That’s interesting.
I remember having quite a dispute because of this with somebody from Native Instruments support (already ~ 4 years ago). He totally insisted on Steinberg doesn’t allow subfolders under …\VST3 (sidenote: NI themselves are indeed dropping only a single plugin.vst3 file into …\VST3)
Original quote (translated): “oh, Steinberg does not provide a separate folder structure in the VST3 folder.”
The problem I had was that the KompleteKontrol software couldn’t be started anymore, because it froze while it was running a pluginscan upon launching it. The support guy basically told me the reason for that would be the existence of subfolders in …\VST3. He said KK can’t handle that because it’s “hardcoded” and stuff like that, rather funny in retrospect lol.
Of course it turned out it wasn’t the problem at all.
Apparently this event somehow planted into my mind Steinberg doesn’t want subfolders under “VST3”
But when you’re saying that’s even in the SDK, then it’s certainly just nonsense. Can’t remember if I looked that up myself at the time, probably did but forgot about it over time. Only thing that stuck in my head was what the support dude was saying lol.
Thanks for pointing that out!