Current Events > is japanese VA *actually* usually better in JRPGs

(+) Yeah! (+)

people say this but it always comes off as an attempt at looking more discerning for being left of field than actually justifiably thinking so.
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nope

a thousand words is fucking atrocious in japanese
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weebs think the overacting is a more powerful performance

The legit criticism of dubs is when lip movements aren't fixed to fit the English lines and someone's lips keep moving three seconds after they're done talking.
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I honestly can't tell most of the time.
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Jiek_Fafn posted...

I honestly can't tell most of the time.

i mean yeah this is kinda true.

dudes who can't understand japanese acting authoritatively as to whether it's good or not lol.


i mean yeah bad english VA is bad but I feel the stuff I mentioned is overcompensating
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not really
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Frankly, yes, the Japanese track usually is better.

In English voice acting in anime and weeb games is usually left to secondary-tier VAs. You'll notice that the really good VAs like Laura Bailey and Troy Baker almost never do anime and weeb games. It's cause they've moved on to bigger and better things.
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Japanese voice acting is always better. If Americans didn't personally create something their voice acting is terrible. Look at anime. Nobody speaks like that. Lmao.
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NinjaBreakfast posted...

people say this but it always comes off as an attempt at looking more discerning for being left of field than actually justifiably thinking so.

If the VA is bad, it's usually bad in both English and Japanese, but if you don't understand Japanese, it's harder to tell when it's bad in Japanese.

When voice acting is good, the English is usually better.
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JRPG character interactions are generally pretty cringey and American VA just exposes how bad it can be

If it's subbed I can at least brush it off cause the Japanese are a weird bunch
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I still think it's a mixed bag. But if the team handling the translation is good, like say Fire Emblem Echoes' 8-4, honestly, from what I heard, that was a rare case where English VA knocked Japanese VA out of the freaking park
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It depends. It often goes past just the VAs themselves though, as there is a lot of technical and writing work that needs to go into re-voicing something in a different language. Some English dubs are better and some Japanese dubs are better.
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I don't understand Japanese so it sounds better to me because I don't know what they're saying

SerperiorThanU posted...

Generally yes. As someone who is multilingual

the vast majority of people who claim they are are not multilingual, though. maybe they think they are cos they've watched a lot of subbed anime but otherwise it's pure guesswork rather than weighing up the technical merits, as true as what you said may be.

i think there's an element of 'authenticity' too. people want to be seen to use the japanese VA because of the nerd cred or w/e.

I guess to a lot of people, va they can't understand is superior to actively bad VA they can. I just don't think *that* many JRPGS are actually that bad
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Well when someone does not know what someone is saying and you have to read the text to understand what's going on how do you know if the acting is good or bad?
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Hambo the Hog posted...

and someone's lips keep moving three seconds after they're done talking.

I think scriptwriters and voice directors take great pains to avoid that nowadays. You might not have lip movements match during dialogue but I seldom see dialogue stop short or extend past lip flaps.
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Don't understand playing games with dual audio. The game went through a localization process, whatever you're reading will be similar but not the same as the stuff they're actually saying. Might as well play in the language it was localized to.

Unless changing language somehow changes the script as well, then go nuts.
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SerperiorThanU posted...

NinjaBreakfast posted...

SerperiorThanU posted...

Generally yes. As someone who is multilingual

the vast majority of people who claim they are are not multilingual, though. maybe they think they are cos they've watched a lot of subbed anime but otherwise it's pure guesswork rather than weighing up the technical merits, as true as what you said may be.

i think there's an element of 'authenticity' too. people want to be seen to use the japanese VA because of the nerd cred or w/e.

I guess to a lot of people, va they can't understand is superior to actively bad VA they can. I just don't think *that* many JRPGS are actually that bad

What do you mean by that? I'm half Chinese. I'm fluent in Mandarin Chinese and English and I took up to French V in high school.

Sorry i phrased that badly. I meant that most people who champion non English VA are not multilingual like you are and thus they can't attest to the actual qualities of the VA.
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LordFarquad1312 posted...

Don't understand playing games with dual audio. The game went through a localization process, whatever you're reading will be similar but not the same as the stuff they're actually saying. Might as well play in the language it was localized to.

Unless changing language somehow changes the script as well, then go nuts.

Yeah, for that reason, I won't use Japanese in games unless I'm checking it out or the English VA is really bad.
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SGT_Conti posted...

You might not have lip movements match during dialogue

Japanese dubs have this problem sometimes too though, especially when they use the usual simplistic open/closed flaps during dialogue. They show a closed flap when a syllable can clearly be heard coming from them. It just isn't noticed as much because people are looking at the subtitles.

authenticity is a dumb thing to care about
i'll listen to the game in my native language (english) because listening to what's literally nonsense to me isn't any more pleasant than listening to the occasionally sub-par performance

Maybe in the early days of JRPG voice acting, but certainly not today.
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