A bit of an explanation + Apology + ANOTHER announcement
Hey, everyone. Mod-okuma here. With the blog now slowly coming back to life (yet again, I know), I feel I owe you all an explanation as to why it went on a second unannounced hiatus and (With the blessing of the other mods) an explanation of what's been going behind the scenes at Vocal Ronpas.
When the blog started out around this time last year (Back when it was just Mod-omi and me running it), We split a lot of the work (Like initial casting, getting asks up on the blog, answering any OOC questions you all had, etc.). However a few months in, Mod-omi (Through no fault of his own) had started to run into a lot of problems offline and suffered a congo-line of hardships one after another (All of which were very personal issues so I will not be going into detail).
Due to said hardships, I decided to take on the brunt of the work so Mod-omi could focus more on getting to a better place mentally. And for quite a while (Again through no fault of Mod-omi's. Don't think for a SECOND that I'm trying to throw him under the bus), I was the sole mod in charge of keeping tabs on the ask box, uploading asks to the blog, making sure VAs got their asks in, helping VAs less experienced with sound editing add music and sfx to their files, answering OOC asks, relaying asks and scripts to the VAs, and so on.
As you can probably guess, being in charge of so many tasks took its toll on me overtime and I realized that I couldn't do this alone anymore. I brought this up with the group and two of the VAs (Wendaline and Mr.CakeDragonMan) graciously volunteered to be promoted to mods (Mod-kuro and Mod-zuryuu, respectively) so we could split up the work. Unfortunately we ran into another problem (Once again through no fault of any of the mods. I REFUSE to throw anyone under the bus). As it turned out we all had very conflicting schedules and as such we seldom had opportunities to come together to discuss issues related to the blog (And then Mod-omi's laptop crapped out on him so we had that ontop of everything else). So once again I took on most of the responsibilities until we did have more opportunities to sit down and talk (And for me to show the new mods the ropes).
Then as most of you long-time followers of the blog already know, during late June-early July was my big move and as such I focused my energy on that (And forgot to make an announcement about it on here. Something I STILL have regrets over). I thought that maybe after the move was said and done (And with Otakon around the corner during that time), I would gain a much needed charge to get the blog back up and as active as it used to be at the start of all this.
Not so.
Sure, I was able to keep updates coming (And even edit together the elaborate skit known as "Mono-swap"), but it didn't take long for that fatigue to come creeping back. By mid to late October, I was just completely...burnt out.
And that's why the blog went on a second hiatus. I meant to make an announcement, but due to other projects outside the blog, shifting interests, and letting the thought keep slipping from my mind over and over, I never got around to it. And for that, I deeply and sincerely apologize. I feel absolutely awful for breaking my promise to be more transparent about goings on with the blog. I should have realized sooner that I was setting myself up to fail by making such huge goals after nearly draining myself the first time. For all this, I'm so, so sorry.
Which brings me to my announcement.
After talking about it at length with both the group and the other mods, I have decided that I will be stepping down as moderator.
With that being said though, this doesn't mean that I'm leaving the blog completely. I'll still be here as the VA for both Monokuma and Owari for whatever it is we decide to do on here. However that's about as much as I can contribute for the time being (Since over the second hiatus, I've been cast in a lot of projects outside the blog and I've been wanting to work more on projects unrelated to voice acting).
Maybe once we decide exactly how we want to tackle asks in the future, I'll finally take on all the asks that have piled up for the both my characters. But as of now, that's completely up in the air.
This post is starting to get too long so I'll end it with this: It's been a blast modding for Vocal Ronpas (Even though it was super hard work), and now that Mod-omi is doing MUCH better (AND has a new laptop) plus the other mods going above and beyond to help out, I know I'm leaving Vocal Ronpas in excellent hands.
'Till next crime.
-The VA formerly known as Mod-okuma
