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Welcome to the Suisei Archive Guide

Streams are temporary by nature. A VOD can disappear because it was intentionally unarchived, music rights changed, a channel closed, or a paid viewing window ended. This guide explains how to make a well-organized personal copy of content you are allowed to access.

The examples lean toward Hoshimachi Suisei and VTuber streams, but the workflow applies to many creators and platforms.

Start here​

If you have never used a command-line program, that is fine. Follow these chapters in order:

  1. Quick start — make one complete YouTube archive.
  2. Prerequisites — install and verify the tools.
  3. YouTube and yt-dlp — understand formats, cookies, and reusable options.
  4. Live streams — prepare before a scheduled stream and recover afterward.
  5. Preservation — keep metadata, checksums, and backups alongside the video.

Paid events are covered separately in Paid streams. Platform behavior changes often, so those notes include a “last verified” date.

Scope and boundaries​

This guide is about preservation, not publication. Owning a ticket or channel membership does not normally give you permission to redistribute the recording.

Keep archives personal
  • Do not claim a creator's work as your own.
  • Do not republish members-only, ticketed, deleted, or unarchived material without permission.
  • Follow the creator's wishes, the platform terms, and the law where you live.
  • DRM-related downloading issues are outside this guide's scope. Please consult another resource if you encounter them.

The tools described here can be used in many ways. You are responsible for confirming that your use is permitted.

Acknowledgements​

This guide grew from Aozaki's former guide.suisei.cc and the wider Project Stargazer effort. A historical copy is available through the Internet Archive. Thanks also to Rahmat Mustafa Samik-Ibrahim for encouraging students to document what they learn, to the friends who introduced the author to VTubers, and to Hoshimachi Suisei for the moments worth remembering.

License​

The site's source code is available under the MIT License. Written guide content is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International; see the content license for attribution details.