Ditch Maya LT and just make Maya Indie available worldwide

[ValentinN84]

Most of the ideas in this forum are about bringing features back from Maya Full to Maya LT , features that were cut to justify the price difference. 
About one year ago Autodesk announced Maya Indie, basically Maya full for the price of LT for individuals and companies making under 100k a year. This is currently a pilot program for select privileged countries unfortunately and from what support told me, there's no plan to extend this program for at least another year!
For freelancers like me who love Maya but are struggling to get anywhere close to that income since we live in second rate countries, we are stuck between choosing to pay 2000E for the full version or ditching our beloved plugins and python scripts and working in LT.  Personally I'm a modeler so don't need and never use most features of Maya Complete like simulation or rendering so currently I feel like I'm paying almost 10x the price just to have Python and plugin support which is ridiculous! LT is not a viable option since it's crippled in weird ways like not having access to the Crease Sets editor since it's in Python. Also, I do freelance and my clients want Maya Complete scenes with special setup that doesn't translate well with FBX. Maya Complete scenes open fine in LT but not the other way around since Autodesk wants to discourage working with LT and then combining stuff in Complete later.

Taking the plunge and making Maya Indie available worldwide would have quite a few benefits for both Autodesk and customers as follows:

For Autodesk:
1. Would save development and support costs for Maya LT.

2. Save development costs for special "Autodesk approved" plugins specially compiled for LT (like Substance).
3. Bring new revenue from "emerging" markets that currently pirate Maya. 
4. Make this whole forum section automatically solved! No more wasted time discussing what features to bring back from Maya Complete to Maya LT!
5. Show that Autodesk cares about emerging markets and is not discriminating against them by having preferential pricing as they do now with the Maya Indie pilot program!

For customers/potential customers in the targeted income bracket:
1. Maya Complete features for the costs of Maya LT.

2. For developers: a wider audience, a single script that works in all Maya versions.
3. For current users of pirated copies, increased security from not having to download shady cracks from shady websites! Having a good reason to pay for that is otherwise a good piece of software and an industry standard!
4. Make this whole forum section automatically solved! No more wasted time discussing what features to bring back from Maya Complete to Maya LT!

If you agree with me, make sure to post your comments below! Let's make this more popular than the Python request!

[Anonymous]

Yes.avi

Pretty Please. 

[Anonymous]

This would be very helpful for all the freelancers out in LA as well. It would undercut c4d and bring a much wider community into the loop like adobe did with the subscription based cc. This is probably the best idea yet. But could you make it so we could open our older projects from LT. It always prevented me from upgrading to maya full in the past.

[ValentinN84]

Opening older projects shouldn't be a problem. As far as I know Autodesk offers a "one time" service of converting LT scenes to regular MB/MA scenes when you upgrade your license.

[Anonymous]

Yea not on board with this idea, still uses saas model approach.  This ends up being just of development time and resources.

[ValentinN84]

I think the chances of Autodesk switching back from a software as a service approach are practically 0. This only gives the user the choice between paying a "software tax" or not using that software. Having a cheaper "software tax" might be preferable to switching software for some users and I think Autodesk should feel the same considering the prices of the competition.

[sir.seko]

DON'T ditch maya lt! It doesn't have a revenue cap - maya indie does.

[ValentinN84]

That's actually a good argument. I would say that personally I would pay the full price if I earned more than the revenue cap but I can see how some people might prefer living with LT's limitations rather than paying more for the complete version even if they earn more than the cap.

[robert.lettan]

The big problem with Maya LT is that originally it was Designed & Developed to be a Free Tool., specifically to complete against Game Max (G-Max) and Softimage | XSI Mod (also both free).

In this respect the original limitations made (some) sense as it was Free.

Now as a note I agree we DO need a change in regards to the Maya Editions available and what their Feature Sets are., and at least for my own perspective / need... being able to get Maya (Full) at the cost of Maya LT, albeit with earnings restrictions is fine.

But I think that Autodesk / Alias are somewhat missing the point of the regular complaints over specific restrictions to Maya LT.

What I mean is that while the original Restrictions imposed on Maya LT made sense back in 2002 - 2005., as all of the competing products had the same basic restrictions (No Script Support, No Native Exporting, No Renderer (well they did but it was Watermarked), etc.)... the reality is that Maya LT is the ONLY one of these products that still exists to this day.

And, well the Industry (and needs of Artists) has changed A LOT over the past 15 - 20 years.

Realistically what should've happened, is when Maya Limited switch from being Free to "Low" Cost (Subscription)... well it should've been redesigned to better suit it's new role.

Now here's the thing., I actually think there does need to be 3 Versions (Tiers) of Maya.

• Free

• Standard

• Professional

How they should differ., I'd argue is in what tools are available. 

For example... I think the "Free" Version should quite literally just be Polygon Modelling, UV Mapping and Animation with a Basic Hypershade Engine., with Support for Baking Normal Maps and Ambient Occlusion Maps.

No Support for (3rd Party) Plug-Ins

No Support for (Custom) Scripts (MEL / Python)

Support to Output FBX

And well that' be about it...

Now I'd argue that it should be called "Maya Open"... and the reason is because Functionality should be sold as Subscription Plug-Ins., think of it like having a Netflix Subscription; but then if you want Anime you get the Funimation Channel, or you want old Films you get the MCM Channel... and each of those is a Micro-Subscription added to your main.

The idea being that technically speaking you COULD restore Maya Open to be as Fully Featured as Professional., but the incentive would be that'd end up (overall) more expensive.

This has two key benefits... one to the End-User; who has a "Core" Product that is usable, but is tailoring the Feature set to their Budgets and Needs; the other is Autodesk gets DIRECT Feedback on what is most popular... then look into either focusing improvements on those OR figuring out why other features aren't as popular and focus their attention there on making them better / more appealing / useful.

(cough:sculpting:cough)

The next step up would be Maya Standard / Indie., I'd say that this would be the "Low Cost" Subscription; which again is Maya Open the difference being it has a pre-defined set of Common Plug-Ins that are useful for Modern Game Development. 

Say., Sculpting, Substance, Renderer, Baking Tools (and seriously I don't understand why Turtle Baking in Maya LT is actually a more complex and difficult experience compared to Maya; shouldn't it be the other way around, where Maya has more options to customise... where-as Maya LT has a basic "One-Click" style approach?),

Physics Simulation (PhysX / Bullet / ODE)...

access to Custom Scripting (MEL / Python)...

Access to 2nd Party Plug-Ins (these would be plug-ins signed and released via the Autodesk Marketplace., as opposed to 3rd Party that would be "Fully Custom")

I feel like I'm missing something out here; but you get the idea.

Like Maya LT in many ways is "Close" but just has a few legacy restrictions that I'd lift. 

That said the point here is, said Subscription would be cheaper than getting said "Upgrades" for Maya Open.

The of course there's be Maya Professional., which would basically be the "Full Product" with maybe the restriction of not having every plug-in; such-as Bifrost or such; those could still be part of an Enterprise Subscription., but in terms of actual features it wouldn't really be restrictive in any way with a need for any extra subscription cost. 

I mean... that's just how I'd suggest approaching all this. 

As I said., my plan will be to switch to Maya Indie when my current Maya LT Subscription is up in October., as for the same price the "Full Package"; sure that works for me. 

But I can see how it isn't ideal for everyone., and I really do think there NEEDS to be a Free Version of Maya.

Blender is far too appealing to new Artists; and it's slowly starting to be adopted as an Industry Standard; if Alias don't do something (and within the next few years) about this... well they're going to loose the Hobbyist / Independent Market entirely; which in turn will also mean their big studio clients., as they switch to what is more commonly used.