Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-53539-20180531074332

So the other topic I wanted to create was about how we're increasingly getting more and more Vocaloids that "sound a like" and our thoughts on them.

So if anyone was around the late V2 period and the early V3 on Vocaloid Otaku forums, you'll have witnessed the knee-jerk reactions o late V2 vocals and early V3s. The guys are VO forums were increasingly getting fed up with people saying how VY1 sounds like Miku Append, how "X Vocaloid sounds like y and Z vocaloid", etc, etc.

They were mostly doing this because they didn't like some of the new vocaloids they liked were instantly apparently being put down, because this was often being used in a negative light. And its true, this was going on, but we had so many Vocaloids in early V3 it was overwhelming. There were winners and losers in early V3, whereas V2 we had vocaloids at a easy pace we could keep up with. So anything that was being said urked the VO'ers.

I'll admit it did tend to get crazy and people would say they practically sounded like any vocaloid. Some other comparisons like Sweet Ann sounding like Len made me laugh because Ann came before Len meaning it should be the other way around. We also had the "sounds like 1, 2, 3, 4, Z vocaloid" comparisons wherein several vocaloids would be listed.

It got to the point wherein I actually started having a go back at a few people and pointing out how in real life, there are vocal impersonators, such as Elvis ones... This shouldn't be a surprise as Big Al was originally going to be based on one. Not only that since the human voice is based on the same model with just variants based on the two variants (big voicebox male and non-big female), you have all the limitations and scope of the voice within each human being. Voice actors can produce if their good about a dozen voices (as I examples Brendon Small in my previous topic I made yesterday).

It wasn't just the voice, we also had the "Miku Formula" stuff come out. I thought I'd create a page to save having to repeat the same information over and over again. Bare in miku that a lot of Vocaloids take design pages from Miku, and even one of those majorily having a go at me for this page was a fan of miki… Weeks later the devs turned around and said miki took a few design notes out of Miku and Rin. For those who don't know, the origin of the term is the Chinese contests, the Chinese fans noted how many Vocaloid entries just looked like Miku and this is true. Fans don't and do have creativity and can be either really creative or lack creativity and just copy designs.

Some of the other fans got what was going on and pointed out how as Miku was iconic it was bound to happen, VO had a topic once about a keyboard mascot for a piano keyboard and they had discussed how close to Miku she was. This came about a year or two before this all was going on. So they themselves had joked about it. So Miku was based on a lot of common tropes in design, you can particularly tick off the list and the only one worst then her is V3 Tone Rion. So, with little effort you get this come up time and time again that a Vocaloid will look like her or Len/Rin since those two also have variants on her design. None of the vocaloids who I had noted on the page looked like Miku and there is no mistaking Miku and miki for each other. This was the point.

SeeU is also another who is purposely trying to mimic Miku and it because ever so obvious once the concept art went up as the artist literally had originally done one of her more distinct designs in Miku's v2 art. We also had Ring and Lui who were also problematic as some pointed out how Miku and Len looking the pair was. One had a semi-school theme and the other was a maid/nun. The similarities were bound to happen and yet had no impact on the project.

Eventually this thing got moved to Controversy Concerns and helped actually create that page. This isn't the only example of their reactions and honestly, I'm not going to discuss the woes of VO forums as they often felt they could either bully us into submission or force us to change. This is the only time I really caved in, because the stress got to me, they were constantly harassing me, and I even got chased down outside of the wiki and forum over it. There were no deaths threats, but some of the harassment I got was not much better.

So, it all came to a point by the end of V3 we either weren't mentioning it or people were finding it hard and harder to reject the idea. When Chika came out it was very hard for even some to admit the Gumi comparison. There were also a number of vocaloids as I mentioned being confirmed for the Miku design traits and all that. I think the first foreign designs were being caught up in this too, with anything resembling Miku having a redesign. Then we get to V4 and the vocal like problem has now openingly been noted by devs.

So at this point we've got a Vocaloid inspiring other designs of Vocaloid, vocals that sound too alike... And this comes around to the point of the topic, how we're not really seeing many unique vocaloids anymore and how people feel about it. I like Akari's design was similar to Yukari's but different, as it helped her be more unique but associate with Yukari. Yukari is sadly one of the vocaloids who often was noted to take a page out of Miku's design, so this was a good step away from the problem. We do have the most major problem of the voice type situation, but this is simply common voice types coming out.

I think myself that things have somewhat matured and people no longer are as bothered about design and voice comparisons... There has been little with Komachi despite her having both problems and I myself think we're getting over it. I like this as it means we're moving past pettiness, or that those who do it are starting to realise their missing out on some good vocaloids. We now know that vocaloids can and do end up similar and that's something the fandom as a whole has come to terms with. Thoguh vocaloids can sound alike their voicebanks are mostly unique (they re-use samples across voicebanks) and designs though may share elements are also not splitting clones of each other.

I would like to say "life is good" and better now, but there still are a few jerkish reactions.

I personally think since Circus-P is pretty much saying how like Vocaloids are and that Circus has a following, this means a lot of his followers will have the same opinions. When a person says an opinion and you respect them its going to make you question things more. 