (though I’m using it in Ableton 11 atm instead of Cubase). When I drag the click it names the click with the name of the sample, but when I drag the sub it just calls it sub. Could it call both something like “samplename sub” and “samplename click”?

Just from a user point of view, anything that wants me to leave the software and go into the system browser is bad! A lot of in-VST browsers now allow me to do that, Spire, Diva, OsTIrus etc . It’s not a major thing, just helps with the housekeeping and it’s something I like to see.

Still getting used to how it works differently, I’ve been using Kick 2 for too long. :slightly_smiling_face:

Ok cool. It was just my totally cold first opinion.

Oh, zoom…how do you zoom back out? I can zoom in with the magnifying glass, but couldn’t get it to zoom out again.

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There’s a zoom bar above the main waveform display area, if you over your mouse on it you’ll see a magnifier icon, you can double click to reset the zoom and vertical mouse scroll to Zoom In/Out

Kick 3_Zoom Bar
Kick 3_Zoom Bar1178×292 52.6 KB

1 Like
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Oh, what would be useful, if not essential, is the ability to preview a sample on the import browser before importing. Just a toggle button for preview and I can use the up/down arrows to go through a list of kicks to preview them before importing.

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What would be a very cool feature, and a lot of plugins have this these days, is a randomise button, so that it can put various clicks with various subs and envelopes, change the length etc. Just for those moments when you are lacking ideas.

One thing I really do like is the trigger…ok, it’s not a huge deal, most DAWs offer some kind of audio to MIDI, worst case it saves a few minutes manually recreating a kick track for a remix. But I can see it being useful to rock producers wanting to beef up a kick.

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Had a couple of bugs. One was that somehow the bottom sub click bars, when I clicked X to “Remove that click/sub” somehow, when I went to the import section and back to the main screen, the “Remove” text was overlayed on top of the regular info.

And when going into effects, for some reason I cannot move the dials.

Both seem sporadic and hard to pinpoint what the cause was.

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Really like the new version with the text on the bar and the box around the magnifier on the bottom icon, makes it much clearer. :+1:

2 Likes
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Feature request…when I go to the eq and click on a node, it doesn’t move until I turn that node on. If I click on a node, could it automatically turn on so I can drag it?