User blog comment:OtterJiang/Stardust/@comment-53539-20150529083153

I would argue that her design is suppose to be influenced more by Luo Tianyi, but overall its definitely too Miku-append. *sigh* the fact that their both Vocaloids won't stop the Miku/Stardust comparisons getting out of hand either. People who remember the drama over the misinterpretation of the "Miku Formula" stuff know that this is a clause for drama. Even those who claim they have little interest in Miku go on the defense for Miku whenever this comes up.

The problem is that Miku is the most popular/common vocaloid and that she already borrows most of the cliches from popular cultural design that was made popular by Sailor Moon and its era of characters. In other words, Miku is formulaic to begin with so anything that vaguely uses the same Sailor Moon-esque formula instantly will look like her. Even Tone Rion is using the design forumla, but she is purpose-moe-built so its not a surprise.

The other issue is this.

http://www.clipartbest.com/cliparts/xTg/aer/xTgaerxTA.jpeg

Lets take a look at a stickman. Its suppose to represent a human right? Yep. We know this because humans have a unique design of standing on two feet and having two hands.

http://evilstickman.com/comic/img/comic/30.jpg

We can tell this is attempt to be something like a dog by the same formula.

I remember reading a article about making a character distinct so that just seeing its shoulette makes you acknowledgement its suppose to be.

http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/6/69032/1337547-darkstalkers_wide_cvr___teaser_by_alvinlee.jpg

Its what makes the Dark Stalkers characters stand out as the majority of them you can identify just by shapes alone. Each one is designed to be as different as to the nest one. This was essential during the 90s as system design restraints meant you had a limited palette and pizels to work with. Its why lot of them have unnecessarily oversized design parts, like Morgans wings.

http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120218154855/pokemon/images/f/f2/Who's_That_Pok%C3%A9mon_(IL011).png

Pokemon was the same, it had 150 pokemon and 150 designs to deal with. And it had to fit them onto a Game Boy screen and make them stand out. Plus, since the game was marketed to kids, who identify designs more quickly the more basic they are then adults, the kids identified the characters quickly because they "knew" them from their designs. This is why a lot of kids designs are... Well... Basic...

http://a.images.blip.tv/Rantasmo-WhyStraightGuysLoveMyLittlePony509.jpg http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/06/09/article-2338608-18802C73000005DC-145_634x433.jpg

I mean compare a My Little Pony design to an actual pony...

We learn over time how to tell one design apart... This comes from experiences in real life and is a essential primal skill we have to develop. Sort of how to tell the colour Crimson apart from Scarlet, as a kid we identify them as both "red" and not "Crimson" and "Scarlet".

So move back to Vocaloid. Vocaloid's problem is that its original concept was that every vocaloid was unique back in 2009(ignroing the English vocaloids here as they were still unknown).

We had
 * Miku with her teal pigtails
 * The two Kagamines with their blond colours and twin theme, allowing you to identify they were a pair
 * Luka with her long pink hair, mature body and look asymmetric outfit
 * Meiko with her short red outfit and short brown hair
 * Kaito with his scarf and blue colouring
 * Gackpo with his purple colour and traditional samurai clad
 * Gumi who was green and orange.

In short... Every Vocaloid stood out. Then a few months after Gumi got kicked out we got our first influenced vocaloid, Sonika. I'm not saying that Sonika was bad or anything like that, its just she was the first design we got with any obvious similarities to any past vocaloids. We then got Miki, Big Al...

Basically, what I'm saying over time the things that made the early vocaloids stand out now make the newer ones not stand out. Its like you KNOW every pokemon starts with fire, plant, water as a starter choice. you know there is likely a new Butterfree/Weedle-esque bug, a typical Ratta-esque normal type within the starter areas, a new Pseduo-legendary like Dragonite... Etc... Etc... The list goes on. What once made these characters stand out, now makes them formulaic and you expect them to appear. Its also why Anon & kanon get hassle as "Kagamine Clones" because most see them as that for being two girls with school uniforms + blonde-hair (even though thats light red, but lets not get into that).

Like digimon with its goggles on most main character leaders... :-/

So the theories exist... This is what Miku Formula was suppose to explain, how far Miku's design was suppose to be. Unfortunately the guys at VO thought I was trying to make up a new concept or idea and brand every Vocaloid a Miku clone or something... Either way it was stupid, crazy. I didn't put it in Miku-'s popularity section because of how large it was (see Controversy Concerns, which contains the ramins of the attempt).

Its sort of like how many vocaloid end up being female to begin with... Females sell. Therefore the formula is "female = more money". Vocaloid has become fairly formulaic over the years... We expect a cyber-on-normal-clothes design, for example. We expect a new company to enter with a female vocal. Even when the voice provider is older, the vocaloid they end up with is younger because that also sells more.

Hell, I'll agree with Voilet looking like a purple SF-A2 miki, because ignore the colours their basic shapes are similar.

TL-DR;
 * When we look at a design, we look for the basic identifiable traits (see stick-man, Dark Stalkers, My Little Pony and pokemon explanations), especially younger audiences.
 * Companies use formulas for success all the time, so its not a suprise (see pokemon + digimon examples) that reputation of what made one thing popular will be continued as it kinda... Gets... Expected.
 * Early vocaloids stood out because of their design uniqueness, there were no other characters like them
 * Later Vocaloid designs stand out less because their re-using formulaic stuff
 * These formulas are common design traits (see Sailor Moon and Miku... Hell how many characters are based on Son Goku from dragonball).
 * Its getting harder for companies not to re-use the design tropes since these are popular in culture.

I still don't see the big deal. Maybe its because at this point I'm 31 now and not 18... But I still remember having fun for looking for Beyblade characters "long-lost twins" from other shows.