New version is out with some cool stuff… 
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It looks like Maxon has been starting to pour more money into R&D, which is good in a world that has little to no credible competition against Autodesk in the commercial space (at least outside of Side FX). To see the rise of another titan that will battle it out will be interesting to watch, even though it could mean Blender taking a hit because of the full potential of closed source being realized.
Though it does sound like all of these improvements will cost users even more than before, with subscriptions now being the only choice, and the likelihood of Maxon ditching the native C4D Sculpting in favor of expecting people to subscribe to Zbrush (since they own it now).
If there is anything Blender can borrow, it would be that new softbody simulation. The BF even has code that can make it happen because of previous GSoC projects.
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Yawn.
So glad I left c4d and aren’t paying massive money for these meager updates.
The star feature of this release - symmetry tools is perhaps 10% better than what we already have in Blender.
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It’s funny, what they did with Forger is something I always wanted to see in Blender’s sculpt mode… 
That simple out-of-the-box ACES color management option without the need to fiddle with configurations is something I’d like to see in Blender.
Also, I’ve still got the feeling that Maxon is more supportive of macOS than Blender Foundation, although macOS support in Blender has noticeably improved since Apple became a supporter.
But my real regret remains ZBrush being a subscription-based Maxon product now. 
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Uff, not really a great showcase for ACES though, but that’s hardly their fault.
Completely blown out and clipped colors, looks horrible.
Other than that, kinda underwhelming release.
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Well according to demos, it seems that their Topology Mirror is a lot more reliable.
Demos are using operators generating geometry. Those operators don’t work with symmetry in Blender’s edit mode.
That is why there is no overlay in Blender. And why you would use Select Mirror instead, for such operators.
And Symmetry Axis can be customized without forcing to redefine object’s origin.
A Blender user would have to symmetrize or use and apply a Mirror modifier, a lot more, do a lot more steps than a C4D user with such reliable symmetry for mesh edition.
To me, that are 3 important points that are making Blender’s symmetry is a lot less powerful.
And that is normal.
It is also older of 3 years, now.
We have symmetry generalized to any axis and any mode, since 2.81 (closer to stress and hesitation of 2.80 than validation of Blender 3).
Blender developers did not go as far, because there were other basics to improve, at that time.
For the modeller, who thought about Symmetrize feature (that was added to Blender, in 2.65, almost 10 years ago) : the fact that it became a must-have, in any 3D software package, is consecration.
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Maybe it could be better but I have zero complaints with Blender’s symmetry. Certainly was better than what I used in c4d from 2007-2019. And it even is integrated into a lot of add-ons.
Also to note, Maxon has taken the app. in a direction that assumes Linux does not exist (by way of replacing OpenGL with Metal and DirectX).
CGTalk | Why Cinema 4D R22 deprecated OpenGL? (cgsociety.org)
Cinema is now the only software outside of Max that is actively shunning open graphics standards in favor of proprietary solutions (so while the simulation stuff is great, it will eliminate the option of moving to Mint and Ubuntu should things go south for Windows and MacOS).
New release…
Still not a lot of hype for their scene nodes? It is supposedly their Blender Geometry Nodes killer (in accordance with what was reported in the past), but their userbase does not seem to be producing crazy generators and other operations with it. I see node management, but the video does not show any scene building action.
Scene nodes development is moving like a snail lol… it’s still unfinished and over-complicated… doesn’t feel like something you would see inside of a very intuitive app like c4d… that’s why very few people are using it…
They really need to rethink this all thing…
Does Maxon even offer C4D for Linux? I thought all they had was a command-line renderer, not the full application. In other words, doesn’t surprise me that they aren’t concerned with supporting a graphics API for an OS that they aren’t even making a product for.
@Ace_Dragon Scene nodes are just not really used by Cinema4D users that much. It’s been like that since the very first release.
The C4D crowd is a very very different type of user base compared to Blender, Max, etc. users. Blender’s community tends to be more 'hands-on", if you know what I mean. Lots of motivated and curious young people as well.
C4D remains mostly inaccessible to teenagers due to its high cost. Even installing a hacked version is probably just too much of a hassle, since Blender is one download and two clicks away and offers TONS of resources for free. So why bother with C4D? Besides, all the cool stuff is done with Blender by other young people.
And it also doesn’t help that Maxon has a tendency to stop putting any effort into a module when they find out there is an initial lack of interest or when the devs are steered into a different direction by management.
Top it off with Maxon’s distinct lack of low-level interaction with the C4D community and a hidden roadmap, and… it is what it is.
PS also not helpful is that the only C4D focused forum (Core4D) requires payment to post stuff. Until a few months ago the forum was closed to anyone but for paid subscribers.
No, they do not.
After checking it looks like this is still a case?
No one wanted Scene Nodes. We asked for Xpresso improvements, yet they delivered a beta test of Scene Nodes that can’t be used in production.
The few examples of Scene Nodes already can be done using Mograph, so why bother. Is quite different here where there is no alternative to Mograph.
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Before it wasn’t even possible to read posts without subscribing. It now is.
I just checked Core4D. You can see the thread titles, but you can’t actually go in and read them (so Maxon is still the only vendor with a locked down community).
I understand if they want to make it harder for users of other apps. to register for the purpose of trash talking C4D (as there is already such a thing on the Unity forums of gamers registering an account for the purpose of complaing about the engine, just because they own titles made with it), but I guess it is better than it used to be.
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