New Vocaloid Announced: TONIO from Zero-G
Just in time (well, almost) for Prima’s birthday, Zero-G announces a new Vocaloid to join the group. A press release post made on Zero-G’s website has announced the release of a new male Vocaloid called Tonio and you can view his boxart below.
From the website:
Following on from the success of Vocaloid PRIMA, Zero-G announce the release in February 2010 of Vocaloid TONIO, a brand-new plug-in virtual singer modelled on the voice of a professional male opera singer, and powered by Yamaha VOCALOID2 Singing Synthesis Technology.
Tonio will come with all the bells and whistles we’ve come to know and love from Vocaloid2, and his recommended retail price is £114.95 / €169.
source: Zero-G
Vocaloid Tonio, eh?
Short for Antonio?
Eh, opera…
What interests me is that his boxart isn't marketed towards the jap-based fandom. C: And when I think about it, hiring opera singers would be hella difficult. It's definitely an interesting direction to take.
The entire Vocaloid production coming from Power-FX and Zero-g wasn't marketed towards the Japanese fandom until it became obvious that Japan was a huge market, and English fans enjoyed character images just as much as the Japanese did, so it was a safe investment (unlike FL-Studio, who's users thought FL-tan made the program unprofessional).
Zero-g still kept trying to appealing to the English fandom, though, and we all know how that turned out, Sonikaaaaa.
For something so hugely professional-targeted like opera singers, trying to market it with anything other than (very pretty) stock photos would be a humongous faux pas.
They did keep the fandom's fetish for character images in mind though, which is something worth noting.
Good job on marketing correctly, Zero-g! Now where is our act2act2act2act2.
My 2 cents:
The first batch of English Vocaloids were marketed more towards musicians, whereas Sonika and Big Al were marketed towards anime fans. While I continue to believe that promoting Sonika has paid off (i.e. she’s culturally relevant, for lack of better term), the ultimate killer is always going to be the price point. For the same money, an anime fan can buy a nice keyboard AND a guitar, a DS or PSP, a year (give or take) of World of Warcraft, or something else that would be of more value than one piece of musical software.
Also, greatest piece of trivia ever: the English voice actor who plays Vegeta in Dragonball Z is trained in opera. 8D
My mind just just flashed Vegeta screaming 'it's over nine thousand!' but slipping into Queen of the Night Aria during 'thousand'.
What