Is the Akai Force Worth It in 2023?

A semi-review / analysis / demonstration of the Akai Force in light of its many firmware updates and the release of the standalone Ableton Push 3.
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Timestamps:
00:00 Intro/background
01:05 What is the Akai Force
02:03 Sound engines
06:26 User interface
09:19 The biggest advantage over the Push 3
09:46 Value for money
11:45 Arranger view
14:34 Who should (or shouldn't) use the Force
17:32 The verdict

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[vertigev]

It took me a while to learn the Force and I didn't like it at first. These days I won't use anything else though, the workflow is fast, powerful, and it's great for live performance. You can sketch ideas quickly but if you want to go deep, you can. Force is the brain for my whole studio. I also just got the Juno synth for it (Jura) and it sounds amazing. The Force team has added some massive features over many software updates as well which is great.

[PoboyMusic]

I think the force is the coolest thing Akai has ever made.

[NetterForest]

Something missed when talking about the Force is it's greatness as a midi controller. You have 64 pads to assign Midi Macros. You have 16 crossfader banks, with 1 macro on A and B sides, You have a bank of 4 XY screens that can be split to 8 columns or quadrants to assign midi macros. And for the creme de la have 128 banks of 16 Knobs that can also be used like buttons, all with oled screens. If only force could send midi notes in a macro and had more robust options like accel, decel and step increase the Force would be hands down the greatest midi controller ever made. You can add those features with a midi processing box if really needed though. A used Force is well worth it's price for just its midi controller potentiental alone.

[n]

Great video Gabe! I had an MPC ONE, great machine truely, but it just didn't work for me, I felt like I was spending too much time menu diving and not completing anything. I switched to the force and I LOVE it! Is it perfect, no, but what device is? I'm sticking with the Force, for better or worse, at least I feel productive on it! Thanks for sharing your experience and knowledge with the rest of us. Peace. Bill

[konstantinoskarentzos]

Force is a lovely machine. If it had a flip on screen this could be easily the best machine out there for full dawless production. I really dont understand why MPCs sell more that this gem. I would buy it a second time….

[WotanSkyFather]

I played a live show with my Force in Nov 2021, and I used a tape deck and a Circuit Rhythm on different channels of my mixer to bridge the gaps between songs when I needed to load a new project on the Force. My new goal is to add a second Force and bounce between the two, that way transitions are on the outro of one song on the L Force, and the intro of the song on the R Force.
I added spontaneity during my live set by adding live keys, guitar, vocals, knob tweaking on a 303, etc. You could still do that on 2 Forces, and it's also possible to have tempo changes while the Forces are synced together using Ableton Link via ethernet cable.

[ToyKeeper]

Was looking forward to this video, and I'm not disappointed! I'm also part of the niche who really likes the Force's workflow. I had wanted something like it for about 20 years before it finally existed, and I'm very happy with it. I could see a standalone Push eventually becoming a better product, but that hasn't happened yet and the Push 3 might never reach that point.

[DmitryPuffin]

I am playing techno live and started recently to use Force for that. Played couple of shows for 400 and 800 people in Germany, and it was quite good.
Yeah, tempo changes and warping is very shitty, agree with that.
There is a workaround for audio tracks. You can load long samples into drum tracks and it does the job!
I am using Circuit together with Force and it gives me possibility to have a nice part of improvisation live, and at the same time Force's effects allow me to have a better mix going out to the PA.
I made a crappy video of my live setup, because I found that there were not so much of this covered on YouTube.

[AhmadWtx]

I totally agree with your statement about taking the Akai Force over the MPC X SE. Great video and very balanced view of some of it's strengths and limitations. I actually prefer working standalone on the Force more than I enjoyed Push 2 when I used to use it. I owned Push when it first came out and upgraded to Push 2 before the Force was released and used that until I bought the Force. The updates have gradually made this device a very useful creative tool and much more. Still much improvements are needed, but those needed improvements do not prevent a user from making some dope music.

[novalogue]

Whats also good for releasing only software instead of hardware is you have a device that gets further developed in function as it almost holds everything you actually need to make music specs wise (at least if your not going crazy) and not having to buy a new device because yours get outdated/not updated anymore even though i would rather have more firmware updates since i almost always use my external Synths

[AstrixMusic]

The force is the brains for my creative process. I am still learning after having it for 2 to 3 years. All the updates that have been made to this machine make it a completely different machine than it was when it was originally released. I agree you have to devote alot of time into remembering the shift commands to be proficient. Some rethinking needs to be done with the overall machine layout to make it easier to just sit down in front of it and start using it. Hopefully many of these things get worked out in future versions as well as the tempo changing issues that everyone has complained about from day one.

[SticksAandstonesBozo]

Kind of wild your channel isn’t bigger. You come up every time I search anything like this and I always end up watching your stuff all the way through. So many people make these videos but sadly have no business making music.

[feelmytool]

The Force is by far the best user interface and workflow of MPC/Maschine/Ableton and the only thing that stops me from using it is that it doesn’t change time signatures or tempos. It’s been a paperweight since I got the Live Mk2 but if they ever add useable time signature changes I’d probably sell every other groove box for it.

[MKS]

As a long-standing Ableton (and Push) user, I tried a Force (bought second-hand) because I had really hoped for a standalone live performance machine and thought the Force might be “it”. Despite trying hard, I just *couldn’t* mesh my Ableton DAW brain with what the Force could do and workflow I expected wasn’t immediately accessible in the Force. It’s not that it was bad, *AT ALL*, but when I tried to reach for a given functionality I just couldn’t get it to do what I needed. The Push3 scratches that itch. All I need, in a workflow that makes sense to me, and standalone mode to boot.

[suitandtieguy]

If you look at Force as an element in a larger setup it makes more sense than the only thing to use in a set.

[Jeremyelrick]

I'd love a scaled down, portable version of Maschine+ with the Forces ability to arrange in a linear way. If they perhaps had different versions with one primarily focused on sequencing and sampling rather than running vst instruments that I could use with some hardware synths.

[wilsoncj]

I don't think enough has been made about how many updates the Force has gotten since launch. It is still getting new features. This contradicts the "just milking the customer" argument.

Also, disk streaming with drumkits allows a lot of flexibility with audio tracks.

Tempo and time signature changes are the biggest omissions.

The Force is really good for songwriting when you want to combine instrunents and vocals with samples and synths (as opposed to being built mainly for sample-based workflow).

[banksideleopards]

Excellent quote "good instrument don't go bad"

[ZiwaHD]

The PUSH was originally produced and made by AKAI for ABLETON and I believe there's a non-compete clause in there somewhere thus they will always for the most part be different from each other in terms of mileage !

[DM]

Great Video Gabe, answers a lot of my questions on "why I bought this product", and that was to build studio based songs, and not DJ which this does, although found a nasty bug today which is no Audition on Midi sounds when selecting melodic expansions, also AKAI have repeated all of the melodic sounds as the same, and sneakily renamed them differently.. Logged a ticket with InMusic, could be a faulty sample list...