So Voice actors are striking..

I personally … okay let me get this out of the way first
I don’t think that voice actors are irrelevant but are they as a relevant as artists and programmers NO
Not at all
also another disclaimer: I could be biased because… well… this is blender artists and I am a blender artist

So all I have to say is,

At least your name is actually recognizable if you are a voice actor
And you get a decent pay for a relatively low amount of effort(I have a hard time believing that reading lines out loud that other people wrote is as challenging as making an entire environment/weapon/etc from scratch but hey what do I know right?)

Nobody seems to recognize Kevin Østerkilde, Victoria Passariello,etc
But everyone seems to instantly recognize Nolan North, Troy Baker,Elias Toufexis,etc

I guess you could make the argument that the artists I picked were pretty obscure but that’s the point, it’s incredibly hard to find a well known Video game artist

What are your thoughts?

I don’t find it a terribly informative page. Needs a bit of deeper digging to know how unfair the offered contracts are.

In terms of effort, I’d agree more or less, leaning on the less (standing in a booth for days on end saying the same lines and making noises whilst keeping character and energy levels up doesn’t sound easy to me).

I do find it a little sad that any crew of any film or game don’t get as much public recognition as an actor, but I think people within a given industry tend to take note of talent within that industry.

^This exactly. The articles says absolutely nothing about why there needs to be a change or what is unfair about the current agreement, only that it is old, which means little.

“Voice Characterizations by Mel Blanc.” The very first time that a voice-man got screen credit … and of course it changed his life.

The actors in question don’t state what their “beef” actually is. Do they expect royalties, or what?

I will take there place :smiley:

I’ll scab :stuck_out_tongue:

Funny thing about actors, And even voice actors. A great one might not make a game, although a shit one can ruin one.

You’d make a fantastic team member. Seriously(!)

A voice actor is just as important as both the programmers and the ‘artists.’

And you get a decent pay for a relatively low amount of effort(I have a hard time believing that reading lines out loud that other people wrote is as challenging as making an entire environment/weapon/etc from scratch but hey what do I know right?)

You underestimate the difficulty of being a voice-artist. You’re not “just” reading lines off of paper, you have to make sure you express yourself the correct way, in the right character and in the right manner. You can tell if someone is just ‘reading’ because they always sound so wooden and fake when you’re listening. That’s the sign of a poor vocal-actor.

@Kurtis

Actually,
I’ve seen succesful games without voice actors(see half of Nintendo’s games)

But I haven’t seen a game that was built with voice actors only

They’re nice to have don’t get me wrong
And as Joseph said ,

Funny thing about actors, And even voice actors. A great one might not make a game, although a shit one can ruin one

Any shit voice acting can be overlooked if the game is fine. For instance the voice acting in something like Fallout3 is nothing spectacular but to the world sizes and NPC numbers the voice work is simplified. Then you have earlier games like Shenmue and Resident Evil which only add to the charm, then and now.

Personally I think games put too many voices in the games. Games run on repeat and repeating VO in MGSV is just shoddy work.

Let me rephrase myself; voice actors are important as all other involved members of the team. You can’t include a team-member and then say they’re not important. You’ll discredit your entire your team doing that.

It’s like saying binmen and cleaners are unimportant in the grand scheme of things, they’re not. Without them, your rubbish would pile up and up and you will end up missing them.

and now text to speech really has gotten pretty good. might not be long before the game can say anything in any voice, and it will take up far less space.

voice actors should be scared, I have seen ones that you can set emotion values in real time…

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://habla.dc.uba.ar/gravano/ith-2014/presentaciones/Schroeder_2009.pdf&ved=0CC4QFjAFahUKEwiX_Liu8qbIAhWGj4AKHfvqD1k&usg=AFQjCNFwj5ewdGnFLSDwTVNewl4qnRG4XA&sig2=fT3znJCao6PZB2sSQTU3Qw

I hope the voice actors that are striking do not include the ones that already make tens of millions of dollars for their role in blockbuster movies, because if they feel like they’re not making enough while living large in their Beverly Hills estate, I don’t know of any other reason for it other than greed.

Honestly, I hope this turns out well for the voice actors. The CG and games industries have some serious problems with employment and management ethics (insane hours, rapid employee turnover, crunch time on top of that). These industries are in dire need of proper unionization. As a CG artist, I say rather than trying to discredit or talk down the voice actors, let’s learn from their example and follow their lead. A rising tide lifts all boats, as they say.

@Captain

I hear that the game artists got it pretty good compared to the other fields.

Well, sometimes (very few cases) a voice actor can make some difference in a game, take for example “Bastion”, I just can’t imagine it would have been that successful without a voice, but again, there are really very few cases like that.

Just the other day I was looking throw a-couple THOUSAND voice actor pages and found the Guy that is the narrator for the discoverys Mythbusters tv show’s intros. Should I get him to Voice Over my KickStarter game trailer?