General Discussion for Virtual Youtubers / Vtubers / Chuubas - it's okay to be a simp for 2D, just don't thirstpost.

[Green Oil]

get in here, who needs sleep? Weaklings, thats who!

Poor Kanata got PTSD when talk about Sans.

 

[Dang Woodchucks!]

get in here, who needs sleep? Weaklings, thats who!

Breaking news: Local angel and PowerPoint enthusiast suddenly on a rampage, blames it on someone with the street name "Mr. Skeltal".

 

[(iIivVvbBb-iIimMmvVv)]

I'm now picturing a cool single mom chain-smoking Coco Kaine.

I'm picturing Yasuko Takasu from Toradora. Looks like we have another member for Holomilf everyone, the sky is the limit here.

"rolly-polys," which is a Midwestern thing.

bay area and everyone I know calls them rolly pollys I don't think it's a dialect thing.

East coast with relatives spanning Florida to Maine; same here.

Obligatory dogpile. NYr an my entire extended family calls them 'roly-polys,' and only nerds and bug people called them pill-bugs.

Coco said EN management has not replied to her about wanting to collab with HoloEN members.They didn't tell her no, they just didn't reply back.

That just seems weird honestly. Personally, I think it has to do with the chat interactions, but not necessarily the CCP insects infecting the EN chats, but the blowback coming from the EN side of things. Look at how 'productive' it has been with Coco's fans going ham on twitter, chats, etc. . . at targeting them. Imagine the monster if any of the competent EN fandom members, which you know contain some real psychos with Taken levels of internet search ability, feel the need to defend their oishi. Just a thought, but I still think they should just let it rip and see what happens. More than likely it would just scare away the antis when they see the Gura wave of spam, or the toxic Amelia stream snipers targeting players in their AO for payback.

Oh, except for some dude asking Marine to say the thing, which was tacky and reddit-tier.

In all fairness, he meant for her to say 'Ahoy,' which is pretty innocuous. She just assumed the foreigner wanted to hear 'I'm Horny' which actually makes the whole thing that much more funny. Keep being you Senchou.

 

[ElUltimoMohicano]

A lot of what you describe makes sense but we all know how Japanese companies are very backward and hierarchical - with lots of what you outlined likely above the paygrade of EnMa who's main responsibility is likely limited to managing/tard-wrangling the three NA EN girls. Note that most of the EN girls sponsorship deals at this point has primarily been with Japanese companies (Kadokawa/Bookwalker, Princess Connect) despite their explosive growth as a gen, so that's a clear indicator of where the main shots as far as deals/partnerships are being called.

This kinda touches on one of the things I was super concerned about in the weeks leading up to the Myth debuts, and a few hours afterward. Within days I had thought the fears were unfounded, but I still see more and more little things that show me there was a little nugget of validity to my concerns. So gimme a minute because I need to let my autism out for a little bit.

I was worried Myth wasn't "actually" going to be English, and it was going to be a Japanese gen but with a half-assed excuse to say they were appealing to the English speaking market.

Before the debut: Almost all the official promotional copy related to the talent listed their names in Japanese order, even when it didn't make sense to do so like Watson Amelia. Two of the characters have very distinctly Japanese-ish names Ninomae and Takanashi. and Takanashi Kiara's sword and shield looked like they would fit right in on some Kamen Rider or Super Sentai show, but was always in her promotional artwork, by the way when was the last time she actually had the sword and shield out during a stream?

During and immediately after the debut: Kiara made it a point to speak as much Japanese as possible. Kiara and Calli confirmed they were living in Japan. Ina had an accent and mentioned playing not just super-exploitative phone games, but the particularly anime ones like FGO, Arknights, etc,

So I didn't catch all of their debut, I completely missed out on Gura, and I forget why, but I went to bed that night convinced that they hired Amelia to be the token actual English speaking talent, but this is a Japanese gen. I ended up being wrong and I'll admit that. But some stuff still comes up that makes me turn my head.

Why is Amelia's official logo still showing her name in Japanese order? Why is Ina's name in her logo written in columns rather than rows? Why are all of Kiara's songs in Japanese with maybe one line in English (I actually still don't know if this was purely Kiara's choice, though I wouldn't put it past her, so she could very well get a pass)? Why are all the promotional contracts for streams done using distinctly Japanese platforms or content like Bookwalker, Princess Connect, Project Diva, Taiko no Tatsujin? I won't speak on game choices for gaming streams that aren't paid promos, because the talent like what they like, so free passes on that.

Like would it really hurt to see if we could get someone in contact with Valve, Bethesda, or Rockstar to get some promo contracts for CS:GO, Fallout, Doom Eternal, Red Dead, GTA Online etc? I mean I get it they're kawaii animu grills and they're mostly going to attact weeb audiences, so in part it makes sense to lean into that, I guess, but every now and then I feel like I have to wonder if they really need to lean that hard into making very Japanese decisions.

 

[Osterry]

Why is Amelia's official logo still showing her name in Japanese order? Why is Ina's name in her logo written in columns rather than rows? Why are all of Kiara's songs in Japanese with maybe one line in English (I actually still don't know if this was purely Kiara's choice, though I wouldn't put it past her, so she could very well get a pass)? Why are all the promotional contracts for streams done using distinctly Japanese platforms or content like Bookwalker, Princess Connect, Project Diva, Taiko no Tatsujin? I won't speak on game choices for gaming streams that aren't paid promos, because the talent like what they like, so free passes on that.

Like would it really hurt to see if we could get someone in contact with Valve, Bethesda, or Rockstar to get some promo contracts for CS:GO, Fallout, Doom Eternal, Red Dead, GTA Online etc? I mean I get it they're kawaii animu grills and they're mostly going to attact weeb audiences, so in part it makes sense to lean into that, I guess, but every now and then I feel like I have to wonder if they really need to lean that hard into making very Japanese decisions.

I mean, I hate to be the one breaking this to you but Hololive is a Japanese company. HoloEN is their international product, but that doesn't mean they have made an international branch per se, like Nintendo or Mitsubishi who made an American subsidiary company, they only have a English Manager to handle the International talent. All the ads and promotional thing can be easily passed away as Cover still thinking, and limited, to domestic sponsorship even as they have extremely successful international product, which made sense considering A. how Cover is still very much a startup with no real history until recently and B. how shit Japanese companies can be at expanding to international market.

 

[Islamic Heisenberg]

Why are all of Kiara's songs in Japanese with maybe one line in English (I actually still don't know if this was purely Kiara's choice, though I wouldn't put it past her, so she could very well get a pass)?

Well for my personal taste id rather hear a japanese song coming out of the mouth of anime looking characters as my brain has been wired to automatically make the connection that anime=japanese, but that's just me. As for Kiara i think it's because she's more comfortable singing in japanese? i don't know, living there for 5+ years might do that to you. Besides, she's one of the EN member (other than Calli that does JP only stream from time to time) that actively uses Japanese and caters to the japanese audience and the way i see it, singing a japanese song would please both audience from the JP side and EOPs as all of them, we can safely assume, are anime watcher and thus are familiar with japanese songs. Calli songs got many japanese lines in them too, and even Moona, who barely speak any japanese and by theory would've alienated the japanese speaking audience, made her own original song full in japanese and she even wrote the lyrics herself.

So yeah, i think they're all just a huge fucking weaboo.

 

[Jaeger]

Like would it really hurt to see if we could get someone in contact with Valve, Bethesda, or Rockstar to get some promo contracts for CS:GO, Fallout, Doom Eternal, Red Dead, GTA Online etc? I mean I get it they're kawaii animu grills and they're mostly going to attact weeb audiences, so in part it makes sense to lean into that, I guess, but every now and then I feel like I have to wonder if they really need to lean that hard into making very Japanese decisions.

Honestly, consider what sorts of companies these are, by-and-large, as well as all the copyright laws and stuff that exist. For example, why was the "DOOG" Easter Egg removed? Legal reasons. CYA stuff. International copyright laws are more difficult to deal with than domestic ones. To top it off, Hololive and anime in general are still not mainstream and keep in mind even Sony has all but abandoned Japan by now and Valve keeps purging Japanese stuff off of Steam because somehow 18+ anime characters = sexualized minors (while Netflix's Cuties is "stunning and brave"). We don't have the most welcoming environment to anything that doesn't make a Herculean attempt to appease the festering troon-pits of ResetEra.

 

[Biobreak]

This kinda touches on one of the things I was super concerned about in the weeks leading up to the Myth debuts, and a few hours afterward. Within days I had thought the fears were unfounded, but I still see more and more little things that show me there was a little nugget of validity to my concerns. So gimme a minute because I need to let my autism out for a little bit.

I was worried Myth wasn't "actually" going to be English, and it was going to be a Japanese gen but with a half-assed excuse to say they were appealing to the English speaking market.

Before the debut: Almost all the official promotional copy related to the talent listed their names in Japanese order, even when it didn't make sense to do so like Watson Amelia. Two of the characters have very distinctly Japanese-ish names Ninomae and Takanashi. and Takanashi Kiara's sword and shield looked like they would fit right in on some Kamen Rider or Super Sentai show, but was always in her promotional artwork, by the way when was the last time she actually had the sword and shield out during a stream?

During and immediately after the debut: Kiara made it a point to speak as much Japanese as possible. Kiara and Calli confirmed they were living in Japan. Ina had an accent and mentioned playing not just super-exploitative phone games, but the particularly anime ones like FGO, Arknights, etc,

So I didn't catch all of their debut, I completely missed out on Gura, and I forget why, but I went to bed that night convinced that they hired Amelia to be the token actual English speaking talent, but this is a Japanese gen. I ended up being wrong and I'll admit that. But some stuff still comes up that makes me turn my head.

Why is Amelia's official logo still showing her name in Japanese order? Why is Ina's name in her logo written in columns rather than rows? Why are all of Kiara's songs in Japanese with maybe one line in English (I actually still don't know if this was purely Kiara's choice, though I wouldn't put it past her, so she could very well get a pass)? Why are all the promotional contracts for streams done using distinctly Japanese platforms or content like Bookwalker, Princess Connect, Project Diva, Taiko no Tatsujin? I won't speak on game choices for gaming streams that aren't paid promos, because the talent like what they like, so free passes on that.

Like would it really hurt to see if we could get someone in contact with Valve, Bethesda, or Rockstar to get some promo contracts for CS:GO, Fallout, Doom Eternal, Red Dead, GTA Online etc? I mean I get it they're kawaii animu grills and they're mostly going to attact weeb audiences, so in part it makes sense to lean into that, I guess, but every now and then I feel like I have to wonder if they really need to lean that hard into making very Japanese decisions.

Most Japanese companies that aren't necessarily traditional multinational conglomerates tend to be Japan-centric in their business-focus and strategies. Being agile and adept at leaning into explosive trends isn't really their thing. EN wasn't expected to be this successful, more like a bigger version of ID with a throwaway foreign audience they didn't quite expect to be this big.

It reminds me of this 7-minute clip from the Trash Taste podcast episode where their manager Meilyne Tran was recalling how she, as the only foreign employee at Kadokawa/Bookwalker at the time, had to push/convince the company about the merits of marketing via collabing with YouTubers and online influencers (which isn't really a novel idea, but take note, she HAD to personally advocate for it). Meilyne isn't Japanese - she's a Vietnamese-American transplant in Japan who managed to get hired/work at Kadokawa because she found a marketing job-listing of theirs listed IN FUCKING CRAIGSLIST.

Now let's ask ourselves: who at the Cover head office is like Meilyne? Someone who isn't necessarily married to traditional Japanese business culture and can think outside the box with fresh ideas that can take advantage of the explosive growth and visibility of HoloEN?

Coco, right? She's the one who pushed for the EN gen and was actually the first to actually take advantage and lean into their foreign audience and viewers.

The problem is that Coco is just a talent who probably burned through her clout with management after the Taiwan incident. The EN advocate can't be one of the talents as well. It has to be someone from upper management with actual clout that can push for a more aggressive pursuit of deals/partnerships outside of Japan. I don't think that person exists among the Cover higher-ups at the moment though.

As someone has already succinctly phrased above: Cover is still basically a start-up with a highly successful international product that they haven't realized they can monetize even further because of how at their very core, they're still just a Japanese company.

 

[TiredCatto]

Why are all the promotional contracts for streams done using distinctly Japanese platforms or content like Bookwalker, Princess Connect, Project Diva, Taiko no Tatsujin? I won't speak on game choices for gaming streams that aren't paid promos, because the talent like what they like, so free passes on that.

Like would it really hurt to see if we could get someone in contact with Valve, Bethesda, or Rockstar to get some promo contracts for CS:GO, Fallout, Doom Eternal, Red Dead, GTA Online etc? I mean I get it they're kawaii animu grills and they're mostly going to attact weeb audiences, so in part it makes sense to lean into that, I guess, but every now and then I feel like I have to wonder if they really need to lean that hard into making very Japanese decisions.

like @Stadenwick said, yes they are under the Japanese company, with japanese connection. that is why mostly their promotion going around Japanese stuff, things i realised when watching some joey from trash taste videos. he went around interviewing anime company, voice actor, rockstar, because his manager have that connection and prolly have some talk, doing interview might got them money. unless Hololive become a Franchise, then most thing going on are under Japanese agreement.

the same goes with the game they streams, idk but recently i realised this girl game kinda saturated, and mostly follow each other so im getting bored watching them. yeah sure some have their own game that many not play but it doesnt hide the fact many game the talent play are already greenlight and their option not that much so like it or not the others just try play that game that already on greenlight list. you can see everyone play Mario, everyone play Undertale. its one of the retarded thing Japan does, it make them look progress backward.

here to clean your mind someone also getting tired with weeb shit request

 

[Grass4Cats]

F for Choco's level. Gone with the wind by creeper's fart explosion.

 

[Hangula Hungui]

Over the last year, I only ever saw highlight clips of Vtubers and found them cute but never fully involved myself with any livestreams or any deeper level of „fandom“.
However, after I stumbled upon a clip of Kiara speaking german (and hearing a slight austrian accent), I think I became a fan. I live relatively close to the austrian border (about an hour by car) and was fascinated how somebody with an accent that I always connect to my home area is a Vtuber. So yeah, I‘m glad her livestreams are now more accessible to me due to timezones not being a factor anymore. I might even join the membership.
What the fuck is wrong with me. What have I become? Why do I find this so comfy?

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

Wait zentreya is political I just didn't like him/her? Because of the voice

Yeah, a lot of people don't like the voice. Its the reason that the most common rrat is that its a man behind the avatar. Otherwise, why even bother hiding the voice. Well, that and the "voice reveal" they did some years ago that only threw fuel on that fire. Somebody else has already posted that video way earlier in this thread, so search it up. Also posted earlier; the Trump sperging Zentreya did on their Twitter after joining Vshojo. Surprised she got no punishment for that one.

Since we already talking about her. The latest info is she's married. And divorced. And have a kid. Coco say her sister is independent and would never ask her for money, so I'm now picturing a cool single mom chain-smoking Coco Kaine.

She sounds like a woman who's lived (and is still living) a very hard life.

 

[Diya]

She sounds like a woman who's lived (and is still living) a very hard life.

So far seems to be by choice, and she have a family that support her, and push come to shove she have the most super-chatted dragon in the world as her big sister. Her and her kid will be fine.

 

[ElUltimoMohicano]

No lie though the one I'm actually most confused by is the logo saying Watson Amelia.

I actually get angry sometimes when I see that thing.

It's the most petty dumb bullshit first world problem ever though, so I'll accept my autism reacts.

 

[rivershell]

I was worried Myth wasn't "actually" going to be English, and it was going to be a Japanese gen but with a half-assed excuse to say they were appealing to the English speaking market.

I think Cover was unsure how to approach the EoP audience since the western vtuber scene was and still is a baby when holoMyth debuted. They went in a direction they were familiar with by sticking to a similar culture as the JP side from the start while slowly giving the talent more autonomy over time. As successful as they may be, holoMyth is still Cover's pioneers in EoP territory and I think the direction with the next batch of EN talent will be quite telling if they double down in their current ways. I think they will since there's no reason to change what's working and like other's have said: Japanese companies are slow to adjust.

Why is Ina's name in her logo written in columns rather than rows? Why are all of Kiara's songs in Japanese with maybe one line in English (I actually still don't know if this was purely Kiara's choice, though I wouldn't put it past her, so she could very well get a pass)

I think these are coincidences. I believe Ina chose who designed her logo and they probably thought it looked aesthetically pleasing while Kiara just likes how Japanese songs sound and the feel they have compared to English lyrics so yeah like what Islamic Heisenberg said, they're mega weebs.

Honestly, consider what sorts of companies these are, by-and-large, as well as all the copyright laws and stuff that exist. For example, why was the "DOOG" Easter Egg removed? Legal reasons. CYA stuff. International copyright laws are more difficult to deal with than domestic ones.

like @Stadenwick said, yes they are under the Japanese company, with japanese connection. that is why mostly their promotion going around Japanese stuff

the same goes with the game they streams, idk but recently i realised this girl game kinda saturated, and mostly follow each other so im getting bored watching them.

This is one of the advantages of being an indie and I think it will be interesting to see how it affects the growing EN vtuber space because it's hololive vs. everyone else right now. Sure there's VShojo, but I consider them a band of indies similar to VOMS rather than a bona-fide company--someone who watches them can correct me on that though. I'm curious to see an American or Western-based equivalent to Cover (or bigger) to try and challenge hololive just to see how Cover would react.

 

[ZMOT]

Most Japanese companies that aren't necessarily traditional multinational conglomerates tend to be Japan-centric in their business-focus and strategies. Being agile and adept at leaning into explosive trends isn't really their thing. EN wasn't expected to be this successful, more like a bigger version of ID with a throwaway foreign audience they didn't quite expect to be this big.

what's even worse is that this whole thing is still so new that there isn't really a book you can follow, which would be an issue for most companies. so I can't really fault them for the "proceed with caution" strategy.
the other thing is probably a bit corporate arrogance, like I said the smart thing would be to let the talent pick their own stuff they wanna play/stream, and then work out a deal, but any big company goes "how does that profit us?", which means only high profile titles, which would come with their own stipulations, which no wants to bother with, turning that whole thing into a bureaucratic human centipede.

give mio-mama another comfy builder, and since indie games aren't that long this way you could easily have an influx of new games every week instead of the usual apex/minecraft/meme game of the month. the profit would be the stream itself (and the SCs flying in your direction) with the talent having fun, and indies are probably thankful for the boost so they'd be very accommodating with any license deals.

What the fuck is wrong with me. What have I become? Why do I find this so comfy?

welcome to the next level brother. wait till you get to the jp branch and be confronted by dragon tights and the abyss that is haachama.
and that's just hololive. so buckle up and enjoy the ride.

Sexy boomer? No sluts are allowed in Hololive??

That was hilarious! I can't believe I hadn't seen that clip yet.

what kills me is the perfect uzaki-chan impression of the pirate being smug. I suck at art but it would be perfect reason for some OC.

This is why we need HoloBalkans. Everyone can be entertained by their constant bickering and colorful insults.

till someone says something wrong and the next thing you see is them choking each other out live on stream and starting another civil war.
also the poor subbers.

 

[Hangula Hungui]

welcome to the next level brother. wait till you get to the jp branch and be confronted by dragon tights and the abyss that is haachama.
and that's just hololive. so buckle up and enjoy the ride.

I‘m a 30 year old divorced lonely sack of shit who sometimes holds a cup of coffee/tea against his face to feel some sort of warmth in his life.
I think I‘m ready to embrace this abyss.

 

[Deluxe]

JENMA is not Japanese according to Marine

 

[Osterry]

This is one of the advantages of being an indie and I think it will be interesting to see how it affects the growing EN vtuber space because it's hololive vs. everyone else right now. Sure there's VShojo, but I consider them a band of indies similar to VOMS rather than a bona-fide company--someone who watches them can correct me on that though. I'm curious to see an American or Western-based equivalent to Cover (or bigger) to try and challenge hololive just to see how Cover would react.

I don't think western company would/could actually manage to capture "v-tubing industry" though. While streaming with avatar obviously isn't an exclusively Japanese thing, making a corporation out of it to gather, market, and develop talents is certainly so, occurred only because of the influence of the traditional Japanese idol industry and how competitive the local entertainment industry is. To me, it would be just like how drawing comics isn't exclusively japanese but Manga is and how DC/Marvel can't just replicate Shounen Jump to cash in the U.S weeb market.

There would be a historical-cultural nuance that western entertainment industry will inevitably miss/get wrong, not to mention the obvious difference in attitude toward politics that will led to a lot of mess. Don't get me wrong, shit like V-shojo can certainly thrive in the market and a more competent group may even downright compete with Hololive, but its only because as you said, they're just band of indies. They know what actually happening in the field and free from meddling out of touch corpos who'll force their hands to do unproductive shit.

 

[Kazuma]

Uto is doing a singing stream for 400k subs