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[spazchicken]

It's kind of annoying when someone who doesn't speak Japanese prefers Japanese audio to the point that they have to bash the English VO. You'd rather hear a bunch of gibberish than the language you actually understand?

"the VO is so much better in Japanese"

You really have no idea if it is or not. Don't mean to upset anyone, just my personal feelings on the issue.

But with that said, there was an anime I watched as a kid and the Japanese was the only version available to me so when I heard the English VO as an adult, I was like hell nah but I got used to it and it's fine.

 

[Sesuadra]

Love me some Duckroll.

You guys need to understand friendly shit talk. It's fun.

Does not work that good over the internet and it also usually only works between friends. We're strangers.

 

[whalleywhat]

Does not work that good over the internet and it also usually only works between friends. We're strangers.

You're ridiculous and surrounded by enablers.

 

[PMS341]

I'd imagine they just don't think it's worth it since so relatively few people care.

As someone who doesn't mind dubs or subs, depending on the voices/context, I don't see why the option isn't possible. With the data on the cartridge, it honestly would only be a little bit of coding (and, if the UI from the demo is final, incredibly basic Graphic Design work) to do.

Honestly, it shocks me why developers give so little options for games on console (and certain PC games too, of course). Xenoblade X did a wonderful job of letting you essentially customize and curate everything when it came to player/game options, though unfortunately did not include dual audio either (I assume because the game was so large to begin with). With Zelda though, this is clearly not the case, as the files are on-cart.

 

[Rippabulo]

Japanese voices with english subs better get patched in, I have no interest in hearing american princess Zelda

 

[duckroll]

Hmmm like I said I was always planning on doing the English dub, but I'm not really sure that I'm buying this. How sure are we that the creators themselves have a strong enough grasp on the English language that their intent with emotion will be properly translated? We can't be.

Aside from how this might sound pretty insulting to the creators because it suggests that they're ignorant of the process and that Treehouse is not a competent partner that gives them confidence in the collaborative effort, I will throw the question back at you - If you don't understand the language itself, how sure are you that you really have a strong enough grasp on the nuance, emotion, and intent that was being conveyed in Japanese? You can't be.

We're strangers.

I'm sorry you feel that way. T_T

 

[Eliseo]

This is where I start making fun of people again because we're talking about Zelda, an international franchise where it is developed in parallel in multiple languages. This obsession with the "original intent/direction" doesn't really apply to a lot of game development because unlike films, for many big titles the creators themselves are working closely with multiple writers and editors in different languages to ensure that their intent is conveyed to as wide an audience as possible. It's so different. People are fooling themselves if they think the Japanese version is somehow more authentic.

Exactly, this whole thing about "original vision" when talking about games it's stupid.For example my friends are bashig the latin american spanish dub because the way they said "irule" instead of "jairule" sshitting on how bad that was and they will stick to the true version...the english one lol.

 

[noctis_pls]

Maybe if enough fanboys protest, Nintendo will have a solution for this by adding a new System Language called "Weeb". Get all your UI text in English, and have a cute female announcer in Japanese for voice cues! And all games which support it will force English text and Japanese voice! For that authentic fansub experience! Uguu~

Better get started on those online petitions and Twiitter hashtags!

No need to post that in a condescending manner just because you don't agree with "weebs" , damn you sure got them with that one ,how long did it take you to come up with that insult?! Youe're so cool dude.

 

[darkazcura]

Aside from how this might sound pretty insulting to the creators because it suggests that they're ignorant of the process and that Treehouse is not a competent partner that gives them confidence in the collaborative effort, I will throw the question back at you - If you don't understand the language itself, how sure are you that you really have a strong enough grasp on the nuance, emotion, and intent that was being conveyed in Japanese? You can't be.

Sure, maybe. The thing is I watch Hindi movies quite a lot and have barely more of an understanding of the language past basic commands and what not..and I have a perfectly fine understanding of nuance and emotion. Now that I'm married to someone who is Telugu, I have started watching Telugu movies with no understanding of the language at all, and when I switch to the Hindi dub, it always sounds completely off tone wise and alien despite me not understanding either language. Tone of voice is something that transcends language in my experience. All I am saying is that I can see why this is frustrating since it is all there just sitting.

You can already see the divide just from that crying scene that was all of 3 seconds in one trailer.

Mind you I do understand where you are coming from in terms of video games being far more of a joint collaborative thing than movies and TV, and that's why I'm OK with the English dub..but I can see why it bothers some from my experience.

EDIT: ah, I re-read your post and get what you mean now. Point taken.

 

[Bjoern the Smexy]

Are you people really mad that I said Weeb? Really? Try to imagine my avatar saying it a few times.

Obviously options are good, but we're probably not going to get this with Zelda so I honestly think it's a good thing that there's the Japanese version available on the same card. Is that really a bad thing? I mean, as far as options go, here how I see it:

A) If you buy the English version you only get English text and voice. If you buy the Japanese version you only get Japanese text and voice.

B) If you buy any version of the game, you get the text and voice in the language your system is set to.

C) Regardless of system settings, you can toggle text and voice languages independently in the game itself.

C is the best option for everyone, but in lieu of that, B is a way better option than A.

Thank you for this post.

Let's not forget (and I said it in this thread before) that there are A FUCKING LOT of games that only have Option B. Option C is actually not as common as people think.
Most games on Steam are set to the language of your OS, though you have the option to change that language as an option in Steam (not always in the game itself).

The God of War series uses Option B. I'm 95% sure that I had to set my PS2/PS3/PS4 to English to have the English VA, at the cost of having English subtitles/in-game text as well.

The Batman Arkham games are especially guilty of an alternate Option B, in a way where you had to CHANGE A TEXT FILE TO SET THE GAME'S VOICE AND SUBS TO ENGLISH if you're not in an English speaking country, meaning that they didn't even include the option to change the game's language either within the game nor as an option in Steam itself (EDIT: This only seemed to be the way for the non-GOTY versions of the games. GOTY versions let you switch your language through Steam).

Dark Souls was guilty of YET ANOTHER alternate Option B where you can only change the language if you used DSfix. Granted, this only affected the text and subtitles because the game only has English VA anyway, but still.

I am from Germany and if I have to use Option B to play Zelda in Japanese, English, French, Italian, Russian, LATAM Spanish, European Spanish or German then I will gladly use that option. Yes, Option C is so much more convenient, but take a look at your game collection and count how many games use Option A, Option B (plus variants like decribed above) and Option C.

You will see (especially in the Americas and probably Australia) that the vast majority will probably use Option C (probably something like 60%, which may be reduced to 40-50% in Europe and maybe even upped to ~80% in Asia), then comes Option B (which may be somewhere around 30% in America/Australia and up to 40% in Europe and maybe 10% in Asia) and the rest uses Option C (do the math yourself, please).


It's nice to have Option C. It really is. But please just stop whining about having to use Option B.

Be glad that we even HAVE the option.

 

[Sami+]

That's a shame. I was disappointed when they first revealed the JP/English voices because I had been hoping for an ICO/SotC/TLG fantasy language approach. I would've played in Japanese to replicate that feeling since it's a language I don't understand.

It's really dumb that the content is there and we still can't mix and match.

 

[Calm Killer]

That's cool I guess, but I dont see why I would ever want to do that. I wonder how this affects the file size? Does it affect the install size?

 

[brad-t]

friendly reminder that duckroll is a mega-weeb and all of you that were hurt by such an obvious joke should do some real introspection

 

[darkazcura]

That's cool I guess, but I dont see why I would ever want to do that. I wonder how this affects the file size? Does it affect the install size?

There are no installs with the physical version.

 

[Maintenance]

You guys need to understand friendly shit talk. It's fun.

I do understand that, I also use it. But there are ways to do that while being clear that it's actually friendly and not just shitposting.

 

[rootbeerafloat]

Any word if we can just turn the voices off then? I'd rather just read the subs than listen to the awful English voice acting. If not, I'll probably just cancel my Switch/SE pre-orders and wait until SMO, or the Switch is cracked and someone does an undub.

 

[Bjoern the Smexy]

There are no installs with the physical version.

There is a 3GB install with the physical Wii U release. Switch version (digital and retail) and Wii U digital download do not have any additional installs whatsoever though.

Apparently (or most logically I think) the 3GB install is probably to reduce load times for the overworld, not for any sounds (which includes the VO).

 

[Innolis]

Whelp...Nintendo always finding ways to save me money...

 

[fastmower]

Aside from how this might sound pretty insulting to the creators because it suggests that they're ignorant of the process and that Treehouse is not a competent partner that gives them confidence in the collaborative effort, I will throw the question back at you - If you don't understand the language itself, how sure are you that you really have a strong enough grasp on the nuance, emotion, and intent that was being conveyed in Japanese?

You are right that you can't be sure - but I truly believe that not knowing the language helps you ignore grating VA.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

The shit talking in Neogaf doesn't exclusively come from fanboys and from people who want to say 'weeb' at anybody who suggests the option. The option is great.

The shit talking comes from folks pretending that one rendition is the absolute best and can only say as much by completely shitting on another by pretending that x or y makes the one they want a better rendition.

The key example here is the Zelda crying scene. So many people want to say the English one lacks emotion and that the Japanese has more. Never was it considered that conveying emotions could be more blatant in one industry and culture vs another where emotions can be more subtle. Then when this point was brought up, they'd bring up how the voice acting doesn't even fit the scene itself and plugged their ears refusing to acknowledge that the scene itself there are multiple things that could work for the English version, particularly how most cry in real life and the sound being muffled when you fall on someone mouth first.

Then after discussing that it turned into "but the original intent", and so on moving the goal post. You want the original intent, that's perfectly acceptable. But for folks who have actually listened to bad dubs, the fact you can't just say that and instead pretend you are the sound director of the game and can tell when one scene is shit compared to the other, that's when people become aggressive.

 

[Jedi2016]

In the interests of knowing what's going on in the game, I think I'll stick with English, thanks.

 

[FSLink]

I'd imagine they just don't think it's worth it since so relatively few people care.

It's likely they just didn't think about it honestly.

It's nice to have Option C. It really is. But please just stop whining about having to use Option B.

Be glad that we even HAVE the option.

I think showing that people dislike Option B could help companies consider doing Option C more. I don't think people should just be glad if they're not pleased with a product.

 

[duckroll]

Then after discussing that it turned into "but the original intent", and so on moving the goal post. You want the original intent, that's perfectly acceptable. But for folks who have actually listened to bad dubs, the fact you can't just say that and instead pretend you are the sound director of the game and can tell when one scene is shit compared to the other, that's when people become aggressive.

Thanks, that hits the nail on the head. I mean, I really think it is perfectly fine for people who think that the English voice track is no good, to want to listen to something they think is better instead. I would fight to the death in support of people who genuinely want options because of preference. That's honest and good. I just roll my eyes and get really snarky when we're trying to pretend to have a serious debate about how the Japanese voice of Zelda crying in a trailer is the true authentic original vision of the perfect Japanese creators. It's really silly!

 

[FSLink]

Thanks, that hits the nail on the head. I mean, I really think it is perfectly fine for people who think that the English voice track is no good, to want to listen to something they think is better instead. I would fight to the death in support of people who genuinely want options because of preference. That's honest and good. I just roll my eyes and get really snarky when we're trying to pretend to have a serious debate about how the Japanese voice of Zelda crying in a trailer is the true authentic original vision of the perfect Japanese creators. It's really silly!

I do think the JPN one worked well for the trailer. The highly dramatic crying for Zelda just works well for the climax of the trailer IMO. I'd imagine that's why most people enjoyed the Japanese rendition of the scene.

Will it work well in-game with actual context? Eh who knows at this point, the Japanese one might end up being terrible in context. But I'd really like the option to switch to whatever just for replays of the game.

 

[icecream]

Tone of voice is something that transcends language in my experience.

It is something that transcends a specific language too. Nothing to say that the "tone of voice" in a work cannot be accurately portrayed in the English language that we communicate in.

It seems the fringe movement that likes to condescend on English dubbing do so with disregard to the subtleties of voice acting. Don't like how an English dub is? Instead of complaining about how you hate dubs, start demanding better effort into the dubs that are going to be made.

Also love how in this topic people always clamor for dubs in a language that they cannot understand.

"But I have subs!" they cry.

Subs alter the work's original "tone of voice" too. Sometimes even moreso than a dub! It's why my preferences nowadays lie in either playing games entirely in Japanese, text and voice, or entirely in English. The disconnect from hearing Japanese VAs (that's assuming they're good VAs) say one thing and have the subtitled text completely not portray anything close to what was said has soured my experience too much in games to accept the halfway option.

 

[Bookman]

It's kind of annoying when someone who doesn't speak Japanese prefers Japanese audio to the point that they have to bash the English VO. You'd rather hear a bunch of gibberish than the language you actually understand?

"the VO is so much better in Japanese"

You really have no idea if it is or not. Don't mean to upset anyone, just my personal feelings on the issue.

But with that said, there was an anime I watched as a kid and the Japanese was the only version available to me so when I heard the English VO as an adult, I was like hell nah but I got used to it and it's fine.

I don't think that anybody bashed the English version? Also, we who arent Americans are used to read subtitles. I have subtitles on American movies as well. In my country dubbing is considered ridiculous. As I have read the comments I have come to understand that there is different opinions regarding whats the "original" language but in my case I just would like to have the choice . Im pretty sure that a very large group of gamers in my country feels the same. Thats what I ment with that Nintendo don't understand that particular group of gamers + the ones who (for whatever resons)would like to choose Japanese for whatever reason.
This must be put in perspective off how litle , next to non, effort it would be to inklude that option.

I really dont understand the hate in this thread.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

If you haven't seen people bash the English version you aren't looking hard enough. Look at any Zelda thread discussing the VA. There were two at the least besides this one

 

[duckroll]

I do think the JPN one worked well for the trailer. The highly dramatic crying for Zelda just works well for the climax of the trailer IMO. I'd imagine that's why most people enjoyed the Japanese rendition of the scene.

Will it work well in-game with actual context? Eh who knows at this point, the Japanese one might end up being terrible in context. But I'd really like the option to switch to whatever just for replays of the game.

Lemme rephrase that so it's clear - I think it's fine to feel one performance is better than the other. But that probably has more to do with the execution of the performance rather than some inherent "original intent" which makes it that way. I'm also not certain if "most" people enjoy the Japanese rendition more here, but whatever, that's another issue entirely.

 

[Hattori]

not all English dubs are bad, Kid Icarus dub was excellent so it really depends on the budget and casting they put forward.

Spoiler

Jpn Pit voiced by detective Conan though 🔥🔥👌🔥🔥

 

[CouchMaster]

Lemme rephrase that so it's clear - I think it's fine to feel one performance is better than the other. But that probably has more to do with the execution of the performance rather than some inherent "original intent" which makes it that way. I'm also not certain if "most" people enjoy the Japanese rendition more here, but whatever, that's another issue entirely.

Yeah I hated the japanese version, thought the crying scene was way over dramatic. If it was the other way round people would say see how cringy and overacted the English dub is, the japanese one is beautifully subtle.

 

[Eliseo]

Yeah I hated the japanese version, thought the crying scene was way over dramatic. If it was the other way round people would say see how cringy and overacted the English dub is, the japanese one is beautifully subtle.

The latin american spanish it's even better on that scene.

 

[ShadowSoldier89]

You are right that you can't be sure - but I truly believe that not knowing the language helps you ignore grating VA.

god no. I dont know japanese, but Teddie and Rise in the JP version of persona 4 are the most grating noises I've ever heard

The shit talking in Neogaf doesn't exclusively come from fanboys and from people who want to say 'weeb' at anybody who suggests the option. The option is great.

The shit talking comes from folks pretending that one rendition is the absolute best and can only say as much by completely shitting on another by pretending that x or y makes the one they want a better rendition.

The key example here is the Zelda crying scene. So many people want to say the English one lacks emotion and that the Japanese has more. Never was it considered that conveying emotions could be more blatant in one industry and culture vs another where emotions can be more subtle. Then when this point was brought up, they'd bring up how the voice acting doesn't even fit the scene itself and plugged their ears refusing to acknowledge that the scene itself there are multiple things that could work for the English version, particularly how most cry in real life and the sound being muffled when you fall on someone mouth first.

Then after discussing that it turned into "but the original intent", and so on moving the goal post. You want the original intent, that's perfectly acceptable. But for folks who have actually listened to bad dubs, the fact you can't just say that and instead pretend you are the sound director of the game and can tell when one scene is shit compared to the other, that's when people become aggressive.

I think people fail to notice when their subtle comments are more obnoxious to read than what they are feeling slighted by. Whenever someone tosses out "All english dubs are terrible IMO" the imo doesnt stop you from being obnoxious. I feel like the lack of perspective causes people to get so incredibly defensive or offensive with this shit.

People who like watching shit in their own language are constantly hearing "It sucks, not original intent, why the fuck wont you watch this in japanese." Things like Animenewsnetwork are impossible to comment on if you even think of talking about english dubs. I made a thread here when blazblue central fiction dropping its english dub and got hordes of comments about how its perfect because the horrible english is gone.

Then vice versa you get threads where the japanese is unavailable and you get things like this.

When people feel slighted enough by a segment of a group they disagree with, they lash out at everyone who doesnt share their opinion

 

[Chainsawkitten]

As someone who doesn't mind dubs or subs, depending on the voices/context, I don't see why the option isn't possible. With the data on the cartridge, it honestly would only be a little bit of coding (and, if the UI from the demo is final, incredibly basic Graphic Design work) to do.

Of course it's possible. There some programming and graphic design involved, but mainly testing. Don't underestimate the testing required for any feature, however small it may seem.

I don't think the cost would be significant but if they don't feel like the playerbase cares why would they do it when that money could be spent elsewhere?

 

[Bookman]

The swedish dub in resistens 2 is one of the most horrific dubs ever made. Featuring all the bad actors from the Swedish dub company (or whatever they're called). Sony a apparently didn't understand this either.


Wouldn't trust a Swedish dub, feels suspicious on eng (ger/fra/it and so on) but I hope that they are good. Im not baching them, just would like to have the option of Japanese voice eng text (assuming that there are no Swedish subtitles)

On movies and most games (like final fantasy xv) seems to have that option?

 

[ShadowSoldier89]

Wouldn't trust a Swedish dub, feels suspicious on eng (ger/fra/it and so on) but I hope that they are good. Im not baching them, just would like to have the option of jap voice eng text (assuming that there are no Swedish subtitles)

I get a little chuckle when someone asking for japanese voice acting says "jap"

you should probably stop doing that

 

[Bookman]

Shouldn't the fact that there is anger and bashing in this tread would be reason enough to argue that there is genuine feelings about this and that they are different opinions? therefore Nintendo should give us the option to choose and nobody would give a shit what options other players prefer?

 

[etking]

Nintendo really needs to patch that, it should be fairly easy to do if all voices are already on disc or cartridge. For the Wii-U version fan made homebrew undub patches will likely arise quickly after release if Nintendo does not deliver a patch on their own.

 

[Bookman]

I get a little chuckle when someone asking for japanese voice acting says "jap"

you should probably stop doing that

Omg sorry. Thats the shortening 4 Japanese.

 

[Maintenance]

The latin american spanish it's even better on that scene.

Years and years of soap operas will do that. I also thought it was better than both JP and US versions.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

Nintendo giving the option this late in the game might mean they have to do some more work, and depending how close the game is to go gold it might not be viable.

Didn't P5 only give us the japanese dub because they had to delay it again and then said that now they can actually work with the game to give the option?

 

[Maintenance]

Didn't P5 only give us the japanese dub because they had to delay it again and then said that now they can actually work with the game to give the option?

I don't believe a single thing the P5 team says anymore, classic boy who cried wolf to me right now.

 

[Easy_D]

Kinda wish they'd gone the fake language route, everyone would get the same voices and it'd be cheaper!

 

[Aeana]

I don't believe a single thing the P5 team says anymore, classic boy who cried wolf to me right now.

I love how the response is "they're lying" rather than "plans changed." Like they are purposefully trying to mislead people.

 

[Shouta]

They kinda do iirc

They strait up play kingdom hearts in english, iirc.

I can't tell if you're serious or not because KH1 was in Japanese when it was released. I didn't play KH2 but I'm sure it was in Japanese as well.

Releases in Japan either come with only text translated or the whole thing is done properly. When it's text only, it's a lot less favorable to people, especially with RPGs. The Witcher 3 got some praise for being a full localization by Japanese players.

Being a non-native English speaker in a country that doesn't dub anything, all my life I've been consuming media with original VO + subtitles. I'm used to it being that way and I find dubs weird, so yeah being given an option to have VO in a language I don't know that well and have subtitles in a language that I understand is great. That's how I learned English in the first place.

Does that make me an elitist weeb? I don't understand why people are being less receptive to things like these when discussing Japanese media in particular.

If you're used to it because your country doesn't dub anything at all then sure, it's pretty understandable to prefer it because you're just used to that practice.

If you, for one second, think it's because the Japanese voices are better without even comparing, it's the original creator's intent, or some similar junk, you're a weeb.

 

[Mr-Joker]

Personally I wanted to play the game in with German audio because I felt that it was better than the English voice and was very disappointed when I learnt that wouldn't be an option unless I changed my console setting to German which would also change the text as well, which I thought is silly and backwards as they could have easily let the players decide how they want to play the game, which is ironic since that's what Nintendo has been heavily touting that you can do.

I can only hope that they include it in a patch but knowing Nintendo I doubt it and as a result my enjoyment of the game story won't be the same in English compare if to the German version.

Kinda wish they'd gone the fake language route, everyone would get the same voices and it'd be cheaper!

Same, I never wanted full voice acting in my Zelda game in the first place.

 

[Spukc]

It's kind of annoying when someone who doesn't speak Japanese prefers Japanese audio to the point that they have to bash the English VO. You'd rather hear a bunch of gibberish than the language you actually understand?

"the VO is so much better in Japanese"

You really have no idea if it is or not. Don't mean to upset anyone, just my personal feelings on the issue.

But with that said, there was an anime I watched as a kid and the Japanese was the only version available to me so when I heard the English VO as an adult, I was like hell nah but I got used to it and it's fine.

it's called being a snob

 

[The Hermit]

Does not work that good over the internet and it also usually only works between friends. We're strangers.

GAF is a community dude. Or was I guess.

 

[FSLink]

I can't tell if you're serious or not because KH1 was in Japanese when it was released. I didn't play KH2 but I'm sure it was in Japanese as well.

Yep. Though the Final Mix releases on PS2 had the English voices. The Final Mix versions of KH1 and KH2 on the PS3 collections have Japanese voices again.

 

[pinkurocket]

Even if I have my system language as my mother tongue, it would really annoy me if games automatically switched to that language without giving me the option to change it in-game. I'l probably put the system in English anyway, but it's rather annoying. Not many games get translated to Dutch, but I will always prefer to play it in English. It's giving me flashbacks to Beyond Good & Evil which only had dutch dubs on the disc.

 

[Bookman]

Im still not sure what a weeb is, I understand in context but I s it a insult?