Graha Voice Actor Change?

Whilst I will continue to wait until we have some formal information is announced, when I heard it I really thought it sounded like an AI voice lacking any warmth or depth like a terrible Siri voice.

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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I have no idea what the issue with Aymeric was, but Y'stola's actress wasn't replaced without notice.

But thanks for stopping by to patronize others here for an issue you clearly don't care about. It's nice of you to use your one and only comment on these forums to look down on others.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird

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That compilaton was needed solely because people were throwing around misleading and inaccurate information, trying to excuse 7.4 VO disaster. If you think presenting facts is now being parasocial, then we truly live in a vastly different worlds...

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Originally Posted by Regis_Paran

That compilaton was needed solely because people were throwing around misleading and inaccurate information, trying to excuse 7.4 VO disaster. If you think presenting facts is now being parasocial, then we truly live in a vastly different worlds...

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Just another person who has no idea what the word means, but spews it out thinking it's a winning argument.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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The irony of using “parasocial” to describe the people posting about their concerns here, then immediately speaking as though you personally know any one of us well enough to know how we reacted to past voice direction and quality issues lol.

If you bothered to read the comments here, you’d know that Y’shtola’s 6.0 quality issues, Aymeric’s weird overly jovial delivery during that one post-ShB patch (which was one of if not the first patch with the new remote COVID setup, so issues were understandable), and others have all been mentioned here as points of concern highlighting Square’s history of not ensuring quality and consistency with EN VA work in general. But in the previous cases, the majority of the playerbase still believed their favorite characters were voiced by the same VA, which is the point of differentiation here. Further, the more this happens, the harder it is for people to give grace. A miss here and there is expected and fine, but when it becomes a pattern, and to more and more of an egregious degree, the less people are willing to offer continued patience and good faith.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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Yet it’s totally fine to worry and complain about strangers on the internet and assume you know *anything* about them? These comments are so unnecessary and immature. It’s okay to not care about this aspect of the game, but others do and want to discuss it. It’s the same as those who care about literally any other aspect of the game and discuss it amongst themselves. If you don’t have anything productive to say, don’t say it.

Well you see if you can no longer "lose" the argument with misinformation, you now instead have to "lose" the argument with stupid, surface-level judgement on your characters. It's really creepy that you did basic organized research for a famous person's publicly available listing of work, guys. It's bad even when the publicity listings are public because I said so. Think about how this affects the famous person who will never know you exist, or the company that regularly takes your money and treats you like a little idiot. Think about how stressed you're making them.

My genuine condolences to everyone here trying to get answers and having to deal with this stupid judgemental shit even less filtered through socmed. Posting on forums is already nightmare mode for me (been playing since 2014 and the vast majority of my posts are because of this expansion...ugh...ugh...) so I can't even imagine the added stress of having people who only know how to speak in misused buzzwords going through the extra effort to insult you publicly.

Again, even as a guy who does not give a shit about G'raha or Bailey, I really thank you guys for the well-organized and easily digestible collection of information. It was respectfully written and helped put a light on the situation for me, and I'm assuming many others as well.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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1. Correcting the sheer flood of misinformation that people kept throwing around matters when it comes to keeping this thread on topic and away from baseless speculation, which doesn't help the situation.

2. If the vocal performance/quality issues regarding Aymeric and Y'shtola mattered so much to you, then maybe you should have bothered to raise your concerns when it might've made an impact instead of coming here to point fingers at the people who are here doing just that when it comes to an issue that we care about. If I'm paying 15 dollars for a sandwich I like and I suddenly end up with a different sandwich, I'm going to focus on what's up with my meal instead of whatever's wrong with a meal two tables over. If you wanted a tantrum, you should've thrown it yourself; clearly you're capable.

And on that note, nobody here is hassling Bailey for information on the situation despite whatever rumormongering you heard on whatever social media platform you picked up every mud slinger's favorite buzzword from to hurl it at the people participating on this thread. That's why we're here in the one place that actually stands a chance at bringing our requests for transparency/clarification to the eye of the corporate entity that literally runs in part on our dime. We're paying customers; we have every right to ask questions. Whether they're willing to answer is beyond our control, but at the very least, we're entitled to the opportunity to try and make our voices heard to them no matter how much you want to rant about it.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

have to agree with the guy saying people are being parasocial. spending the time to compile all of that information, regardless of whether it's public or not, is weird. you're not entitled to any info from JB or SE about whatever is going on. if a single character's voice acting is impacting your gameplay experience that much, you have some serious issues. it's funny how people are only just now whining about VO issues because it's graha, yet there wasn't any outcry to this degree when aymeric sounded bizarre last time he spoke or yshtola sounded different

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This wasn't it, babygirl.

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Originally Posted by mildlymoonstruck

1. Correcting the sheer flood of misinformation that people kept throwing around matters when it comes to keeping this thread on topic and away from baseless speculation, which doesn't help the situation.

2. If the vocal performance/quality issues regarding Aymeric and Y'shtola mattered so much to you, then maybe you should have bothered to raise your concerns when it might've made an impact instead of coming here to point fingers at the people who are here doing just that when it comes to an issue that we care about. If I'm paying 15 dollars for a sandwich I like and I suddenly end up with a different sandwich, I'm going to focus on what's up with my meal instead of whatever's wrong with a meal two tables over. If you wanted a tantrum, you should've thrown it yourself; clearly you're capable.

And on that note, nobody here is hassling Bailey for information on the situation despite whatever rumormongering you heard on whatever social media platform you picked up every mud slinger's favorite buzzword from to hurl it at the people participating on this thread. That's why we're here in the one place that actually stands a chance at bringing our requests for transparency/clarification to the eye of the corporate entity that literally runs in part on our dime. We're paying customers; we have every right to ask questions. Whether they're willing to answer is beyond our control, but at the very least, we're entitled to the opportunity to try and make our voices heard to them no matter how much you want to rant about it.

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You're about to get called out for using a food analogy while the rest of your post is ignored.

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Originally Posted by c4prisun

...yshtola sounded different

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Y'shtola's audio quality was absolutely 1000% brought up multiple times when discussing 7.0's EN VO quality, both here and on other SM sites. The reason why it didn't garner the same level of worry as G'raha 7.4 EN VO is because fans understood that Y'shtola's actress just had a child at the time and would be recording from a home set up. I believe her lines were replaced/fixed as well, the same patch they released other 7.0 EN VO fixes/rerecordings.

It was understood that Y'shtola's actress hadn't been replaced, and people were more critical of Square's lack of quality VO direction/control after switching to the US for DT; Square understandably wanted S./N. American accents for the fantasy S./N. America setting, but they seem to have bad luck with US VO direction/quality control as DT shared a lot of issues with ARR EN VO (was also based in the US.) Hopefully moving back to whoever they used in the UK for the next expansion gives us an EN VO consistent with HW -> EW.

However, with G'raha 7.4 EN VO, you have an extremely popular character whose fans are now worried over having his actor replaced. Bailey is in the unique position of becoming a Hollywood A-lister after initiating his role of G'raha which might impact his capacity to continue the role, other VO roles have been recast for less.

(Eg. Prismo from AT was recast for F&C S1 as the actor's agent refused to communicate the role to him when the F&C reached out, in S2 Prismo's original VO was reinstated and they even gave his replacement VO a new character to voice (who's amazing btw.) The original PowerPuff Girls actresses were all replaced in the Reboot without even being contacted, assumed due to hiring unknown talent being cheaper then hiring the original actresses. The Mihoyo games have replaced a lot of VO due to the strike, but prior to that the EN VO for Argenti/Mr Tails and Huohuo were replaced out of the blue for reasons unknown; the Argenti actor said he'd recorded missing lines prior and didn't seem to be aware he'd been replaced until it was added ingame.)

I hope Bailey is able to keep the role, outside of extraneous circumstances I don't want any of the characters to 'lose' their voice.

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Originally Posted by Daralii

You're about to get called out for using a food analogy while the rest of your post is ignored.

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I've been called mean, immature, entitled, and even bigoted all over encouraging fellow fans who care about the incredible work that Bailey has done these past years to come post on this thread, so one more drop in the functionally illiterate bucket won't make much of a difference to me. But I appreciate the warning lol.

I thought Jonathan Bailey had just wrecked his voice from the Wicked pt. 2 tour or something, or is using a different recording setup than normal. He's a busy man, but I wouldn't immediately jump to the conclusion that he's been recast.

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Originally Posted by PaulH

Whilst I will continue to wait until we have some formal information is announced, when I heard it I really thought it sounded like an AI voice lacking any warmth or depth like a terrible Siri voice.

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No one's performance should ever be baselessly accused of being AI. It is a soul-crushing and gutting insult to any artist who pours effort into their craft.

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Originally Posted by Liyinabi

I thought Jonathan Bailey had just wrecked his voice from the Wicked pt. 2 tour or something, or is using a different recording setup than normal. He's a busy man, but I wouldn't immediately jump to the conclusion that he's been recast.

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This isn't direct at you, necessarily, but mostly at the part of the fandom that is clearly distressed about this yet choosing to cope by vehemently denying there's any chance it wasn't Bailey.

The deciding factor to me that makes it clear it's not him are this VA's vocal inflections.

Vocal inflection are the unique traits of someone's voice—their speech patterns and quite literally the unique ways in which their mouth forms certain sounds. While one's pitch can change due to illness, fatigue or strain, their vocal inflections won't.

If you truly listen for Bailey's vocal inflections in past patches and expansions and really compare it to G'raha in 7.4, you should definitely able to tell it is simply not his voice in this patch. Trust me when I say there's nothing I hope for more than to be wrong. I certainly tried extremely hard to convince myself I could still hear Bailey if I did this or that—but I just couldn't. Because it isn't his voice.

So coming from that premise, much as I loathe it, the issue at hand is:
1) Square Enix was clearly aware that the difference was immediately noticeable, hence them omitting G'raha's voice line from the English 7.4 trailer, when it was present in every other language.
2) Square Enix has chosen to not say anything to their fanbase about it.
3) Fans are being left to speculate and worry over whether this recast is a temporary thing, likely due to Bailey being an incredibly busy man who may have finally been at a point where he truly could not fit a recording session into his schedule prior to the release of the patch, which is perfectly understandable—or that this is a permanent, unannounced single character recast for reasons yet unknown, which, by the way, has never happened in this game other than in the case of a voice actor dying.

Whichever is the case, it would certainly help calm people's emotions if we were told literally anything about it. Instead, many are worried if this is just what G'raha is going to sound like from now on, if it's a Troy Baker situation (actor being recast due to being assumed to "just be too big for the role" without ever being even asked to return), and many other unfortunate scenarios.

Even to those still clinging to the firm belief that it's totally Bailey, I wish they'd consider that there is a possibility it isn't. And if that upsets them so much they'd rather keep convincing themselves otherwise, maybe they should be in this thread voicing to Square Enix that maintaining G'raha's seven year long voice actor is important to them rather than burying their heads in the sand.

We're lucky enough to be talking about a live service game in which things can be patched and adjusted on the go, after all. So if Bailey wishes to (because no one is trying to hold the man hostage if he wants to let go of the role) and could come back, Square Enix should know that many, many of their paying costumers want him to.

Otherwise, I'm sure they'd be happy to just know they can replace any character they want with soundalikes whenever they feel it's convenient and there'll simply be no backlash against it. Or if there is, they'll hardly have to do any work to cull it—they'll find plenty of willing, unpaid volunteers doing their utmost to yell insults at anyone complaining, to call them parasocial, delusional and mentally unstable, and to ramble endlessly about how not big a deal it is. Leave the multimillion dollar company alone, you creeps! They need that Bailey money to invest into more AI slop.

From my perspective, as the person with the hundreds of hours of listening to the English voices specifically to analyse every last thing - the guy in 7.4 does certain consonants differently, and JB always does those ones the same, even as Growingway and the random Garlean soldier.

Plus, I've got this, I don't know exactly, but when people speak I feel their voices as if it's me making the noise (so, in my face/throat etc. in the right places) and JB's is one of the most distinctive physical sensations I've ever felt in nearly four decades of living with this whatever-it-is. Hence me fighting so hard to prove Nald'thal wasn't him, and having to find other reasons that weren't just "my nose feels wrong, it's not him" so people didn't think I was unhinged :D

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Originally Posted by peachsyder

The deciding factor to me that makes it clear it's not him are this VA's vocal inflections.

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So much this.
And this is also the main reason the new VA makes G'raha seem like a whole new person.
These things are so unique to people that it's almost inevitable with a new VA - so if they absolutely need to recast, at the very least I hope they'll look for someone who can mimick the established voice better than whoever voiced him this patch.

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Originally Posted by shoebilldreams

From my perspective, as the person with the hundreds of hours of listening to the English voices specifically to analyse every last thing - the guy in 7.4 does certain consonants differently, and JB always does those ones the same, even as Growingway and the random Garlean soldier.

Plus, I've got this, I don't know exactly, but when people speak I feel their voices as if it's me making the noise (so, in my face/throat etc. in the right places) and JB's is one of the most distinctive physical sensations I've ever felt in nearly four decades of living with this whatever-it-is. Hence me fighting so hard to prove Nald'thal wasn't him, and having to find other reasons that weren't just "my nose feels wrong, it's not him" so people didn't think I was unhinged :D

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This is unhinged and yet we love you for it <33

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Originally Posted by shoebilldreams

Hence me fighting so hard to prove Nald'thal wasn't him, and having to find other reasons that weren't just "my nose feels wrong, it's not him" so people didn't think I was unhinged :D

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NGL i was one of the ones really thinking it was him at the time. its close enough to JBs voice at least. dont know if the person was attempting to mimic or if it was just something that occurred. it was only a couple of lines though.

curious on what you feel though, ive never heard of that. such wonderful things us humans are. only just vagularly remember how cynthia says she sees music as colours which i have heard about before.
My brain is apparently completly duff as I dont get anything XD

Though..curious where do the scions reside? is graha a nose feel?
ooh if you don't want to answer to an extent (on such a personal thing perhaps?) .. please do shale :) her voice is so soothing to me i can only imagine its something along the top of your head like a head massage :)

JB in general, G'raha or not, feels like a slight pressure in the front of my face, particularly my nose and forehead. I can also feel it in my throat and chest a bit, but without that exact pressure at the front I know it's not him!

Shale is quite close to a voice I can do myself (also being Scottish, like her actress, and being able to put on that English accent she's doing) so it's harder to pick out - but I also feel her in the top of my head, not quite at the surface.

I'll have to remind myself of the other Scions, it's been a while!

As a matter of pure curiosity on my part, have we ever been aware of how long before release, on average, are patches recorded?

I vaguely remember something about Bakool Ja Ja's VA celebrating his character's return a full patch before he actually had any voiced lines, which makes me assume at least 4 months or so? Though, of course, it may be that not every VA gets to record in the same timeframe as they'll have different schedules and availability and not every patch might follow the same timeframe, but I'm curious all the same.

(Also, does anyone remember when it was that they patched Wuk Lamat's Interphos voice lines? If I'm not mistaken that was also when they patched the lines Y'shtola had in 7.0 that had some pretty noticeable sound quality issues due to the actress' personal circumstances at the time.)

Personally .. a voice actor adds to the immersion.. within a story if anything changes it takes time to get used to.. I'm not saying I won't in time get used to the change.. but I've grown along way with g'raha .. it's just odd that during an expansion things change like this.. :)

This thread now has just as many views as the official welcome thread in this forum, which was posted over a decade ago. Which, uh, might be saying a lot on how many people noticed that the voice sounds different.

In other news, Happy Starlight!

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Originally Posted by peachsyder

As a matter of pure curiosity on my part, have we ever been aware of how long before release, on average, are patches recorded?

I vaguely remember something about Bakool Ja Ja's VA celebrating his character's return a full patch before he actually had any voiced lines, which makes me assume at least 4 months or so? Though, of course, it may be that not every VA gets to record in the same timeframe as they'll have different schedules and availability and not every patch might follow the same timeframe, but I'm curious all the same.

(Also, does anyone remember when it was that they patched Wuk Lamat's Interphos voice lines? If I'm not mistaken that was also when they patched the lines Y'shtola had in 7.0 that had some pretty noticeable sound quality issues due to the actress' personal circumstances at the time.)

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Just a quick search and shows Wuk Lamat’s lines were patched in November 2024. Not sure when they were recorded, but that’s when the community started discussing it.

Also, yes, Happy Starlight! :)

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Originally Posted by shoebilldreams

From my perspective, as the person with the hundreds of hours of listening to the English voices specifically to analyse every last thing - the guy in 7.4 does certain consonants differently, and JB always does those ones the same, even as Growingway and the random Garlean soldier.

Plus, I've got this, I don't know exactly, but when people speak I feel their voices as if it's me making the noise (so, in my face/throat etc. in the right places) and JB's is one of the most distinctive physical sensations I've ever felt in nearly four decades of living with this whatever-it-is. Hence me fighting so hard to prove Nald'thal wasn't him, and having to find other reasons that weren't just "my nose feels wrong, it's not him" so people didn't think I was unhinged :D

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Without knowing anything about this, this could be a form of synaesthesia - I have that too, though mine's associative and visual (meaning I know what colour ANYTHING has, from feelings to names to flavours etc., but I don't actively see them - some people do).
Generally, about 4% of people have some form of synaesthesia, and it means that one sense kinda bleeds into the others as there are synapses in the brain that normally aren't there.

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Originally Posted by KiraRavens

Without knowing anything about this, this could be a form of synaesthesia - I have that too, though mine's associative and visual (meaning I know what colour ANYTHING has, from feelings to names to flavours etc., but I don't actively see them - some people do).
Generally, about 4% of people have some form of synaesthesia, and it means that one sense kinda bleeds into the others as there are synapses in the brain that normally aren't there.

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I've got various other synaesthesia type things going on, so I did consider that this might be related, but also I just have such a vivid memory that brings in all senses so sometimes I write off things that are probably synaesthesia as a physical memory.

I can also "see" a different mood/vibe in music if the key is changed by even half a semitone which is a fun one when people record covers in a different key and I'm trying to figure out why the happy song is now giving "existential crisis"

Anyway, day 746574657 and I still think it's not JB because 7.4 G'raha doesn't give me any pressure in my face, let alone JB-specific pressure. And also it didn't sound like him at all but let's use shoebill science here. :D

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Originally Posted by Bantochan

Just a quick search and shows Wuk Lamat’s lines were patched in November 2024. Not sure when they were recorded, but that’s when the community started discussing it.

Also, yes, Happy Starlight! :)

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It was indeed in 7.1! It's in the patch notes as well, though it doesn't specify what was patched. We all suspected it and found out though, lol.

Unfortunate. I was half hoping it had been patched as early as some 7.0x patch. I assume they did the rerecording of the Interphos lines alongside the recording of new lines for 7.1. I do wonder, though we're aware they record in cycles (x.0, x.1-x.3, then x.4-x.58), is there any indication that they record all of those patches at the same time/date? With how far apart they are, I presume not, though I really can't be sure. I assume that by the time they're bringing VAs in to record a x.1 patch they're not ready to already record x.3 content.

All of this being me feeding my own speculations of "if Bailey comes back, can he do it as early as 7.5, or has his replacement already recorded all the way to 7.58?"

Sigh. I've been doing a Shadowbringers replay that I started long before all of this, and continuing it after 7.4, there's just a certain sadness to it. If it truly comes down to they're recasting Bailey permanently, I hope this isn't the half-baked way they're planning to do it. I'd much rather have someone with a slightly different voice but a comparable performance than what I can only call "a half-plausible impersonation with none of the flavor". Hearing the sort of completely flat delivery we got in 7.4 just feels so wrong on G'raha. Not to mention the inconsistent accent, the noticeable lisp, and the moments where it just doesn't even pass as an impersonation. Sorry if all that sounds harsh, but it's hard to not be critical, especially after DT has been a consistent mess of terrible voice directing overall, and especially with an actor we may be expected to accept as successor to a performance like Bailey's. I had been away from the game for a while, so I actually played 7.3 shortly before 7.4 dropped, which just made the recast that much more jarring to me.

That said, again, here's hoping the recast is just not permanent. I'd truly hate to see Bailey go after seven whole years, especially if it's a case of him getting Troy Baker'd.

Happy Starlight, everybody.

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Originally Posted by peachsyder

As a matter of pure curiosity on my part, have we ever been aware of how long before release, on average, are patches recorded?

I vaguely remember something about Bakool Ja Ja's VA celebrating his character's return a full patch before he actually had any voiced lines, which makes me assume at least 4 months or so? Though, of course, it may be that not every VA gets to record in the same timeframe as they'll have different schedules and availability and not every patch might follow the same timeframe, but I'm curious all the same.

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See, this is what gets me. "Wicked press tour" is the reason most people keep saying Bailey might not have been able to record for 7.4, but... that was early to mid November. Surely they recorded 7.4 before this?

The other dates I could see schedule conflicting is the Jurassic World press tour, which was throughout mid to late June. But surely there was a time through July, August, September or October where they could have scheduled Bailey for, I don't know, a day? I doubt G'raha will have enough lines in 7.4-7.58 combined to warrant much studio time.

Then again, this is all just speculation. I can only hope that he has some yet unrevealed project that maybe kept him busy through the latter half of this year, and not that he has decided to leave the game or that Square Enix is pulling a Troy Baker on him for whatever reason.

I'm just... sad. My hype for the game is kind of dead over this (yeah yeah I care that much, don't really care nor wanna hear what you think about me because of it), and the harassment over caring about this recast was kind of the biggest blow of it all, to be honest.

Not really expecting to hear from SE at all at this point. I think the best scenario at this point is Bailey just returning for 7.5 and them pretending like all of this just didn't happen, but I don't know how feasible that is. NA Fanfest should be around the time 7.5 will drop, can we even hope to hear anything about it then? If they do those character introduction slides for the characters that will be prominent in the next expansion, and that includes G'raha, will he have a little footnote saying who is his voice actor?

So many questions and it all just feels like copium.

A belated happy Starlight to all of you. Let us hope for better news in the new year.

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Originally Posted by paradisea

I'm just... sad. My hype for the game is kind of dead over this (yeah yeah I care that much, don't really care nor wanna hear what you think about me because of it), and the harassment over caring about this recast was kind of the biggest blow of it all, to be honest.

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I felt this too. My excitement for 7.4 was completely deflated because G'raha is the primary reason I am still subscribed to the story. He's just that well written, and his Jonathan Bailey did a phenomenal job with him.

However, upon hearing about Yuma Uchida's role as G'raha in JP, I started giving the JP audio a listen. And down the rabbit hole I went- I learned a lot about how the EN localization changes a lot of G'raha's dialogue, and even just... cuts out things entirely.

A criticism about G'raha I'd have as a solely EN player was that it felt like his identity issues were forgotten about until his speech in Ultima Thule, where he makes a passing allusion to it with nothing before it really... communicating that. And that's where I learned that Yuma Uchida plays G'raha in a way where, in times of need, G'raha's voice itself switches to the Exarch's.

Yuma plays him in such an intruiguing twofold way, where even in 5.0 theres intentional slips where the Exarch voice is dropped for a more boyish delivery. It's night and day, and it especially gets the point across that there's two identities at war with each other. Mt Gulg, for instance, has a deliberate and obvious change in Yuma's delivery if you call him by his name, versus remaining silent. I don't hear much of a difference on the EN side. Bailey's 'Exarch mode' is more commanding and booming, as the moment in Radz at Han calls for it, but it is still the same voice.

I had learned this week that the JP cast is treated extremely well, and they get to sit in the studio with the writers and discuss the story and context. They get retakes, direction, and they get questions answered. Yuma makes a point to truly understand G'raha and where the character is at, emotionally, for each line of dialogue. His passion for the role is inspiring and entirely wholesome.

I've heard that the EN cast either sends in recordings from home or if they have a scheduled recording session, they only have a certain amount of time allotted, far less direction, less time for retakes, and they don't get nearly as much context going in.

And yet, despite all of it, Bailey was able to interpret G'raha's voice in his own unique way which landed well with the EN audience.

G'raha's 7.4 EN voice is not resonating with a vast majority, to the point many fans are convinced of a recast. Until we know for sure what happened and if Bailey is still on board, I'm actually happy to switch to the JP audio.

Any fans of G'raha would be delighted to hear him there- and also learn of so many little details in his JP dialogue thats omitted in English! I'm actually learning Japanese now because of it.

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Originally Posted by CosmosNovaRose

I've heard that the EN cast either sends in recordings from home or if they have a scheduled recording session, they only have a certain amount of time allotted, far less direction, less time for retakes, and they don't get nearly as much context going in.

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The German actors seem to get even less time/context than the English ones - even not being an amazing German speaker, I could easily tell they had very little direction. As late as Endwalker, it sounded like they didn't know they were in an epic fantasy story, even if they'd been doing the voice since ARR.

In fact, the German voices in Shadowbringers are so lacklustre that Vincent Fallow and Toni Michael Slatter - the German voices of Clive and Dion in FF16 (which is incredible in German, honestly sounds a bit like Ben Starr learned German) - gave up on the German cast in Il Mheg and switched to English.

If anyone's thinking of switching, French G'raha is the very definition of little meow meow. Even has rolled Rs in some of his subtitles, like a purr.

I'm personally not a fan of the switch between "Exarch" and "G'raha" voice that happens in the Japanese and find the consistent voice Bailey keeps more compelling. It definitely helps counteracts the flanderization G'raha sometimes suffers in the writing to me.

The discrepancy between the English text and Japanese voiceover is also unappealing to me, personally. It really takes me out of the story to read text with prose and vocabulary that matches a medieval fantasy setting book while listening to the characters speak like Seinen anime characters. Understanding enough Japanese to be acutely aware of the discrepancies is what makes it even more jarring to me.

There's also just an entire different vibe between the English and Japanese voiceover, and certain characters (Alisaie, for instance—why do you sound twelve and why are always yelling at me, girl?) feel like entire different people.

But that's obviously just my personal opinion and I'm aware it's somewhat unpopular. However, I really don't want "switching to Japanese" as a solution to a Bailey recast, frankly... Especially wouldn't want the sentiment of SE reading this thread to be like, "they'll be mad with a recast but they'll just cope and switch to Japanese, it'll be fine".

I think it best to focus on what makes the English voiceover good, of which Bailey's performance as G'raha is the main highlight to me, at least. It'd truly be a major downgrade of the overall quality of the EN voice acting to lose him.

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Originally Posted by CosmosNovaRose

Snip of a very interesting take.

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One thing about Bailey's take on G'raha is he seems to play up the limerence for the Warrior of Light, which makes perfect sense since Bailey loves to play romantic characters of all types. You can just feel that the man adores our character. He's VERY good at it, too, and I'm not at all shocked so many WoLRaha shippers in fandom spaces are coming into this thread with worries since that's such a detail with Bailey that's nigh impossible to mimic that's been baked in since day one.

The identity crisis part of G'raha's character just doesn't come out in the English version at all, but I agree it's more of a writing issue, as it seems like the original text wants to imply the memory and soul meld between current G'raha and the bad timeline Exarch G'raha wasn't as smooth as he lets on.

There is one short story instance where G'raha struggles to remember a few details on etiquette with Hien, and is glad it's something he can still recall. It's the one Hien asks for information on Corvos and Thancred recommends G'raha go to Hien.


What's funny is I've heard several comments that the German dub has some weird casting choices but that's terrible.

Bailey grasps the inherent yearning of G'raha's character in a way no other of his actors does, in my opinion. That doesn't mean something inherent romantic—it's that "craving something you can't let yourself have" feeling that was especially notable with the Exarch and still comes out at times with current G'raha. The desire to reveal himself to the WoL and speak as friends, as he says in A Breath of Respite; the desire to adventure together; the desire to be like the heroes of the books he read as child. That's all yearning, and that's something Bailey absolutely nails. His delivery in emotional scenes is without peer, and the fact that he was able to grasp that about the character even lacking the full context that the only the JP cast is afforded speaks immensely to his skill as an actor, IMO.

"A Breath of Respite" in Shadowbringers, "Hello World" in Endwalker, "In Serenity And Sorrow" in Dawntrail are all quests that are so incredibly memorable not just because of the writing but because of the way Bailey delivers G'raha's lines in them. That's what we mean when we say he makes the character to a lot of us.

I appreciate the other languages as alternative takes on the character, but how Bailey interpreted G'raha is what truly made the character so compelling to me and to many others. To have him leave is, to me, to have G'raha become a different character.

Just like if you watched the same movie twice with different actors interpreting the same role you'd come across with different feelings towards the character they embodied, a different voice actor is going to change the way you see the character.

Now imagine you're not watching the same movie twice—imagine you're watching a movie and once you're past the 2 hour mark, a major character starts being interpreted by a completely different actor. Would that not be incredibly jarring? Maybe you'd be able to just deal with it and shrug it off if the character was kind of irrelevant to you, but your friend who's watching with you whose favorite character is that one is going to feel a lot different. Especially if the new actor happens to be noticeably... lacking, in comparison to the original.

Sure, G'raha won't be changing faces, but that's how a recast feels to a lot of us. In the same note, that's how switching languages after seven years of playing in another one might feel to some too, myself included. It's not really a solution, so I'd rather not go there. The VAs in other languages are not going anywhere, so enjoying their interpretations of G'raha while not losing the one we have in English is the scenario I think we should focus on.

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Originally Posted by paradisea

"Wicked press tour" is the reason most people keep saying Bailey might not have been able to record for 7.4, but... that was early to mid November. Surely they recorded 7.4 before this?

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He was to the US quite a few times during the summer months going by the social media posts & interviews that popped up on my timeline, though I don't follow closely enough to actually confirm.
However, them leaving out the voice in the trailer could in fact have been them waiting till the last moment and it then just not working out in time after all.
I still think that it would be incredibly weird to recast him permanently without any notice or statement whatsover, so I'll just keep hoping for the best.

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Originally Posted by shoebilldreams

The German actors seem to get even less time/context than the English ones - even not being an amazing German speaker, I could easily tell they had very little direction. As late as Endwalker, it sounded like they didn't know they were in an epic fantasy story, even if they'd been doing the voice since ARR.

In fact, the German voices in Shadowbringers are so lacklustre that Vincent Fallow and Toni Michael Slatter - the German voices of Clive and Dion in FF16 (which is incredible in German, honestly sounds a bit like Ben Starr learned German) - gave up on the German cast in Il Mheg and switched to English.

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I'm Austrian (bilingual with English). I've never played with the German voices myself but Vince is a friend and I've watched his streams, and though there's really good German voice acting, too, FFXIV is ... not great ... in German.

The German translations are usually (not just for XIV but for any FF) much closer to the Japanese original than the EN versions, though, so I will occasionally set the game to German and read up on stuff (or just watch the German YouTube videos). I also speak Japanese - not nearly as well as German or English but well enough to see where either version deviates from the OV, and while some things do indeed have a different "flavour" or are clearer in German, I still very much prefer the EN localisation as it feels more consistent and thought-through. Japanese has a very specific way of saying things, which (literally) doesn't translate all that well to EN, so what MC Koji Fox is doing with the EN localisation is way better than any close-to-literal translation could ever be imo, from a cultural point of view alone, not even mentioning in terms of how pretty and/or poetic things sound.

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Originally Posted by peachsyder

I'm personally not a fan of the switch between "Exarch" and "G'raha" voice that happens in the Japanese and find the consistent voice Bailey keeps more compelling.

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Same... he's not actually two people, after all.

Just know that if a voice actor was replaced, Square Enix would have never have pulled this with their Japanese playerbase.

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Originally Posted by Bantochan

I’m fully aware I’m reading into it, but it’s just interesting to me and it made me feel a certain type of way.

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further to this (as apparently my brain likes to stew unanswered questions like a darn unseen processing system in the background - and this apparently was one...)

can anyone post what the other languages say?
Please can someone in go speak to graha and see. if its similar to what graha says in EN we can be sure its part of the story and not related.

Text in EN below (direct accidental copy from when i was typing out my 7.4 personal discord review)

G'raha Tia: Warm fare-thee-wells can ease the sting of partings, as we come to terms with an absence not soon forgotten.
G'raha Tia: To tell those we hold dear what they've meant to us, and to wish them the best... We should seize that chance whensoever we can.

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Originally Posted by lievaordiea

further to this (as apparently my brain likes to stew unanswered questions like a darn unseen processing system in the background - and this apparently was one...)

can anyone post what the other languages say?
Please can someone in go speak to graha and see. if its similar to what graha says in EN we can be sure its part of the story and not related.

Text in EN below (direct accidental copy from when i was typing out my 7.4 personal discord review)

G'raha Tia: Warm fare-thee-wells can ease the sting of partings, as we come to terms with an absence not soon forgotten.
G'raha Tia: To tell those we hold dear what they've meant to us, and to wish them the best... We should seize that chance whensoever we can.

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I am also interested in this.

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Originally Posted by lievaordiea

can anyone post what the other languages say?
Please can someone in go speak to graha and see. if its similar to what graha says in EN we can be sure its part of the story and not related.

Text in EN below (direct accidental copy from when i was typing out my 7.4 personal discord review)

G'raha Tia: Warm fare-thee-wells can ease the sting of partings, as we come to terms with an absence not soon forgotten.
G'raha Tia: To tell those we hold dear what they've meant to us, and to wish them the best... We should seize that chance whensoever we can.

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Can only access the JP text at the moment, but this is what he says:

アリゼーたちをトライヨラで見送って、
オレたちもトレノで送り出してもらって……。
旅立ちの瞬間は、別れの寂しさもたしかにあるけど、
互いの無事を祈る、優しい想いで溢れている。
何度味わっても、いいものだよな。


At least according to machine translation, it's the same vibe, the only difference being that he directly references Alisaie, Tuliyollal, and Treno as examples of recent goodbyes or partings.

I just started 7.4 and immediately, in one line, I could tell it wasn't him. This voice sounds more light and airy, in a way. Bailey's voice had more richness to it and depth. Not saying this VA is BAD, he's just not Bailey. Unless a different set of audio equipment was used to account for the change in voice. I also hope this was just a one-time thing. I would greatly miss Bailey's voice as G'raha is one of my favorite characters next to Erenville. Whom I also hope they never replace his VA, should we see him more in coming patch/expansions.

Edit: Upon listening to some other lines, it does sound like him at points. Is it possible that some of his lines were recorded with a different setup than others? Like some were added last minute so he had to use what he could get access to on short notice? Otherwise this VA is good at, sometimes, impersonating Bailey's voice fairly well.