Aqua Ch. 湊あくあ

Aqua Minato (湊あくあ) (birthday: December 1) was a Japanese VTuber associated with Hololive, as part of its second generation of VTubers alongside Shion Murasaki, Ayame Nakiri, Choco Yuzuki, and Subaru Oozora.
==Content==
Aqua debuted on August 8, 2018, and her next streams were of her playing Minecraft.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3CAGeeMRvo&t=1shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oVs_gxR8Wg She has also streamed Super Mario Party, Mario Kart Deluxe, ARK Knights, Little Witch Nobita, Cat Mario, Minecraft, NieR:Automata, Biohazard, Resident Evil Village, Monster Hunter Rise, Penguin, Super Smash Bros., Cooking Simulator, Papers, please, Visage, Plug & Play, Super Mario Maker 2, Dark Deception, The Legend of Zelda, Jump King, Slither.io, PIEN, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, D4DJ and is extremely skilled at APEX Legends, Sekiro, Dark Souls and League of Legends.
On August 21, 2020, she held her solo concert Minato Aqua Anniversary Live 2020 AQUA IRO SUPER☆DREAM on Niconico and bilibili streams, where she also released her first original song Aqua Colour Palette.
Prior to this, she had been singing for months, with her first song cover being released on Valentines Day 2019. She has also covered Gabriel Dropkick, One Room Sugar Life, Ochame Kinou, Turing Love and Dadadada Tenshi.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1mbRCgWO90https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aB6MQU8l1shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXUn_ZqeM4Qhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kQ2GtvDV3s&ab_channel=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OtNQEpSeIAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8v5S1nhKzo She also likes to host karaoke streams, and some of her karaoke streams are of anime songs-only.
She is also a huge anime/manga fan, and streamed herself reacting to Gleipnir and Welcome to the Classroom of the Elite.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFT0bzdIvh0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIDzSr3oX1w However on December 2, 2021, she streamed herself and Botan reacting to Arcane, a Western cartoon animated by French and American studios based on the lore of the League of Legends series, citing the game as one of favoritehttps://twitter.com/minatoaqua/status/1465891315728539650/photo/1. 
She hit the 1,000,000 YouTube subscribers milestone during a singing stream.
== Retirement ==
On August 6, 2024, it was announced that Aqua would be leaving Hololive, citing creative differences as the reason. Many idols tried to talk her out of it but she had made up her mind. 
==Collaborations==
While streaming, she was prone to throwing tantrums if things weren't going the way she wished, hyperventilating, smashing her keyboard and playing pranks on others, though she is often on the receiving end herself. This has led to fans believing that she is a masochist, especially her tendency to ask fellow Hololive VTubers to bully her, especially Rushia. Like Pekora, she has her own construction company in Minecraft, Akukin Kensetsu, which is a rival company to Usada Kensetsu. Her second in command is Marine, and her third in command is Mio. Other Akukin Kensetsu employees include Lamy, Nene, Choco, Aki, Iofi and Flare. In her early days in the Hololive Japan Minecraft server, she tried to overthrow Sora, but dropped the act once Sora confronted herhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKuurb6c16g. She would also have a rivalry with Shion, but this has mellowed down and nowadays the two tend to bicker as if they are a married couple. She has played Clubhouse 51 with Marine, Kanata and Shionhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dADPFSV_f-khttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PF5BjcnHrJU.
Sometimes she will collab with VTubers out of Hololive, having played Dead by Daylight with Kurama Tsumugi.
She ended up crying tears of frustration during the 2021 Hololive Mario Kart 8 Deluxe collaboration due to almost winning the Winner's bracket, only for Fubuki to defeat her in the last race. However Suisei ended up winning.
In a Minecraft stream Gura accidentally murdered Aqua out of excitement upon seeing her for the first time in-server, as Aqua was the one who pulled her down the VTuber rabbit hole. On September 14, 2021, during a Super Mario Party collab where Gura was the host, Hololive announced that Marine, Aqua, Gura and Ina'nis would form a new unit "UMISEA", due to their shared oceanic themes, and several videos and streams featuring the unit would be released throughout the month.
==Design==
Her illustrator is Gaou, who also designed Mochizuki Himari (For "Unicreate") and Hourei Tenten (For disbanded trio "Melty+"). Her first modeler is rariemonn, her second Live2D modeler is 入江燈 and her second anniversary dress was designed by schwarz.
**She has actually stated she is uncomfortable with how her artist designs her breasts, so he toned it down.
==Lore==
"A-quality day to one and all! I'm Minato Aqua!" A marine maid-styled virtual maid. She is trying her very best, yet is still sometimes awkward and clumsy.
===Other===
*When Shion asked why Aqua was bad at cooking and cleaning if she was supposed to be a maid, Aqua retorted that she was a "gaming maid"
==Discography==
===2020===
====#AquaIroPalette====
Release date: August 22, 2020
Songs
"#AquaIroPalette" (#あくあ色ぱれっと)
"#AquaIroPalette" (instrumental)
====Kirameki Rider☆====
Release date: February 24, 2020
Songs
"Kirameki Rider☆"
"Kirameki Rider☆" (instrumental)
====Bouqet====
 Release date: December 7, 2020 
Songs 	Disc 1
Dreaming Days (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"BLUE CLAPPER (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"Shijosugi Adtruck (Bouquet ver.)" (至上主義アドトラック, Ad Truck of Supremacy) 	
"STARDUST SONG (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"Hya-kka Ryoran Hanafubuki (Bouquet ver.)" (百花繚乱花吹雪, Blooming Blossoms Fill the Air) 	
"Daily Diary (Bouquet ver.)" (でいり～だいあり～！) 	
"Halloween Night, Tonight! (Bouquet ver.)" (今宵はHalloween Night!, Koyoi wa Halloween Night!) 	
"Suspect (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"Candy-Go-Round (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"AsuiroClearSky (Bouquet ver.)" (あすいろClearSky) 	
"Precious Photographs (Bouquet ver.)" (大切フォトグラフ, Taisetsu Fotogurafu) 	
Songs 	Disc 2 (digital bonus)
Dreaming Days (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"Shiny Smily Story (Bouquet ver.)" 	
"Yumemiru Sora He (Bouquet ver.)" (夢見る空へ) 	
"Kirameki Rider☆ (Bouquet ver.)" (キラメキライダー☆) 	
====Hacha-Mecha Miracle====
Release date: 18th December 2020
 Curry Love with Minato Aqua and Oozora Subaru
Songs
"Hacha-Mecha Miracle" (Hacha-Mecha ミラクル)
"Hacha-Mecha Miracle" (instrumental)
===2021===
====Candy-Go-Round====
Release date: January 13, 2021
Songs
"Candy-Go-Round" (ヒロインオーディション)
"Candy-Go-Round" (instrumental)
====AsuiroClearSky====
Release date: February 18, 2021
Songs
"AsuiroClearSky" (あすいろClearSky)
"AsuiroClearSky" (instrumental)
====Domination! All the World Is an Ocean====
Release date: September 19, 2021
Songs
"Domination! All the World Is an Ocean" (浸食!! 地球全域全おーしゃん, Shinshoku!! Chikyū Zeniki Zen Ocean)
"Domination! All the World Is an Ocean" (instrumental)
===It Comes Ryuuu And It goes Kyuuu===
Release date: August 29, 2022
Songs
"It Comes Ryuuu And It goes Kyuuu" (りゅーーっときてきゅーーっ!!!)
"It Comes Ryuuu And It goes Kyuuu" (instrumental)
==Partnerships==
For V-Ani 2019, Aqua was one of the four VTubers who collaborated with the Kakegurui manga (the others being Aoi Fuji, Kaede Higuchi and YuNi), and illustrations were released of them and the characters swapping outfits. She appeared in the games Dawn of the Breakers, Neptunia Virtual Stars, Last Idea and Azur Lane.https://dotbreakers.fandom.com/wiki/Aqua_Minatohttps://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000000051.000030268.htmlhttps://azurlane.yo-star.com/#/https://dengekionline.com/articles/24467/ . 
She has also collaborated with D4DJ, Red Bull and Curry Week Live.https://twitter.com/D4DJ_game_EN/status/1474560528445935616/photo/2https://twitter.com/hololivetv/status/1423592185358741505/photo/1 On November 28, 2022, Smile Base Cafe announced a collaboration with Gura, Ina'nis, Marine, Aqua, Botan, Suisei, Mio, Pekora, Watame, Sora, Mel and Subaru.https://twitter.com/smilebasecafe/status/1597108026208567298
==Twitter hashtags==
*湊あくあ - General
*#湊あくあ生放送 - Stream talk
*#あくあクルー - Fans
*#あくあーと - Fan art
*#切り抜きあくたん - Video clips
*#湊あくあMMD - MMD
== Fandom ==
Aqua's fans are called the Aqua Crew.
=== In-jokes/memes ===
* In one of Aqua's Ring Fit Adventure stream, she accidentally leaked her mom's name (Kumiko). Since then Aqua and the Aqua Crew mention it casually. She also revealed her weight to be 44.5kg, which many fans have lampooned, and she even brought it up in her 445,000 subscriber special.
* Amelia nicknames her "Vegetable-senpai". She is nicknamed "Onion" because of her hair, nicknamed "Sololive" as she often plays alone and "Baqua" (a pun on her name and Baka). Her other nicknames include Akutan, Dai Tenshi Aqua and Aqua Maji-Tenshi.
* Despite being a "Baqua", she has moments of being smart, which have been dubbed as "5000 IQ moments" because she once said her IQ was 5000.
==Trivia==
*According to her HoloTalk episode, Aqua's daily routine consists of sleeping through the morning and she usually wakes up at noon. She then plays games for the rest of the day.
*In Super Smash Brothers, her mains are Lucina, Joker and Cloud.
*She got a 1 in Choco's quiz.
*She is 4'10 (158cm)
*Her favorite animes are Yosuga no Sora and Lovelive!.
**She likes reading light novels, but has difficulty reading them, and instead prefers reading manga.
*One of her "pranks" is faking retirement (she has done this several times).
*Like Marine, her aesthetic is sea-based, but while Marine is based on a pirate, Aqua is based on a marine maid.
*When Aqua and her fellow genmates met in real life by going out to dinner, they noted that Aqua was extremely shy to speak to anyone. Aqua is also so shy that she can't go to a doctor's appointment without her mother.
*She is a big fan of Sword Art Online and once tweeted herself in Kirito's outfit. This prompted a reply and a follow from the Sword Art Online light novels' author Reki Kawahara.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DaVPeAQfThA
**She has also stated that Asuna from the series is her ideal wife.
*In 2021, Aqua was chosen, along with Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII from as a character to be crafted into a bust and placed at the examination site of Kyoto University and have various offerings placed in front of her, as per school tradition. The offerings Aqua received included 1,000 Yen, a bottled water, rice balls and a discounted purple onion.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2dSsYk3w84
==Gallery==
==References==
Category:Anime YouTubers
Category:Gaming YouTubers
Category:Music YouTubers
Category:Japanese YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2018
Category:One million subscribers
Category:Two million subscribers