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Love Live! Franchise Launches 'Virtual School Idol' Project This Fall

The official YouTube channel for the Love Live! idol franchise began streaming a video on Monday, revealing that the franchise has a new project focusing on "virtual school idols" with an emphasis on streaming. The video teases a story told "together with school idols over 365 days." According to the video and volume 25 of the Love Live! Days magazine (which also made the announcement on Monday), the project will include all forms of media including live concerts and music tracks.

In 2010, the anime studio Sunrise, Lantis, and ASCII Media Works' Dengeki G Magazine launched Love Live! as a self-described "ultimate user-participation project" that lets its fans vote on the future of the fictional idols in the μ's school idol group, including parts of song lyrics, character details, sub-group members, and center positions. This practice would go on for future Love Live! groups. A series of music CDs and animated music videos then followed. The first Love Live! School idol project anime series (pictured right) premiered in January 2013, and the second series premiered in April 2014. The Love Live! The School Idol Movie film opened in Japan in June 2015.

The Love Live! Sunshine!! project was then announced in February 2015. The project's three key phrases are "Reader Participation," "Inspired by μ's," and "Seaside Town Setting." The franchise focused on a new generation of idols following μ's' footsteps. Fans chose the group's name Aqours by popular vote. The first Love Live! Sunshine!! television anime premiered in July 2016. The second season ran from October to December 2017. The Love Live! Sunshine!! The School Idol Movie Over the Rainbow film opened in Japan in January 2019.

Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club, the third new project in the franchise, debuted its first season in October 2020. The story focused on a new group named the "Nijigasaki High School Idol Club" in a well-off school, but with its members explicitly not participating in the titular Love Live! competition, and instead focusing on having strong individual personalities. The anime will have a second season that will premiere on April 2.

Love Live! Superstar!! is the fourth and latest project, focusing on the group Liella! The smallest group yet with only five members, the new story focuses on a newly established school with no history, with its members focused on finding their own identity in a new environment. The first season premiered in July 2021, and it will have a second season.

Sources: Love Live! Days magazine Vol. 25, Love Live! franchise's YouTube channel, MoCa News