Native Instruments vs Reason

Hi guys, first time posting here, looks like a great community. I've see this question raised a few times, but I'm hoping to get a fresh perspective now its 2016 and theres so much swanky NI hardware available.

Basically, whats better for a total production package: NI or Reason?

My situation is I own Reason 6 and need to pay $125 to update it to the latest version, so basically its a very cheap entry for me to this route. I have a Roland Jupiter80 and Yamaha MOTIF es8 which in conjunction with Reason provide me all the synth sounds I could ever need. I'm interested in getting a MIDI pad controller, something like the Akai MPD218 just to play drums on, but I do pretty well on the keyboard mostly. I would need to buy a few Rack Extensions to come up to KU11's level, so I guess another $500-$700 on top.

NI is a crazy expensive route. I would like to invest in the best hardware, so probably a Maschine Studio and Jam, plus KU11. That's about $3500 for me in New Zealand.

Pros and cons from my point of view:

Reason is amazing to work in, as I have a studio background and the ability to work with patch cables and rack gear clicks well in my monkey brain. The built-in SSL console sounds incredible. Once you get used to the sequencer and blocks, its really fast and creative (admittedly it took me AGES to get the Reason workflow in my head, I was so used to using a traditional DAW). The environment is well suited for all styles or music, particularly rock, metal and pop music that I mainly produce ( I feel Maschine/KU11 is focusing more on EDM/Hip Hop).

However - no VST support! Its a real deal-killer as I have some amazing VSTi I can't live without, a large Kontact library being one of them and thousands of dollars of Spitfire Audio/ProjectSAM/UVI/StudioLogic etc. A recent email to customer support confirmed they have zero intention of ever supporting VST. Insert 'sad face'.

NI is stupidly expensive, and an expensive update process. However, it really covers all bases, particularly the acoustic orchestral instruments well. Plus, the big one, it works in my DAW with my other VST/VSTi instruments!!!! You really need to buy Maschine to replicate Reason's groove box environment, which is cool as I like the look of it and don't have a budget limitation - Im just worried that since not into EDM this might just become an expensive doorstop. But on the upside, NI hard/software holds its value, so easy to recoup some investment if I decided to quit the business. Reason is worth exactly $0 the second you buy it and any of the RE's.

I know you can rewire Reason into a DAW, but its crappy - I don't understand why you would bother. If you could rewire your DAW into Reason, now THAT would be world changing and solve my problem right away (And yes, I know about the VAC hacks and stuff, but Im not into running multiple virtual soundcards and DAW sessions, just too complicated)

Ok, sorry for the long rant. Hoping to hear from some experienced Reason users who have made the swap. Cheers.

 

Maschine cant rewire to Eeason but FL-Studio (free updates for life) and Ableton can...

I choose those for u since u have already many gears and maschine dont support vst3 so means cant support yamaha, but you can just record audio from any gear to Maschine. The exception is Virus TI since it has its own vst2 and vst3.

Also FL Studio has this Visualizer plugin so you can have your camera, visual effects, and the plugin your playing in one screen then use screencasting software to record.

 

I'd vote for Reasons 9 easily... if NI gets their stuff together and that's a not sure if I would go with the Jam first maybe at a discounted price %50 off to get your feet wet and get a few free sounds. The new editions to reasons' allow you to make a few similar instruments that NI and other companies offer, if you understand how to use the Combinator.

 

Reason doesn't support VST natively, but have found it works perfectly well with all my VSTi via MIDI (the Reason External Instrument rack unit), including Kontakt. I love being able to use all my old VST instruments with Reason 9.

 

If you really wanna go "digital", check out Reaktor Blocks and maybe you can mimic your gears from that.