Why does an official Prophet-5 plugin matter?

For decades you could buy emulations of the 1978 Prophet-5, one of the most iconic analogue polysynths ever made, but none of them carried Sequential's blessing. This one does. GForce Software developed it in partnership with Sequential, so it is the first official Prophet-5 in software, not a clone built from the outside.

The headline trick is that it models three hardware revisions. Rev1 and Rev2 give you the SSM filter and envelope character, the rawer, more unpredictable early sound. Rev3 switches to the Curtis filter and envelope behaviour, the tighter, more consistent voice most people picture when they hear "Prophet-5". Having all three in one window means you pick the era to suit the track.

What do you actually get inside?

The preset library runs past 460 sounds. That includes the original 38 factory patches from 1978, so you can call up the exact sounds the synth shipped with, plus more than 420 modern patches designed for current production.

Architecture is where it goes beyond the original. There is a dual-layer engine with Layer, Split and Alternate modes, up to 10 voices per layer, and an independent arpeggiator and chord mode on each layer. The "X-Modifiers" system hands nearly every parameter its own dedicated envelope and LFO, which is far more modulation than any hardware Prophet-5 ever offered.

GForce Software approached the instrument with real care, and no one comes closer capturing the character and musicality of the hardware.

That line is from David Gibbons, CEO of Sequential, and coming from the company that owns the name, it carries weight.

How does it fit your studio?

There are two selectable FX slots plus dedicated Delay, Reverb and Pan Spread, with Chorus, Phaser, Filter, Distortion, Tremolo and Compressor available in the slots. It runs full MPE, has comprehensive MIDI CC mapping and a fully resizable high-resolution interface.

Formats cover VST2, VST3, AU, AAX and standalone, on Mac (Intel and Apple Silicon native) and PC, needing macOS 10.15 or later or Windows 7 or later and 8GB of RAM. A 7-day demo is available if you want to hear it before paying.