The Affinity forums and the Facebook groups are exploding. Users believe this is much like the Adobe arrangement. Probably far from it. If they move to a sub model it’s much cheaper to begin with.
I often wondered how they were virtually giving away these apps at their current pricing. Perhaps they were playing the long game. Acquiring many through low pricing, and leveraging the sale to canva with the sheer amount of people using the apps. I never went with the suite, but I do use Photo and Publisher. I have original versions. Never bit on the suite. And just updated the ones I have.