VOCALOID What do you think the future holds for Vocaloid itself, now that we have finally reached the end of 2020? What would you like to see?

[KingPapillon]

With many developers and distributors having seemingly halted their production or jumped ship from Vocaloid 5 this generation, what do you think the future will hold for, not just new voicebanks with new characters, but pre-existing established Vocaloids we already know and love? As of right now, It looks like a lot of production is finding its way on to alternate engines (Cevio AI, SynthV, Neutrino) to develop and distribute. For a while, I was optimistic that we'd see a new V5 by now, or at least an update at this point, but things are starting to look not so great. Although nothing is ever concrete, over the years we have seen Internet Co, Gynoid, AH-Soft, Vocalomarkets, SSS, Aria/First Place, Power FX, Zero-G, Voctro Labs, and Crypton Future Media all either abandon or halt their Vocaloid projects, and those are only of the groups we do know of that have done or said anything since. When it comes to producing and selling voicebanks, it becomes very obvious that vtubing is the current hot trend, what with every new Voice Synth character coming out with their own talk database, so Cevio AI must be looking pretty good to many of these developers right about now.

My last hope for the Vocaloid engine itself, was for us to see continued support in the forms of updates or new voicebanks for Vocaloids that had maybe at least reached middling popularity status at some point, like some of Internet's Vocaloids, but that isn't looking like its going to happen. My biggest hope for V5 right out of the gate was in Gynoid and AHS with their MEIKA and Sora packages, but now that C Flower is a thing, and AHS having outright said that they will no longer develop future Vocaloids, things are looking kind of bleak for new commercial Vocaloid packages. I'm confident that Yamaha won't be completely dropping their vocal synthesis technology any time soon, and there may even actually be a Vocaloid 6 one day that probably strays even more off of the path that they've been going on for a few years now (catering primarily to edm loop users). I do know about Vocaloid AI and Charlie, but neither of them seem like they will be sold as usable traditional Vocaloid packages any time soon. I don't know what is currently going on with the supposed Vsinger V5 updates that were announced ages ago, but ST Media has been quiet on their new Korean vocal. After UNI and SeeU English, I don't trust anything they say anymore lol.

Personally for me, I really hope Gynoid continues to develop for Vocaloid despite the creation of C Flower, because their Vocaloids are my personal favorites, and Cevio is so unaccessible when it comes to overseas Vocaloid fans like us, especially if you're a Mac user like me lol. I hope I also get to see GUMI and (internet)co either stay with a new updated V5/6, or move on to SynthV. I wouldn't mind a new update from Yamaha themselves either, as their one off projects like ZOLA, Sachiko and Fukase were great new additions imo, but they haven't released a new voicebank since V5's launch.. My hopes for anything new native English Vocaloid related is completely dead, but I would love to see one again some day too.

And if none of that comes to pass, welp, at least we still have SynthV!

 

[peaches2217]

I just want Yamaha to finally release a V5 trial. So many people would be able to try it for themselves rather than hating it just because that’s the cool thing to do, and I think that would also cut down the “vOcAlOiD is dEaD” jokes and crap.

2021 also holds two very exciting releases: Yanhe and Ling V5! I’ve been interested in both and I can’t wait to hear them. I truly hope it helps bring some attention back to Vocaloid, at least for a bit.

 

[___]

I feel like Yamaha will break the 4-year update tradition and will instead keep V5 around for very long, isntead choosing to continue updating it like they're doing now. They'll let the option to let other companies develop vocaloid voicebanks open but they themselves will use the vocaloid synth technology in different ways ie. Charlie.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

I feel like Yamaha will break the 4-year update tradition and will instead keep V5 around for very long, isntead choosing to continue updating it like they're doing now. They'll let the option to let other companies develop vocaloid voicebanks open but they themselves will use the vocaloid synth technology in different ways ie. Charlie.

I agree that Yamaha might keep V5 going for a while longer compared to previous versions of Vocaloid. I can't see how V6 would push the program further, aside from additional language support, and even then, that's something that could be done within a V5 update.

I think Yamaha has been moving away from character/otaku-driven VBs like Miku and trying to get back to the original purpose of Vocaloid, which was to provide a singer that would always be ready for more professional musicians, never mind that this approach has alienated both the companies behind character banks (hence all the moves towards Piapro, SynthV, CeVIO, etc.) and the amateur musician scene that the Vocaloid and wider vocal synth fandoms sprung from. (Not to mention that professional musicians are still turned off from vocal synths due to quality issues, fear of the technology replacing real singers, the cost of buying a vocal synth, etc.)

I'm trying to see a future for Vocaloid in the way Yamaha wants the program to go, but I can't see it, unless a professional musician uses it in a significant way that attracts positive attention and popularity, and helps vocal synths in general break out of their stigma of only really catering to otaku communities. Say what you want about CeVIO recently, but it's still trying to gun for both the amateur musician community that made it popular, and the VTuber community that is currently ascending. Same thing with SynthV to a lesser extent (its AI version is still in the experimental stage, from the look of things, but the normal version continues to gain popularity as it updates). Meanwhile, Crypton hasn't forgotten about the amateurs who turned Miku into the idol she still currently is through Piapro NT. What has Vocaloid got going for it now, especially since Miku has been moved away from it? The Meikas are popular, but are nowhere near as big as Miku and co. obviously, and certainly not as popular as Flower, whom Gynoid are now experimenting on on CeVIO. Sora was quickly forgotten, despite her Cool bank being a dream. Charlie doesn't really count because he's a private bank.

 

[KingPapillon]

2021 also holds two very exciting releases: Yanhe and Ling V5! I’ve been interested in both and I can’t wait to hear them. I truly hope it helps bring some attention back to Vocaloid, at least for a bit.

The VSingerloids are pretty neat, but I would probably be more excited if I understood how to make mandarin synths work. Still hope they get their updates.

I feel like Yamaha will break the 4-year update tradition and will instead keep V5 around for very long, isntead choosing to continue updating it like they're doing now. They'll let the option to let other companies develop vocaloid voicebanks open but they themselves will use the vocaloid synth technology in different ways ie. Charlie.

This seems most likely at this point. Maybe Vocaloid 6 might not even be open for third party developers anymore? I can see Yamaha trying to take full reigns of the program, turning it into a high powered plugin thats aimed only towards "professional" producers with a few default voice choices like Chris and Amy.

I agree that Yamaha might keep V5 going for a while longer compared to previous versions of Vocaloid. I can't see how V6 would push the program further, aside from additional language support, and even then, that's something that could be done within a V5 update.

I think Yamaha has been moving away from character/otaku-driven VBs like Miku and trying to get back to the original purpose of Vocaloid, which was to provide a singer that would always be ready for more professional musicians, never mind that this approach has alienated both the companies behind character banks (hence all the moves towards Piapro, SynthV, CeVIO, etc.) and the amateur musician scene that the Vocaloid and wider vocal synth fandoms sprung from. (Not to mention that professional musicians are still turned off from vocal synths due to quality issues, fear of the technology replacing real singers, the cost of buying a vocal synth, etc.)

I'm trying to see a future for Vocaloid in the way Yamaha wants the program to go, but I can't see it, unless a professional musician uses it in a significant way that attracts positive attention and popularity, and helps vocal synths in general break out of their stigma of only really catering to otaku communities. Say what you want about CeVIO recently, but it's still trying to gun for both the amateur musician community that made it popular, and the VTuber community that is currently ascending. Same thing with SynthV to a lesser extent (its AI version is still in the experimental stage, from the look of things, but the normal version continues to gain popularity as it updates). Meanwhile, Crypton hasn't forgotten about the amateurs who turned Miku into the idol she still currently is through Piapro NT. What has Vocaloid got going for it now, especially since Miku has been moved away from it? The Meikas are popular, but are nowhere near as big as Miku and co. obviously, and certainly not as popular as Flower, whom Gynoid are now experimenting on on CeVIO. Sora was quickly forgotten, despite her Cool bank being a dream. Charlie doesn't really count because he's a private bank.

Hard agree with everything here. If you want to see an alternate timeline where Vocaloid isn't being restrained by its virtual idol inflicted past, look at how well Emvoice is doing lol. Vocaloid's appeal is 100% misc fan made content, anime influence, novelty, and some talented music producers that can actually make them sound nice sprinkled in. The individuals who are only into the tech side of stuff are in the extreme minority. There's also the application of songwriters being able to use Vocaloid to make drafts of songs, but the barrier to entry of usability on top of having to pay for another hefty priced music program probably makes it look less appealing to them too. Also, the overwhelming majority of amateur songwriters are completely broke, and the ones that have money probably have the resources and connections to just grab a real singer who nets them both more popularity.

Side note: a dream concept I have, is that one day, Yamaha releases a sort of legacy version of Vocaloid, that includes voicebanks from V2 and beyond, they could release it on one of their anniversaries as a way to honor their past, and it would serve as a way to keep older Vocaloids running on new operating system versions. I would so buy that..

 

[peaches2217]

The VSingerloids are pretty neat, but I would probably be more excited if I understood how to make mandarin synths work. Still hope they get their updates.

Truth be told, I’ve never used Mandarin vocals on Vocaloid, but I use them frequently in SynthV. So I’m excited to switch things up!

 

[KingPapillon]

Truth be told, I’ve never used Mandarin vocals on Vocaloid, but I use them frequently in SynthV. So I’m excited to switch things up!

I love the Mandarin SynthV voices, and I even purchased AiKO, but I suck so much, I've only played with her in Japanese and English, I find the SynthVs to be so phonetically flexible, even though I know that they sound much better singing in their own native language.
I've considered buying a Mandarin Vocaloid, but for whatever reason, they don't sound as phonetically flexible(?) as the SynthV Mandarin vocals do? There are very few examples of Chinese Vocaloids singing in English, and the few that there are sound very rough. Making AiKO sing in English is fun and her accent is adorable, and she somehow sounds better singing in English than accented, rough Japanese, and I've heard great English uses of Cangqiong. I already butcher the Japanese language so much, I'm afraid of dipping into Mandarin, but If I had to make the jump, Xin Hua is probably at the front of my to-get list, and then its Tiyanyi and Ling.

 

[morrysillusion]

definitely agree with a lot of whats being said here. its clear vocaloid gained its popularity from the fan side of stuff, which was fine for a while, but i always thought it was clear too that it was probably not what Yamaha would want to stick with for the rest of its lifespan.... and its hard to imagine an alternate timeline where they stuck with strict professional aimed vocaloid stuff (and while emovoice is an example of trying that, i do think it failed for....multiple other reasons too lol), because its also clear how unappealing vocal synths are to many- its no ones fault for disliking them other than the technology still honestly, being quite new. Vocal synths still have a long way to go and imo i feel like yamaha leaning into the character vocal stuff maybe didn't give the time to keep improving the core of vocal synth itself? but its hard to say how much time they'd want to spend on trying to improve vocaloid past what it is, considering time, money and interest.

the moment vocaloid 5 released, i just knew thats the vibe they were going for- on top of the loop presets, tutorial videos, etc. its just kind of "too late" in a sense, to try and establish that after so long, when they haven't really done the right stuff to get it to catch on with professionals (like come on yamaha, you have the money to spend on advirtizing it...what are you doing??). and because of that, for fans like me, its more about watching every company and seeing what they're gonna do now.... there are some companies i wish hadnt moved to certain synths due to being unwelcoming (in terms of using it) to overseases users like myself (gynoid, with cevio, for example) but it seems like a period of trial and error is likely about, with trying to see what methods stick and work best.

i can imagine vocaloid/yamaha will remain quite.. silent for a while, but i hope for not too much longer, because i cant even guess why they'd want to be as silent as they have been.. i mean, its not a great look. considering every other japanese voice is scuttling away to a different synth. if vocaloid continues, i hope yamaha will consider digging into more ways to improve the synth, most on the english language side if they are really aiming for professionals. i would definitely be curious about them diving into AI synth stuff too. reason why i say english language too is that im unsure if the japanese side of music producers will pick up in the same way due to so many character voices moving to other synths- but who's to say. with yamaha releasing v5 with two english voices and two japanese one, it at least makes me hope they'd give the same care to expanding on the english language if they really want to branch out to the professional side of music.

 

[WyndReed]

I’ve been hoping for a while now that yamaha would see that most of the people purchasing and using their software are from the hobbyist/fan side of things and rerelease the older engines and corresponding voicebanks. From what I understand there are a lot of users that prefer V4 to V5.
It seems to me that if Yamaha doesn’t do something to appeal to their base or change their ways to be more appealing to new userd, that vocaloid will effectively die since the major companies have jumped ship for other synth companies.

 

[Ronny777]

I know it doesn't sound doable but I'd be really like an international Vocaloid that could sing in multiple languages and accents all in one voicbank. It could really open up all sorts of possibilities.or They could at least let us mix voice banks of the same character together. Like if we could mix Miku's Japanese voice banks with her english to get different sounds. It might not blend that well or at all but i would like the choice to do it since I already own them...

 

[KingPapillon]

I know it doesn't sound doable but I'd be really like an international Vocaloid that could sing in multiple languages and accents all in one voicbank. It could really open up all sorts of possibilities.or They could at least let us mix voice banks of the same character together. Like if we could mix Miku's Japanese voice banks with her english to get different sounds. It might not blend that well or at all but i would like the choice to do it since I already own them...

JSYK, this was actually almost half possible within the cracked versions of Vocaloid 4 with XSY, you could cross Miku V3 Original and Miku English to end up with some sort of abomination Miku with really bad pronunciation and phoneme glitches since they were obviously never meant to overlap lol. I know what you're referring to though is completely different, with wanting to be able to use actual different phonemes and have them transition seamlessly with others of different languages in a single database. It's technically possible, but It would take a staggering amount of recordings and disk space unless the current recording + resampling method itself was overhauled, and absolutely no company has the incentive to do any of that. If anyone attempts to do anything nearly that experimental with sample referencing, my bets are on Dreamtonic's SynthV doing it if at all. That does sound really cool though, and we almost already have an actual Vocaloid like that, and her name is MAIKA!

Seriously though, Voctro Labs kind of went all the way with recording MAIKA's phonemes, with just her single one voicebank, she can sing comfortably in several different languages without it sounding too strained, albeit with a charming Spanish accent lol. It's probably because Voctro has had their own hand in the original development of Vocaloid itself, but I stand by the opinion that MAIKA has the single most impressively developed voicebank of all Vocaloids even to this day.

tldr super underrated vocaloid, pls buy maika..

 

[Ronny777]

Seriously though, Voctro Labs kind of went all the way with recording MAIKA's phonemes, with just her single one voicebank, she can sing comfortably in several different languages without it sounding too strained, albeit with a charming Spanish accent lol. It's probably because Voctro has had their own hand in the original development of Vocaloid itself, but I stand by the opinion that MAIKA has the single most impressively developed voicebank of all Vocaloids even to this day.

tldr super underrated vocaloid, pls buy maika..

OMG you're right! MAIKA does sort of does fill that role... and i already have her. I feel really silly >_>'. I can almost make her sing french with her 'x' input as french r's. so i guess i really just want every vocaloid to have that phonetic input available. i can almost replicate it with Miku using 'v' in front of 'r'.

 

[___]

While there's definitely been switching-over process happening it too had been riddled with complications on all ends. Will those other synths overthrow Vocaloids? Maybe. Time will tell. But it certainly won't happen soon. Vocaloid may not be the most active or promising synth right now, but it's still the most relevant, with the biggest number of relevant voicebanks and all the voicebanks who migrated from vocaloid or have gotten non-vocaloid vociebanks have shown to be downgrades from their vocaloid counterparts giving producers no reason to really use those over the vocaloid version. And even if some non-vocaloid voicebanks will gain as big of a relevancy I think it would take really long to really over-throw the legacy of some vocaloid voicebanks.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

While there's definitely been switching-over process happening it too had been riddled with complications on all ends. Will those other synths overthrow Vocaloids? Maybe. Time will tell. But it certainly won't happen soon. Vocaloid may not be the most active or promising synth right now, but it's still the most relevant, with the biggest number of relevant voicebanks and all the voicebanks who migrated from vocaloid or have gotten non-vocaloid vociebanks have shown to be downgrades from their vocaloid counterparts giving producers no reason to really use those over the vocaloid version. And even if some non-vocaloid voicebanks will gain as big of a relevancy I think it would take really long to really over-throw the legacy of some vocaloid voicebanks.

I doubt another synth developed in Japan will overthrow Vocaloid (not even Piapro despite Miku being the new flagship for it), unless a company made an effort to directly appeal to English-speaking producers. The biggest stumbling block for all current synths right now is that they're mostly aimed at Japanese (and to a lesser extent, Chinese) producers, so there's not much incentive to try out a synth if you don't understand the language it was primarily created for.

 

[SeleDreams]

Also licence wise, except vocaloid and synthv pro, engines like cevio don't allow commercial use without approval so it's less attractive to people who want to make music for games or want to sell their music in albums and stuff

For Vocaloid 5, Yamaha has probably two choices left, go back to their root, by updating the vocaloid 5 vb dev licence to make it easier for third parties to make vbs and update the engine (no need of a completely new one i think it's better to go from the base of V5 and mostly make it better), or just giving up

 

[Krin]

I just want Yamaha to finally release a V5 trial. So many people would be able to try it for themselves rather than hating it just because that’s the cool thing to do, and I think that would also cut down the “vOcAlOiD is dEaD” jokes and crap.

It's still so weird to me how Yamaha doesn't give out at least a 10-day free trial for V5. Even the standard version is a little expensive, and you'd think people would want to test the waters on something before they go and splurge all that money? (At least that's how I felt before buying it, I didn't want to gamble ). I agree this would also stop the dumb "Vocaloid is dead" jokes because then more people would try it out and find out how much better it is than that rusty thing called V4. Also, having no trial for V5 probably makes buying it way less appealing to those who are either fans of vocal-synths themselves or the Vocaloid characters / songs BUT have never used any previous versions of Vocaloid, or maybe even any synth for that matter. If Yamaha put in a trial that lasts at least like, 10 or more days? I think that'd help those who are on the fence about upgrading from V4 -> V5 aaand those who maybe are new to vocal-synths make a good decision!

a perspective from an UTAU user lol

Being someone who primarily uses a vocal-synth that is NOT Vocaloid (ahem, uncultured UTAU user here), it was a really tough decision for me to decide if I either were to stick with my V4 which I owned since late 2016ish, or upgrade to V5. I didn't have many good reasons to upgrade to V5 because I only owned 4 Vocaloids, didn't care too much for tuning in V4 engine, plus I didn't use V4 nearly as much as I used UTAU. The worry was that if I bought V5, I'd end up not liking the feel of it (because again, how am I supposed to know based off pictures and videos if I was gonna like the feeling of tuning in V5??), and essentially just dropping it like I did V4.

I was initially intrigued by V5 because of the new pitchbend system because it felt a little more like home back in the UTAU engine. I did end up making the purchase though a few days ago actually!! And right away I'm already enjoying tuning in V5 so much more than V4. It still has a very different feel to it than both V4 and UTAU, but I'm really enjoying this new way of tuning.

Side note: a dream concept I have, is that one day, Yamaha releases a sort of legacy version of Vocaloid, that includes voicebanks from V2 and beyond, they could release it on one of their anniversaries as a way to honor their past, and it would serve as a way to keep older Vocaloids running on new operating system versions. I would so buy that..

I would love this too!!! This also made me think about how much of a hassle it is if you wanted to use or buy a V2 Vocaloid, but only owned V4 or V5 (since to my knowledge both of those software stopped supporting V2 compatibility, kind of disappointing). Unless I'm missing something, you'd have to get an entirely new engine (preferably V3 since it'd be the most recent one that supports V2s) to use those voicebanks. I just wish Yamaha would, as they release new Vocaloid engines / updates, make it so that all previous voicebanks are compatible, if that's even possible. I'd love to use Luka's V2 but since I don't own any engine prior to V4 it's just not practical to buy a whole other engine and a voicebank just to use her.

---

As for the future of Vocaloid I think I'm on the side of Yamaha giving V5 updates continuously rather than the V6 idea. But I think Vocaloid is kind of in a tough place advertising wise in the west especially because of it's current image mainly being Miku and "hurrdurrrr make anime robot girl sing" kind of thing lolol. I felt like I knew where Yamaha was trying to head with V5 by showing Amy / Chris and showing how it can be a realistic tool to sing for aspiring music producers, it feels kind of more like they were trying to appeal to the westerners too this time but that could just be me idk. I think there will always be fans of Vocaloid itself and vocal-synths so I don't see Vocaloid becoming a thing of the past anytime soon at least. Vocaloid is still immensely popular over in Japan right? So even if Yamaha chose to continue to cater to Japanese / Chinese speakers more, Vocaloid still isn't going anywhere. It's the most relevant vocal-synth right now and probably will continue to be unless something big happens with another company.

Sorry this is so long! I get wordy but this was an interesting topic to read :)

 

[SeleDreams]

the weirdest thing is, vocaloid 5 ALREADY has a trial, it starts when we don't activate it, we can see that it goes in trial mode, they just weirdly basically gave the trial mode to people who purchase it only which makes no sense

 

[Overcast Immortal]

I think the Vocaloid brand is finished. V5 has a very poor reputation and nobody, not even Yamaha, wants to put out a product onto this platform. It's probably too late for a new engine or new VB's to be successful, but we still have like 70 different Vocaloids to choose from, so it's not like Vocaloid is a desert devoid of all usefulness. Most Vocaloids to have been released are still available to purchase and still run on our computers.

The thing I'd like to see with the Vocaloid brand is a drop in price, both for the V5 editor and VB's. I don't have that much money and I've already put a very unreasonable amount of money into buying the few Vocaloids I have, and I think lower prices would lead to many new users picking up Vocaloid, and it would let existing users work with a larger number of Vocaloids.

 

[peaches2217]

The thing I'd like to see with the Vocaloid brand is a drop in price, both for the V5 editor and VB's. I don't have that much money and I've already put a very unreasonable amount of money into buying the few Vocaloids I have, and I think lower prices would lead to many new users picking up Vocaloid, and it would let existing users work with a larger number of Vocaloids.

Honestly, as much as I'd adore cheaper vocals, I think the higher price point is fully justified. Voicebank development is hella expensive, and not particularly profitable in most cases; if every synth and editor and VB was, say, 20% of their current cost, I doubt even the increase in customers would be significant enough to make up the loses; they'd be making just as much (or as little) as if they'd kept their initial costs and userbase. As nice as it is to think companies would be willing to do that just for their userbase, you have to remember: at the end of the day, they're companies. They have to do whatever will make development most profitable. The truth is, so long as fans show up, then the price will remain the same.

And I know I've said this before, but I still think V5's price is fair; do I wish there was a cheaper version that didn't come with the starters so that people could just get the editor alone if they don't want the starters? Yes, absolutely, I won't deny that. But if we assume the base editor is $100 like its forbearers, then each of the starters is around $40. For their quality and usability, that's a fantastic price. Though it makes the software harder to obtain, in the end, it's an understandable move.

the weirdest thing is, vocaloid 5 ALREADY has a trial, it starts when we don't activate it, we can see that it goes in trial mode, they just weirdly basically gave the trial mode to people who purchase it only which makes no sense

To be fair, that's how every Vocaloid functions, VBs and editors alike. Yeah, it would be so nice to have a proper V5 trial! Then more people could see how worth it it is.

 

[Overcast Immortal]

Honestly, as much as I'd adore cheaper vocals, I think the higher price point is fully justified. Voicebank development is hella expensive, and not particularly profitable in most cases; if every synth and editor and VB was, say, 20% of their current cost, I doubt even the increase in customers would be significant enough to make up the loses; they'd be making just as much (or as little) as if they'd kept their initial costs and userbase. As nice as it is to think companies would be willing to do that just for their userbase, you have to remember: at the end of the day, they're companies. They have to do whatever will make development most profitable. The truth is, so long as fans show up, then the price will remain the same.

I don't buy the argument that it's not financially viable to reduce the price of the VB's. Most of them are years old and have made 90% of all the profit they would ever make unless something is done to reinvigorate sales. Then they might be able to squeeze out a little bit more profit. Besides, the cost of making them is already paid and completed. Finally, I doubt most VB's were that expensive to make. Zero-G and Voctro Labs have always sold Vocaloids at very reasonable prices even before going on sale, so I don't believe other companies need such exorbitant prices to make profit.

I'm guessing they can get away with it because Japanese Vocaloids are popular and in high demand, as you mentioned. Enough people are still buying Vocaloids at high prices that Yamaha sees little reason to lower prices. They don't even offer much in the way of discounts during sales.

Anyway, another thing I'd like to see is for Zero-G, Voctro Labs, or PowerFX to come back with new vocal synths. Clearly it won't happen on the Vocaloid platform, but there is more than just Vocaloid in the land of vocal synth platforms. I can dream.