How four top indie VTubers found family in VchiBan

VchiBan didn’t necessarily burst onto the scene like most VTuber groups. You could have maybe read between the lines and expected its creation. However what they’re doing is anything but ordinary, pushing VTubing innovation to its limits.

VchiBan‘s roots, you could say, were set in early 2020. 

The quartet of once-independent VTubers were known to each other in some capacity before then. Shia and Buffpup had been friends for years, having gotten into streaming together. Rosedoodle, being an early adopter of VTubing, got involved in Buff’s circle by osmosis.

But there was also AiCandii. The Australian streamer only moved into VTubing at the start of 2020 ⁠— much later than the other three ⁠— but had a mutual connection to Buff. So when they were invited to a New Year’s VRChat party, they took the opportunity to actually make a formal introduction.

It… didn’t go all that smoothly.

“I was like ‘oh, I’m going to say hi, this person always talked highly of Buff,’” Candii reflected. “So I walked up to her and she was in her little orange dog model, and I was like ‘oh hi! Nice to meet you!’ 

“And she was like ‘do you want a picture?’ And I was like ‘yeah sure?’”

The four of them exploded into raucous laughter at the memory, before Buff quickly jumped in to defend herself.

“Not only was I drunk, but I was under other influences because it was New Year’s Eve! I have an excuse. I literally just got off from talking with 10 people who wanted photos.”

Candii continued the story: “So we took photos together and I think you were like ‘also this is Shia’ and Shia was like ‘yeah…’ I kind of walked off and was like ‘alright.’ We didn’t really talk much after that.”

But from there, the connection was set. Shortly afterward, Buff and Rose were setting up a Gartic Phone collaboration, and Candii came up as a candidate ⁠— after they made an impression for being “so cool” at that party.

The projects racked up from there, and it was the start of a journey together, converging the separate and sometimes lonely paths before. 

The found family

Before VchiBan, each of its members were outstanding independent content creators in their own right. All have been on Twitch for more than five plus years. In the case of Shia and Buff, it’s been a decade or so.

They were all early adopters of VTubing too. Rose got into VTubing in 2018 after a long stint as a faceless entity with “blasty music and an art program”, just streaming her commissions to the world.

“I saw someone on YouTube using a Live2D model,” she mused. “They were not very advanced back then, but its mouth moved and I was like ‘I want to do that! I want to be anime!’ 

“Me and my husband, we made a very janky Live2D model, we started using it, and people on Twitch back in 2018 didn’t know what VTubers were, so they were like ‘how are you an anime girl?! Is this a real person?!’”

The story got a laugh out of all, because of how closely that interaction ties with their own initial experiences starting as early VTubing adopters. Buff did a similar thing and got a similar reaction, just as a cartoon dog, and Shia was sick of face cam streaming so he too got a model (initially designed by Buff).

However that also fosters a sense of camaraderie and community. And so when Candii joined the fray in 2020 and got closer with the aforementioned trio, the found family started to form.

“We were just sharing memes and whatever,” Buff reflected. “We always did collabs, and it was funny because everyone in chat recognized us as family. Any time we would all hang out, they’d be like ‘family!’ 

“It was like the Vin Diesel meme,” Rose chimed in. “They started doing that, and made little emotes of our little boneless models doing a bounce and saying ‘family!’”

It is one thing to constantly collab and interact on socials and behind closed doors. It’s another to take the plunge and put faith into your friends to go on a professional journey.

A failed project led to the four coming together more officially in November 2022. They were close friends. They bounced off each other well on stream, and they were already doing the cutesy cross-promotion. 

They each filled a different skills void ⁠— similar enough to work well together, but unique in their own rights to not step on each other’s toes. Buff, Rose, and Candii have art backgrounds; the latter also excels at graphic design and writing. Shia loves ARG and broader game development. And they all wanted to push their skills further.

“We were bummed about it,” Buff said. “We were sitting there and Candii was like ‘we should just do it,’ and I was like ‘okay!’”

Such VTuber groups, bringing together independent talents under a unified banner, have become more prevalent in recent times. Previously it was just agencies: you’d debut under an agency, who in more cases than not would own all rights to the character you played. Stream teams were a thing, but often very informal.

VchiBan’s establishment ⁠six months ago was seemingly a catalyst for this change though, and there was good reason for it. Together, they could actually get more done to achieve their individual goals.

“When you’re a content creator approaching companies as an individual, it’s difficult to get in the door,” Candii explained. “A lot of companies will specify they only work with agencies rather than individuals.

“So we presented ourselves similarly to how agencies might.”

It was originally just the four of them, but slowly the ambitions racked up ⁠— and so did the headcount. There were animators, then there were merch assistants, and then managers.

“We had so many people in this Discord group, and at this point, I realized I had accidentally made a mini-studio with my best friends,” Buff said. 

“We didn’t know what was going on. We just started doing stuff and having meetings every Wednesday. It got to the point where we had checklists of stuff, and it was legit meetings. We would sit there for 8 hours.”

There was a different air around VchiBan from the very beginning, long before it was even called that. Most projects are very short-lived in content creation, and usually there’s discussion on what the end looks like before even starting.

None of VchiBan’s quartet felt that way though. They wanted to make this work for the long run: for their content, for their friendship.

“Me, personally, I would get weird vibes like ‘this won’t work,’” Candii explained. “But with VchiBan, there wasn’t really a time where I got cold feet because of how passionate Rose, Buff, and Shia are. 

“I said at one point, and maybe this is too hoity-toity, it felt like a marriage. It is marrying our content together, and we all work to strengthen each other, and if there are things we can’t do individually, we’ll build it together in the interest of the relationship and lifting each other up.

“We’re always just looking for ways we can do more things in the space that isn’t just streamed content, like events, cons and meet and greets.”

It was also something they could properly own together: “In previous projects, there were too many things out of our hands, and we wanted control over all of it,” Shia said. “We have our hands on every aspect of it. 

“We work well as a team because we recognize each other, and we know each other very well, and I think that’s a plus on our side because if we didn’t, we wouldn’t work as smoothly as we have.”

But even with all that being said, friendship trumps all. If VchiBan was to end tomorrow (spoiler alert: not the case), it wouldn’t be because of a personal falling out. The four would rather preserve their relationship than push through and burn it all out professionally.

This was emphasized by Candii as a need for anyone looking to create their own VTuber group.

“If there’s ever been points of tension… we’re very accountable and present with each other. We even said, in a hypothetical scenario where VchiBan doesn’t stay together, our friendship is paramount over everything else.”

A chance to Meet Your Oshi? 

VchiBan being together means they can collaboratively work on bigger projects than they’d imagine individually. And while it’s one thing to talk the talk, it’s another thing to walk the walk. 

That brings us to Meet Your Oshi. It’s a Five Nights At Freddy’s-inspired fan game tied to the release of the hit franchise’s movie in October. VchiBan’s stars play the main four animatronic oshis you so desire to meet, and there will be cameos from friends too.

“The whole idea is you’re going to a convention to meet your oshi, but you’re breaking in early so you can print out tickets,” Candii stated.

Fan games have taken a hold of VTubing, but games made by the VTubers themselves ⁠— or their company ⁠— rarely exist outside of a few projects. NIJISANJI’s Pomu Rainpuff and Selen Tatsuki led the production of the Detective Pomu and the Tatsuki Manor Mystery game. Hololive created horror game ERROR featuring a glut of their Japanese stars, and are working on a metaverse project called Holoearth.

For independent or smaller groups though, games are just out of the scope of what they can create. VchiBan is different though, given Shia’s background. But beyond that, they also have the determination to prove VTubers in any situation can create innovative content.

“We wanted to do other things other than debuting all the time,” Buff said. “We wanted to look at the space, or the outside perspective of where we can implement things we want to do. 

“Shia made an analog horror game which all of our friends played. Everyone enjoyed it and had fun, and they noted it was cool to see their friends in the game. Shia was really nervous about it and very critical of himself, but everyone had a ton of fun, and that was before we did VchiBan. 

“So when we were tossing around thinking of what we could do next, Shia was like ‘I have this game I started and I want to continue working on it’ and I was like ‘that’s what we’re doing next.’”

Five Nights at Freddy’s was easy inspiration for Shia and the rest of VchiBan. It is a bit of a cult classic in the content space. Horror is also a particular passion of Shia, noting his previous game. But bringing it to life was a bit more complex than what he had done previously.

“There’s so many fan-made FNAF games. I don’t care how mainstream or big it is, I love it. There’s so many spinoff games that are questionable to amazing. 

“I mentioned that to Candii and they were instantly like ‘gasp, ooh I like that idea.’ Immediately, without thinking of any kind of semblance to the game, I modeled out an environment that would be fun for that. 

“That sat there for like a year, until only a couple of months ago where we made the choice when Candii was visiting. The new FNAF movie was coming out and I was like ‘why don’t we start working on it?’ I started talking to Candii and said ‘I could probably program it, I’m not too worried about it.’ I’m worried more about it now that I’m in it. It works! It’s alright! But that was only a couple of months ago when we were like ‘let’s pick that back up.’”

Shia got his community to sneakily fund the modeling software he lost access to under the guise of wanting to work on more side projects. 

They also outsourced some of the game’s elements to other members or outside of VchiBan entirely. And with Buff having too much of “the ‘too much’ gene,” it became more than just dropping an itch.io link with a full merch line and other side projects tied to Meet Your Oshi.

However the project has been kept very tightly under wraps, outside of a few teasers in the lead-up.

“I was like ‘okay now that we’re making a game, we have to come up with merch and PR kits and this and that.’ It becomes a huge amalgamation of what the f**k. Shia was like ‘I just want to come out with a cute game’ and I was like ‘no, it has to be the coolest thing ever.’”

Before you ask, yes Sawcon was considered as a name. Rose was the biggest proponent of the easy joke, “but there was already a fake website for one though so we didn’t want to deal with that.”

Jokes aside, all of VchiBan is excited to see how people react to Meet Your Oshi. Except maybe Shia, who is too nervous to see his game play out to thousands on Twitch.

“When Shia did the game last time, it was so cool to see everyone’s reactions, good or bad,” Buff added. “Mouse playing it was so funny. Because she’s one of our best friends, it was funny to watch her scream and be like ‘oh my God, that’s me!’ 

“That’s my favorite part ⁠— and this game will have it too ⁠— where we include our friends. It’s always fun to see people react to their presence. Everyone is there to enjoy it and have a fun time. You don’t see this happen a lot in this space, so when someone does it, it feels like a community of everyone being like ‘woah look at this cool thing the community made.’”

Expanding VTubing’s creativity

The creative projects aren’t ending with Meet Your Oshi for VchiBan. The group is already working on a second game ⁠— which is already made but pending artwork.

But they aren’t just going to become the game development VTubers. They want to capitalize on all the mediums VTubing affords. It’s a trend being seen across the virtual world. 

NIJISANJI’s Vox Akuma just released a 55 minute feature film featuring top voice actors, tied to a new model debut. That was a first for the industry. Then you’ve got a VTuber card game being made by Japanime Games. Called Oshi Push, they’ve already announced some of Phase Connect’s biggest talents as playable cards, and there’s an open form inviting VTubers to join them. You could also argue Astraline’s pickup of Fredrik Knudsen and Nick Nocturne, two of YouTube’s premiere long-form video creators, taps into a new niche for VTubing.

These are just three of many fields VTubers are expanding into. And VchiBan wants to keep pushing that envelope.

“One thing we all agree on is looking outside of the space as well,” Candii stated. “Introducing new ingredients from outside of VTubing is how you innovate. You need to look at what your peers are doing, but also what’s not being done and where there’s areas you can expand into. 

Rose agreed, noting how tiring it is to feel confined to a singular meta: “I’m not going to name names or be too specific, but there’s a lot of groups or people who do the same five merch items, the same formats. They follow patterns people feel like they are tied to, and we’re all tired of that…”

Because all of VchiBan’s members have been in content creation for such a long time, keeping it fresh is important to keep it interesting.

“We’re at the point of getting sick of being led around,” Buff continued. “We want to lead and do things. There’s been opportunities we’ve had individually, but it’s been people bringing it to us. It’s time for us to make the opportunities for ourselves. 

“Even if it’s hard and we stay up late grinding, it’s worth it in the end because not only are we doing something we like doing, we’re very creative people so it fills that gap of wanting to be creative. You can only debut so many times before you feel like you’re not creative anymore and getting sick of it.”

And, as has been harped on about through this hour-long call, formally joining forces fosters this creativity in ways they couldn’t imagine doing solo. Their different skill sets complement each other, and while it can be a lot of behind the scenes work to juggle on top of VTubing, the result is worth the effort.

They can rely on each other professionally and personally. Candii likened it to being “the lil husband going and doing his job, in the mines doing stuff for my family.” If there’s some graphics to do, Candii will do it. Same goes for art in Buff or Rose’s corner. It makes it seem like everything is achievable as long as they’re together ⁠— and they don’t need a big agency to make it work.

“The things we can’t do, we have people we know, or people who know people,” Rose continued. “We have this big expansive network of whatever it is we need. Whether it’s animation or games or whatever project we have our mind on, I feel like we could do whatever we want with no end on the horizon. We’re just stubborn.”

And at the end of the day, they’re all VTuber viewers too. They’re all fans. They want to make the experience better for everyone across VTubing, whether they’re a streamer or a watcher. Having different points of view, and being inspired by what’s happening in the space, motivates them to keep pushing new creative avenues.

“If you love what you’re doing, you have a very different way of looking at it,” Candii said. “You can look at it like ‘what do I want to see? What would be cool as a viewer?’ You can participate with it from different points of view. 

“I would point to what Buff did once for Valentine’s Day, where you did the dating sim live with chat. Chat could pick different locations, which was improv mixed with chat integration. Stuff like that is really cool. 

“Shia used to do, and probably still does, ARG elements with debuts. He had a puzzle once with runes and things, and people had to decode it. He makes little apps. For one of Buff’s debuts, he made a moon that was rising as chat was spamming a command.”

VchiBan might not be host to “the next innovative big idea.” Things pop up on a weekly basis, such as the VirtualFace app all over Twitter. But by being on the forefront of innovation, pushing the needle and looking at what VTubing can become, VchiBan can maybe motivate others to pursue the idea they’ve been thinking of.

“In the VTubing space, there’s a lot of tech that’s been developed,” Candii continued. “And the more money and people there, there’s going to be more innovation. Getting more people into VTubing, getting more creativity and more backgrounds [is important].”

The future of VTuber groups

When asked about what got VchiBan’s members individually into VTubing, most (except Candii) wanted the camaraderie and community. That is still their primary goal, and that’s ultimately the catalyst for a project like theirs.

“A lot of people go into VTubing to talk to people and make friends,” Buff mused. “That’s the objective. Sometimes people lose that objective on the way, and that’s not a bad thing, but people forget the core reason of why they started. 

“I was the type of person that never talked to anybody, and the only person I spoke to was Shia. I got to a point where I was like ‘I can’t continue living like this, I have to do something.’”

Even if it wasn’t their initial goal like Candii’s, it certainly became a healthy byproduct: “At the point I started VTubing, I had no friends and I hadn’t had friends for many years. I [have] found people I care about and I’ve become a better person. I became more myself. Less the person I had been twisted up into, and more the person I actually am.”

VchiBan is a testament you can have your cake and eat it too. Don’t get it twisted; each of VchiBan’s members were successful independently before joining forces. But even in those isolated journeys, they didn’t set aside their friends in the quest for growth and fame. It was quite the opposite ⁠— when it came to take the next step, they leaned on each other.

“I remember at one point, we had one of our meetings and Rose mentioned ‘holy crap, this is so much work,’” Shia reflected. Not a bad thing, just we stepped back and realized. 

“Even on the professional side of figuring out all the heavy lifting that comes with creating a group, and the interconnected relationships we have with each other growing stronger because that’s what is necessary, it happens naturally.”

It could have gone different; Candii was in a stream team years ago, but that wasn’t meant to be a serious project. That’s okay in its own right. VchiBan’s members all agree there should be more groups in VTubing, whether they be casual stream teams or more formal entities. It doesn’t always have to be agencies and glamor, it can just be friends getting together and gunning for a shared purpose.

Their journey wasn’t an easy one, but when is content creation ever easy?

“I wish everybody could have that experience of creating a group,” Shia continued. “One of our main reasons for starting the group was showing we could do it, and do what we want in whatever capacity with an emphasis on quality. That’s in every aspect.”

“We’ve had this conversation so many times, but we’re all still here, so we’ve obviously decided that it is worth it in some capacity,” Buff added.

“Where I sit now, I’m very happy we all stuck through it and worked so hard to get to where we are. Now it feels like, after the launch of VchiBan, we can do anything.”