Nintendo Switch: Thread 09

[Junko]

Xenoblade 3 CE goes live , Nintendo website goes down ….. give up with them I really do

[briareos_kerensky]

Hellena Taylor speaks about why she refused to voice Bayonetta 3: she was offered only $4000 for the whole game. She asks to boycott the game and instead donate to charity.

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[Atticus]

That is a lowball paycheque

[Cassius_Smoke]

I suspect they just wanted a different voice actor. That's an insult.

[Dogg Thang]

That is insanely low. Now that has me incredibly curious about game VO rates generally.

[Cassius_Smoke]

That is insanely low. Now that has me incredibly curious about game VO rates generally.

Me too. A quick Google says it's based on script word count, plus the number of minutes in the studio.
I would think someone like Jennifer Hale would command more cash too, so there's that.

[randombs]

Hellena Taylor speaks about why she refused to voice Bayonetta 3: she was offered only $4000 for the whole game. She asks to boycott the game and instead donate to charity.

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Yikes, it gets worse. Second video is about nurses and food banks which is fair enough, but it all goes Pete Tong during the third video. She starts crapping on the replacement VA (Jennifer Hale) saying she has no right to say she’s the voice of Bayonetta because Taylor created that voice, nor does Hale have the right to sign stuff as Bayonetta. Umm.

The fourth video is a quote from Jesus of Lazarus.

Blimey.

[Golgo]

She seems to be coming from quite a bad place in terms of mental health and finances, which indeed she acknowledges. And if IMDb is correct and up-to-date then she hasn't done any voiceover work since 2014 when she did Bayonetta for Super Smash Bros on the Wii U. It's quite a bleak picture overall.

Anyway, I'm sorry that she didn't get offered what she felt she deserved. But her acknowledgement that Platinum were "legally" right to offer what they did while also asserting that she is owed a "living wage" by them, strikes me as quite strange. Also, the attack on Hale ("That betrayal is hers and hers alone") is absolutely raving.

I'm certainly not boycotting the game.

[Neon Ignition]

Apparently the views on the vid are outpacing the reveal trailer for the game. Platinum will need to calm the waters as Nintendo won't want the stink around it and frankly it begs belief B3 even exists in the first place.

[dataDave]

Apparently the views on the vid are outpacing the reveal trailer for the game. Platinum will need to calm the waters as Nintendo won't want the stink around it and frankly it begs belief B3 even exists in the first place.

I really don't see why they should. $4,000 is probably a lot more than what one of their senior developers gets for a month's/350hrs worth of the most hellish work imaginable that involves a desk and a keyboard.

The main reason I'm not poor AF and suicidal is because I chose not to work in video games.

[Asura]

That is insanely low. Now that has me incredibly curious about game VO rates generally.

There's a lot of anger online but I'm waiting to hear more about it, as I can't help but feel we haven't got all the information - but I can tell you with absolute confidence that this was an insultingly low amount.

$4k is absolutely nothing if the character in Bayo3 has as much dialogue as in 1 or 2. I mean those games had so much, it would be several weeks of work for a VA. And I mean this to the degree that the value is nonsensical; it's like offering someone £5000 for a house. £5000 isn't small change but it's a daft suggestion given the context.

I kinda don't want to speculate as that would be inappropriate. I'm just wondering if, with the release of Bayo3 looming, Platinum's PR people are spinning up and are going to release some more information soon which will recontextualise this.

I really don't see why they should. $4,000 is probably a lot more than what one of their senior developers gets for a month's/350hrs worth of the most hellish work imaginable that involves a desk and a keyboard.

A lot of senior developers will earn something approaching ~2.5k a month (i.e. ~4k after you take away tax). And to voice a character like Bayonetta could be literally weeks of work. This estimate only really makes sense if the game is going to do a Snake/Raiden twist and have Bayo only speak a fraction as much.

I get where you're coming from, and how the industry really doesn't want to get trapped in a situation where they're paying VA's Hollywood actor bucks, because there's the perception that poorer paid developers struggle for years to make a game and then a VA comes in for a day right at the end and pockets a massive wedge of cash - but this amount is so small that it barely makes sense. Again, don't want to speculate, we'll see what we know in a few days.

[Dogg Thang]

You can't really compare these two jobs anyway. I mean, you can but in reality there are so many more considerations and VO work is an entirely different thing to being a developer. The expectations are different, the value of the results are different, the terms are different. They're just very different things.

And of course there is more to consider than just the amount of time doing the VO work. That's often not even the primary consideration in a situation like this.

[dataDave]

She’s very quick to let everyone know how much she was offered, but won’t tell how much she asked for in the first place. What if she asked for $80,000?

It makes zero sense that they’d opt for the most prolific female VA to step in instead.

[Dogg Thang]

What she asked for wouldn’t suddenly turn 4k into a larger figure.

[Asura]

You can't really compare these two jobs anyway.

I know; developers are way more important to a project

->Open Spoiler<-

sorry couldn't resist

But yeah, the two things aren't so easy to compare; I'm just making the point that some people are suggesting $4000 is a lot of money and whilst it's not small change, it's certainly not a heap of money in software development or entertainment industry terms.

This is going to be an interesting situation, also, because - and this is what's being tested - do players really care all that much about who VA's a character? The Sonic characters have been recast numerous times. I was miffed when David Hayter was replaced by Kiefer Sutherland but I'd checked out of that series years before anyway, so I can't claim it was what stopped me buying it.

If this really does sabotage Bayo3 (assuming the story doesn't evolve) then that'll suggest the answer is yes. But if it doesn't, then that's a shame, but I suspect it might impact lesser known VAs. It's different if you get a Kiefer Sutherland, as that can go in the trailers - but despite the fact that I love Jennifer Hale, I've never bought a game because she's in it.