Wuk Lamat's Poor EN Voice Acting

[Atelier-Bagur]

On the contrary, location has everything to do with ethnicity, since you can trace things back.

For instance, the population of Puerto Rico is majority white Hispanic. Do you know why that is? Well, it's because the island was colonized by the Spaniards who ruled it for 400 years.

There's also significant black Hispanic and Mesoamerican (this may be the wrong term, but I'm not informed enough to know what to refer to descendants of the Taino as) Hispanic population.

Tural seems to be a caricature itself of North and South America, with the segment most shaped like Brazil being the first featured land map. Brazil has heavy ties to Portugal, which is quite a bit different than Spain. It also has heavy ties to Japan with a troubled history of cultural exchange and immigration to and from there.

If Hispanic and South American identity were what they wanted to most highlight in the individual doing the EN voice for Wuk Lamat, it would have made more sense to go with a VA with stronger ties to a Mesoamerican or South American lineage, rather than a lineage ultimately from Europe.

There are tons of people with Puerto Rican ancestry living in the states, so the bringing up of the VA being from Kentucky is more to highlight a situation closer to... hmm... stolen valor? Nah, it's not that heavy, but I don't know a more appropriate term there either, maybe more like... why not get a VA from Puetro Rico proper or Brazil or Colombia or Panama or anywhere closer to where we're going?

But this is far far far and away from the topic at hand, and I will again maintain that the identity of a VA should not matter at all. Only their work and ability to voice act should matter. And the way I, and many others see it, this VA has fallen short on that front. If they can improve her performance to where I don't feel the need to switch to other languages, then that will be enough. The character herself is fun, not gonna be my new favorite or anything, but I want to like her. I really do. I want to enjoy this game again, because I still have friends who play it often.

If race doesnt matter to you, then why did you bring it up and make such a big deal? In your case, the VAs ethinicity would be the furthest thing from your mind since you preach so much about "quality".

Youre not fooling anyone.

[sindriiisgaming]

From what I've seen with voice acting in the west is that no one really takes it seriously enough to fire anyone over and for the VA specifically, it's not really her fault. Especially when the window of opportunity to "let go" a voice that doesn't fit should have been done during the audition process and whoever hires that voice should be the one held accountable. I think her voice would have been fine without the fake accent because that is clearly the part where she struggles with, if that accent was a must then they absolutely could have hired someone who has that accent and still checks all the other boxes they are looking for.

I know a lot of people mention other voices of side characters but as she is going to be a focus character of the next expansion, then a higher standard expectation by the community isn't unreasonable.

Now if you want to get off the beaten path, then I find it ironic since someone posted her previous twitter comments that since she doesn't fit the character (accent, region of accent, etc) that she her self should not have been considered or have accepted the role. But like everyone on the planet, a paycheck will push beliefs to the side everyday of the week, lol.

im getting really sick of seeing this ethnicity arguement, in the videogame world of ff14 the locations are based on those places but not 100% carbon copys, and this can even trickle down to accents. garlemauld in rissua, yet they have brittish accents and roman names, viera with islandic accents in the greatwood which was aztec, french people of ishgard were brittish, and the faries were scottish. these plcases are only based on our countfries but are not a 1:1 reflection, and for good reason. so this arguement that she should have sounded MORE mexican is based on a pretense that tural IS our mexico and follows OUR mexican accents. even tho other ingame areas dont do this either

[Thighland]

im getting really sick of seeing this ethnicity arguement, in the videogame world of ff14 the locations are based on those places but not 100% carbon copys, and this can even trickle down to accents. garlemauld in rissua, yet they have brittish accents and roman names, viera with islandic accents in the greatwood which was aztec, french people of ishgard were brittish, and the faries were scottish.

Then why bother at all with accents, if it seemingly doesn't matter?

[Atelier-Bagur]

Btw need I remind the ladies and gentlemen of the ethnicity jury that in Stormblood, many of the voiced Ala Mhigan NPCs had not a single VA from Turkey and the Middle East and they all spoke in Cockney or English accent. I dony believe I saw any outcry from that.

I wonder why? Maybe because its British VAs and everyone in the NA automatically assumes English accents = good VA?

[ZavosEsperian]

They’re starting to notice!

Note: we’re still in post-Endwalker, arguably the worst patch cycle this game has seen. Both the writing (director included) and the localization teams have been seriously lacking. The writing for the character is bad and changing the language doesn’t fix it. It—because Wuk is an animal, not a person—is yet another annoying Mary Sue like Zero, Lyse, G’raha, etc. The voice acting fits if only because it’s a bad actor playing a bad character. Perhaps a VA more similar to the Japanese would’ve helped ease the pain, but it’s doubtful.

Besides, do people expect AAA quality anyway? It’s Square Enix in 2024.

Haven't you heard about Square Enix's new game called Foamstars? It is a totally original and novel concept that I cannot figure out how the creative minds at Square Enix came up with the idea. I have the sneaking suspicion Yoshi-P's mantra of wanting players to play other games has something to do with it, as then the devs can exercise their creative minds. It is clear Foamstars is going to be set up for greatness and money coming in from Square Enix's other IPs is not going to be wasted on a potential flash in the pan. By the way, I hear artificial intelligence was being used to create various images in the game, which is extremely forward thinking of Square Enix, just like NFTs were.

I expect the current quality from Square Enix to continue to grow better, particularly from FFXIV, in the following years to come!

[Thighland]

I wonder why? Maybe because its British VAs and everyone in the NA automatically assumes English accents = good VA?

Maybe it's because they're generally good at their job.

[Troxbark]

Maybe it's because they're generally good at their job.

Now we can't be having that, there's a narrative this person is trying spin!

[sindriiisgaming]

Then why bother at all with accents, if it seemingly doesn't matter?

because hydaelyn has its own dialects, can u atleast try to counter my arguement

[Atelier-Bagur]

Maybe it's because they're generally good at their job.

We should probably replace all media with British and Japanese VAs. Lets homogenize that shit

[Atelier-Bagur]

Now we can't be having that, there's a narrative this person is trying spin!

What the narrative that people are caring about the VAs location like some people been spouting?

Yeah no. Nobody cared back then and its just a lame excuse to nitpick an average job in such an average ENG dub localization.