For talents who regularly hold casual chat or gaming streams, voice packs work really well. While free-form chatting and commentary are fun precisely because they’re unscripted, voice packs allow us to bring out a different side of a talent’s voice through scripts and editing, showcasing qualities that don’t always appear in their usual streams. 

For VTubers, fans are able to enjoy listening to them on regular streams: however, voice packs are often purchased by those who wish to support their favorite talent even further. From what we see on social media, quite a few younger fans also like these offerings.

Exactly right. It’s an entry-level product we’ve been offering since 2023 for fans who are just getting to know a talent. We have Starting Voices for every active talent, and whenever someone new debuts, we release theirs at the same time as their debut. Being able to have them instantly accessible for fans who watch a debut stream and think, “I want to support this talent!,” is a major advantage of voice packs. Unlike physical merchandise, which require shipping time, voice packs can be enjoyed immediately.

Because new talents have not yet debuted and their individual characteristics are not fully known, we generally ask them to prepare their own scripts. Some talents choose to include things like self-introductions, situational voice packs, or ringtone-style voice packs as part of their selection and I think it’s a great way for fans to learn more about the talent and get an impression of who they are.

The “Extreme Love Voice Pack” received an incredible response. We asked a total of 40 talents to freely choose one theme – tsundere, kuudere, deredere, or yandere – and record themselves based on a particular situation. Upon release, we were surprised to find that a large number of them had chosen yandere, which ended up becoming a hot topic online (laugh).

Another recent release, “Super Obsessed!” has also been highly praised. It features a whisper-style recording with an ASMR-like quality, created using a binaural microphone. 

“Yandere” or situations of “obsessive infatuation” might sound a bit surprising at first, but voice packs are fundamentally a one-way format in which the talent speaks to a passive listener. Because of this, it may actually be easier for talents to perform such roles where they actively approach the listener.

In the Voice Pack Project Team, one staff member takes full responsibility for each project, all the way from the planning stage right through to it going on sale. The process starts with creating a proposal and presenting it internally, and once it gets approved, we send an offer to the talent and move on to developing the script.

To go into a little more detail, the staff member in charge also handles things like commissioning jacket illustrations, creating banners for sales pages, and preparing promotional videos and X posts ready for a pack’s release. 

There are two main ways we offer voice packs roles to talents. The first is a survey-based approach. For large projects that involve many talents, such as Christmas or Valentine’s Day, we send out a survey in advance to see who’s interested in participating.

The other way is then, of course, individual offers to specific talents. We regularly watch all of the talents’ streams and look for those who would be a good fit for a particular project we’re planning. Or sometimes it works the other way around – we see something on a stream and realize “Oh, this talent really likes that kind of theme,” and then create a project based on that. 

There are so many, but one example would be the “Kanaken” series. “Kanaken” is short for Kanata Construction, a unit formed by AZKi, Amane Kanata, and Sakamata Chloe (graduated). 

Originally, the unit formed through playing Minecraft together, during which an in-game interaction involving Usada Pekora caused her to take on debt and as part of her repayment, they released the first “Angel’s Perch” ASMR Voice Pack (laugh). 

After that, we expanded it into the Kanaken series and produced voice dramas including the Startup Edition and the Company Trip Edition. The Company Trip Edition was a location-based project where the three of them actually traveled to Izu and recorded the ASMR on-site – while enjoying a footbath, and resting at an inn. 

A recent example is Juufuutei Raden’s “I’ll Turn You Into a Pot” voice pack. It’s also an ASMR-style recording, but what’s unique about it is that the listener is a vase exhibited in an art museum. 

The project originally started from the idea of, “wouldn’t it be fun if Raden-san whispered explanations about art into your ear,” and we sent her the offer based on that concept. In the end, it turned into something uniquely her. 

Although it’s not exactly a voice pack, the Voice Pack Project Team also supported the recording for the digital voice rally “ReGLOSS Shibuya Sanpo,” created to celebrate the 2nd anniversary of ReGLOSS, which Raden is also a member of. 

As part of this project, visitors could walk to designated spots around Shibuya and listen to original voice clips from the ReGLOSS members. 

This is just one example of how the Voice Pack Project Team gets involved with various in-house projects across the entire company.

Yes, that’s right, Some talents at hololive Indonesia have even released voice packs in three languages. Since we don’t understand Indonesian ourselves, we work together with the Indonesia team to produce these recordings.

Some Japanese fans even use the English voice packs as a language learning tool. Since we include a PDF of the script in Japanese, they can follow along in Japanese while listening to the English audio. 

Looking ahead, we’d like to create more voice packs that align with different ways of life outside of Japan and cultural customs. For instance, in a previous project proposed by an overseas director, they released “hololive English Back to School Voice Pack” in September. Initially, we questioned the timing, as April is the standard start of the school year in Japan. However, in many countries the school year begins in September, and the product was rather popular with our international customers.  

In many countries, there isn’t as much of a culture of voice dramas, but radio-style formats, like podcasts, are widely listened to. So we thought it would be interesting to create something tailored to that audience, and ended up producing something in the style of an audiobook for our international audience. 

It depends on the project, but in general, voice content for traditional voice actors tends to follow a fixed script, and the actors perform strictly according to that script. In my previous job, I worked on creating voice dramas based on light novels and comics, and for those types of productions, respecting the original IP is extremely important. Voice actors essentially perform according to a scenario and script that are already basically set in stone. 

In contrast, voice packs created by VTubers are designed to make the most of the talents’ own personalities. Some talents write their own scripts, and even when we provide a scenario or lines, many of them will adapt it/them, commenting that they would express a certain line differently, for instance. Since talents continue to grow and change, their way of expressing themselves and even their personal tastes can evolve over time. I think that’s one of the biggest differences and because of that, our team needs to keep up with those changes and propose ideas that suit talents at that particular time. So following their streams every day is extremely important.

I think one of our biggest strengths is our drive to take on new challenges, whether it be three-dimensional audio or on-location recordings. We also place great importance on matching each project to a particular talent, and we always aim to show new and exciting sides of them to their fans. 

We often hear comments from fans saying, “I had never watched this talent’s streams before, but I listened to the sample of their voice pack, which piqued my interest.” A big part of our overall mission is being able to spark that kind of new interest among fans and help someone discover a talent that they end up loving.