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| Spoon 1010th Post
 
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|  "Re(3):Strike that will cripple the gaming ind" , posted Fri 27 May 06:58
quote:
yeah, the problem here is that regular voice actors aren't in the screen actor's guild, and if game publishers were forced to use unionized SAG actors, the smaller guys would get pushed out of business.
and the fact of the matter is, hardly anyone cares about the voices in games, they're just there. These people think way too much of themselves, in terms of how they contribute to a game.
Unless it's like Samuel L. Jackson in the GTA games, where he actually IS in the SAG... i think.
But then, you could probably pull any other random guy off the street and make him say, "MOTHA FU**A!" too.
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| Pollyanna 1126th Post
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| "Re(2):Strike that will cripple the gaming ind" , posted Fri 27 May 19:15
As an English voice actor, I feel obligated to stick up for other actors. VAs don't suck in themselves...it's a combination of bad directors, bad scriptwriters and bad translators that make for a bad experience. Since many of the VAs I work with are professional theater actors, saying that they suck is like saying that theater actors suck.
That isn't to say that there aren't a lot of -BAD- VAs out there, it's just that it's a much bigger problem than "English VAs suck".
I hate dubs as much as the next person, but for different reasons. Besides, anyone who thinks that Japanese dubs are always good is either naive, biased, or doesn't understand Japanese well enough to tell a mediocre performance from a good one. I find myself disappointed with nearly as many Japanese dubs as I do English ones these days. They just have the advantage of not being bastardized by a tag-team of translators, writers and directors.
I had an audition with a studio that specializes in video games recently, so I hope I can sneak my way into someone's game collection someday.
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| Radish 2871th Post
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| "Re(4):Strike that will cripple the gaming ind" , posted Fri 27 May 20:29
quote:
yeah, the problem here is that regular voice actors aren't in the screen actor's guild, and if game publishers were forced to use unionized SAG actors, the smaller guys would get pushed out of business.
and the fact of the matter is, hardly anyone cares about the voices in games, they're just there. These people think way too much of themselves, in terms of how they contribute to a game.
Exactly. And it's not like there are a really high percentage of games that use celebrity voice actors... and even then, people aren't really getting the games because they know a celebrity's going to be doing a VOICE in it. They play because they like the game or series or whatever (such as Grand Theft Auto... did anyone really buy Vice City because they knew Burt Reynolds and Ray Liotta were doing voices in it?). It's not like there aren't enough factors screwing up the game industry now without the Film Actors Guild interfering.
"You sure made the game industry better... didn't ya, Film Actors Guild?"
Mike Myers is getting something to the tune of $9 million to be in the next Shrek game. That has to be a little frustrating to your average voice actor.
Personally I don't really care about what language something is in, as long as it sounds good. In my opinion the English track of Disgaea is much better than the Japanese one, but on the other hand the Phantom Brave guys were just reading lines off a sheet of paper.
While some of these people are overestimating their importance to the industry, I do think that voice acting has become part of mainstream videogames. I would estimate that most people now-a-days (i.e people buying GTA, Madden and EA WW2/Vietnam games) would rather hear the chartacters than read what they say. Hearing a guy screaming about "Charlie coming out of the trees, man!" has more impact than scrolling through some text of him saying it.
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