Wuk Lamat's Poor EN Voice Acting

[Turtledeluxe]

I actually sat down and watched the cutscenes in full (rather than pieces) with a totally open mind to try to figure out what the hell the forums are talking about (bc I don't hear anyone else hating it). I earnestly tried. But to me this is one of the best castings in the game-- a Latina female hroth. I also noticed she's not even supposed to be a dominant force-- she seems to be pretending to be that but her body language and performance definitively inform us that she appears to have some kind of apprehension or even fear. I feel like there's more to the story regarding her father. I also like the dynamic she has with Erenville. I don't get the hate at all. There's two or three lines that are a tad undercooked but still consistent with the rest of the game.

If she had some kind of high pitched, girly voice like an anime girl or a low dull voice like Yugiri, it just wouldn't make any sense. This just works. No wonder the casting directors chose her. Also if she sounded remotely English or Irish or something it wouldn't work at all...that would make her the same as all the people's we have already met. It's the *new* world.

[Heroman3003]

The last thread was about 26 or so pages long before I got entangled with more work before I could be home for the day. As there was lots of people being trolls or spiteful, there was a lot of honest criticism and feedback, too. Is it really so hard to ban individuals, rather than destroy an entire discussion?

"Isn't it better to squish cockroaches one by one than to fumigate the whole nest to not touch a few friendly insects"

[Vyrerus]

"Isn't it better to squish cockroaches one by one than to fumigate the whole nest to not touch a few friendly insects"

Fumigation actually doesn't work all that well on Cockroaches. You have to use powders and other things that kill their in ground nests. Fumigation kills tons, sure, but it won't solve the root problem.

Also this analogy is a bit heavy handed, referring to people expressing themselves as bugs, less than human. smh

[Rowde]

Hopefully they're not just removing topics and actually giving some of the more blatant "mask off" folks a vacation from the forums.

[custe]

this is the very nature of localization. its in the title. you can't translate something 1-1 and expect it to make sense all the time. if you went through and listened to all the japanese in anime, games and other translated media from japan, you'll find lots of differences in that between the source. its not an agenda or some change to the story its interpretation. lots of people sound different in real life to how a the traditional va or movie star might sound, i dont think its an issue when thats reflected in game.

its one thing to say, i wanted this character to be a mommy cat or wtv and a completely other thing to say this character should be this way. a problem in these discussions particular is the va is trans, so you saying she doesnt:

If japan used a woman or a woman sounding voice, why do they take it upon themselves to not follow that same basic approach

is a very poor line of discussion because it comes across as transphobic and if ppl dont believe in this as a concept, theres nothing about this character that is worth discussing with these ppl imo

she sounds fine and i think its very telling that people look to "standards of women's voices" when making arguments against her

[Theodric]

"Isn't it better to squish cockroaches one by one than to fumigate the whole nest to not touch a few friendly insects"

The primary function of the forum is to provide feedback and discuss the game. If those in charge of keeping this place in working order do not actually want that to be the case then they should come out and say it.

They are also a business that is catering to a global audience, so they are inevitably going to encounter many players from completely different countries, cultures and belief systems.

I, myself, have repeatedly called for more engagement from the community representatives as seen here:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...epresentatives

Which, in turn, would go a long way towards keeping things civil and constructive.

[MikkoAkure]

It's just the same thing as Feo Ul all over again.

People hated on that VA for being "fake Scottish" (the VA is Scottish) or hating the sound of her and loudly proclaiming they were switching to the Japanese version. Then the loud voices tired themselves out and no one talked about it again.


OP kept using the "censored" and mentioned how long they've been paying SE so it's probably a mix of entitlement and subconscious feelings towards the VA's identity. It could've been more consistent but I don't think the voice work was otherwise particularly noteworthy for being good or bad. If it wasn't for the VA's identity, the backlash wouldn't be as much as it is.

Not sure where the OP is getting "offensive caricature" from either. The voice just sounds "generic exotic" and the character is a 6ft tall fantasy cat woman so I'm not sure how she's supposed to sound. The only other character from Tural that we've talked to is voiced by an Icelandic person and is Wuk Lamat's childhood friend.

I guess SE needs to make everyone "generic BBC English" no matter where their character came from or what their background is or else people will come to the forums over and over asking to be heard from the manager.

[Heroman3003]

A reminder nobody had a single problem with the voice in trailer and prior to full trailer people even correctly guessed based off of voice that the character speaking is fem hroth. Isn't it weird how all the hate only started pouring in when VA name was revealed?

[Vyrerus]

okay, this is something that needs to be cleared up. the va is puerto rican.

The VA may be of Puerto Rican descent, but they're white as alabaster and from Kentucky (rural, southern state in NA), so it doesn't track along those lines at all.

But I don't care about her identity at all. I care about the performance, and its lack of meshing with the character. Physical identity is irrelevant to voice acting, or it should be as it has been for decades past. What matters is the intent for the character, and how the directors want the character to be perceived by the audience.

As of now, it seems whoever is directing EN's voiceovers either doesn't care for quality, and wants a stiff barely expressive character in Wuk Lamat, or they just wanted a messy production that would create negative buzz to bring attention to issues irrelevant to the game.

[Tsurayu]

A reminder nobody had a single problem with the voice in trailer and prior to full trailer people even correctly guessed based off of voice that the character speaking is fem hroth. Isn't it weird how all the hate only started pouring in when VA name was revealed?

I wouldn't say nobody had a single problem, but there is certainly some degree of truth to that statement unfortunately.