VY2

VY2 (codename; 勇馬, "Yūma") is the second from the avatarless VY series of Vocaloids, produced by Bplats and like VY1 before it, is of the highest quality amongst the Japanese Vocaloid2 engine voicebanks.

History
VY2 was confirmed soon after VY1 and as part of the "VY" series, VY2 shared the same intention as VY1 of being a Vocaloid without set gender, face or voice. Like VY1 was confirmed "Feminine" VY2 was confirmed to be a "masculine" voice type and its release date was set for late 2010.

However, on December 24, 2010, VY2 was confirmed as delayed while quality is improved, it was also confirmed to be specifically a "young masculine" voice. A 15 second demo of the VY2 voice was featured at the Y2×VOCALOID CAFE event in March 2011. On 2011/04/04, a demo song called "Asadoya Yunta" was uploaded into Youtube featuring VY2 singing as the main singer with VY1 as the chorus. On the 14/04/2011, another demo called "Anatani Hana Wo Watashi Ni Uta Wo" was released along with the song 時の過ぎゆくままに. On the 19/04/2011 a demo of Cendrillon featuring the singing voices of VY1 and VY2 was released.

VY2 was release on 25th April 2011, according to the details of the Vocaloid, the Vocaloid is an attempt to make the vocals sound more realistic and stable. VY2 was also designed to define what a male vocal was and has husky results. VY2 is the 4th male vocal in the 'Vocaloid2'' following Kamui Gakupo, Hiyama Kiyoteru and Utatane Piko's male vocals (Kagamine Len and Gachapoid were excluded from this by Bplats due to their vocals being provided by a female vocalists).

iPad and iPhone
VY2 will be released as "iVocaloid" for the iPad and iPhone, release is due before the summer.

Usage for Music
VY2 is intended for professional musicians and according to Yamaha intended to be a high quality voicebank. It shares the same design as its predecessor, VY1, in that as part of the VY series it is designed to set the standard by being a voicebank with no set gender, face or voice and would be a vocalist to complete any song. As a note of the previous Vocaloid VY1, VY2 can be viewed as whatever the user wishes it to be, the voice itself is a "young masculine" voice.

A suggested vocal range was supplied, giving users an idea of where on the piano roll VY2 should be used, unlike VY1 who was left for users to discover. As with VY1, improvements were included, with the inclusion of a faint breath element to make the vocals sound more realistic, which was not present in VY1's voicebanks. The tone of voice was intended to convey the image a handsome young male while the voicebank itself was designed to be easy to use without heavy modifications.

Reception
The following is based on fan forum, Nico Nico Douga and Youtube reactions and may not nessecary be a universal reflection on the Vocaloid for the entire fandom.

VY2 was better recieved then VY1 as the concept of the VY series had been better understood at the time of VY2's release.

Trivia

 * VY2 also was met by some with the same joke that was previously brought up after Big Al and Tonio's late releases, that male Vocaloids (if one regards VY2 as "male") have a tendency of being late, known as Big Al's Syndrome.