User blog comment:Angel Emfrbl/End of Year Vocaloid most/least favs/@comment-27278302-20151226101312/@comment-53539-20151226155043

On realistic + Ia... Honestly... Having seen people go on about how realistic certain UTAU are and then hearing them without the fancy tuning involved... I find the "realism" issue a little bit touch and go. A vocal like Ryuto works the way it does because it isn't realistic and gives hi a lot of leyway much the same way V1 did for Kaito. While the realism of Prima and Tonio goes against them as faults in the engine and vocal just don't always sound how one expects the vocal to do.

Realism is nice, but its one of those issues that shouldn't be the sole judge of a vocaloid, because the producer may not bother nor want realism. Further more, like with quality, if the vocal is being used for purposes it wasn't built for, there is going to be lesser realistic vocals that could do the job better then it.

I've had issues with the subect of realism as much as quality, because there has been so many miss-labels in Vocaloid itself. From CV = mistaken as "voice acted" entirely, to "Engloids are less realistic then their Japanese cousins" to miki fans failing to take realism in calculation when defending her V2 vocal to people being unaware of how bad the Kagamines Act1 + 2 were. To quote an old note of mine, if the VYs weren't said to be HQ, I doubt people would even notice it. And even then, the other issues with both quality and realism is every new vocaloid or engine version that comes out can move the goal post. So what was HQ or realistic for V1, is laughable for V4.

That is why I feel when it comes to voices you like, the more admirable fan is the one who sticks to a vocaloid despite its flaws. And also, the flaws of a vocaloid has always interested me more then the less flawed vocaloids. Despite my dislike of the Kagamines and Sonika, being able to talk about them is what has me investing curiosity in them and why I'm even bothering to notice the V4 Kagamine release. Sometimes a Vocaloid that does its job is boring... Which is where Meiko's problem lies as a good "go to" betweener vocal to rely on that will do the job even when others even of better quality fail.

To me a Vocaloid best trait will always be the job it fits and I value the sound it produces. as mentions elsewhere, Chipspeech hit the nail on the head what I said about the loss of the V1 vocals. Despite the ancient sound of Chipspeech there are people who really would have liked to try the chips of the IBM 704 or Dectalk, those chips being hard to come by make things frustrating. Too clean of a sound can be boring and some songs have benefited more for experimentation then being sparkly.


 * TL;DR, People who focus on the realism of IA could risk thinking that is her only worthwhile trait. :-/

As for XSY, I've talked to death about how wonderful it is and the problems with it despite that after Megpoid was released. I've seen people defend it, but none address the points I made about how stupid it is for 10 vocals to be made with the same tempo and range. I exampled how despite "power" is suitable for Rock perhaps more then the other 9 vocals, that doesn't change that "whisper" can still do that genre despite lacking the traits for it, meaning only the tone gives Power an advantage to begin with over other vocals. I've since heard some Megpoid XSY's between vocals... And honestly, bringing home the point made by Internet, some of the XSY combinations aren't varied enough to notice and others... Well you're better off not XSYing to begin with for one reason or another.

Its the most major flaw of XSY is that its just such a hit and miss feature, despite its awesome ability to increase a Vocaloids achievable tones by double with jut 1 extra vocal.