Jonneh3003
Banned
I think I'm out of the loop with the voice acting industry, I just thought the speech was fine at face value.
Edit: I've read a bit more into it and I'm starting to see some issues
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So...can we talk about that awkward AF Nolan North acceptance speech?
- Thread starter GillianSeed79
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I think I'm out of the loop with the voice acting industry, I just thought the speech was fine at face value.
Edit: I've read a bit more into it and I'm starting to see some issues
AnthonypUK
Member
this voice actor doesnt seem to believe hes been shat on, in response to the polygon article.
Roger Craig Smith
‏@RogerCraigSmith
NOT an attack...
A classy, selfless gesture showing importance of ALL folks in game production.
#PerformanceMatters
Roger Craig Smith
‏@RogerCraigSmith
NOT an attack...
A classy, selfless gesture showing importance of ALL folks in game production.
#PerformanceMatters
Tricky part is that there are lots of game genres/types out there, so this isn't like TV/Movies where if you don't have quality actors you're fucked. Retro-style games (was reminded of Shovel Knight with that prequel on the horizon), pretty much all Zelda games, driving games, etc... there are games that really don't need actors, much less good quality ones. That's the stuff that makes it difficult for the VA strike to hit their argument home for some people/gamers.
Generic Power Ranger
Member
I haven't seen it and I can't cause I'm on my phone, but I don't see how voice actors should get back royalties when game developers don't. An animator and a modeller and a rigger brings at the very least, an equal amount of presence and personality to a character and the game itself. Developers, like voice actors, are sometimes overworked and under paid, and improving those conditions is vital. For everyone. Back royalties is not the solution. Better hours, better general pay and better working conditions are.
That's just my opinion. Developing a game is a grump effort, so rewarding a small group over everyone else is a bit unreasonable. Instead everyone should be liftet equally.
That's just my opinion. Developing a game is a grump effort, so rewarding a small group over everyone else is a bit unreasonable. Instead everyone should be liftet equally.
Sodding_Gamer
Member
Yeah good point. Never thought of it that way. Consider me enlightened.
Diprosalic
Banned
If you can't see that this was a dig at the VA union you are either uninformed or ignorant. Whether you agree with his point or not is a different matter.
If you had been following this strike, you would know that it only concerns actors and voice actors here, not the devs... at all. I would be happy to change stance if you can quote me something that shows they also talked about the devs work conditions. Else, I'm sorry mate but I'll side with Nolan here. :/
orthodoxy1095
Banned
Doesn't help that even in the games that "need" lots of acting, the actors are constantly let down by incoherent script-writing and poor directing, so voice-acting is constantly devalued in the industry.
The only people who have misunderstood what he's saying are the ones who don't get what he was doing by bringing up "performance matters."
Which is why said try to make a game like uncharted or mafia 3. Yeah you don't need voice overs in Tetris, but there are a host of games that just wouldn't be the same without VO. The game of the year, overwatch, isn't even narrative driven but it wouldn't be the same without its fantastic voice acting. It's just as crucial in this day and age as any other aspect of the game.
BassForever
Member
This isn't comparable to a blm vs alm situation. The argument for blm is that black life has been historically cheap and undervalued in the USA which is completely true and has lead to the discrepancies that exist today. In the realm of video games voice actors, programmers, artist, play testers, q&a people, translators, etc any position you can think of is horribly under paid with shit treatment, shit benefits, and shit hours. Nolan North was 100% right, everyone deserves better pay and benefits not just voice actors, as we've discussed before va's have a union that lets them fight for better conditions. It's a comment on how shit conditions are in most of the industry that Nolan North even had to make such a speech.
Dali said:
That's like saying the badger is the most important animal in the world. Because without it we couldn't have Mona Lisa. (some paintbrushes are made from badger hair and "obviously" DaVinci couldn't have painted Mona Lisa if the didn't have those brushes).
Some people commenting in this thread are pretty clueless. EVERYONE is important. EVERYONE is entitled to better work conditions. Arguing if X or Y is more important is missing the entire point.
Nolan doesn't have the power to suddenly redirect or divide equal or greater attention to devs so they can immediately unionize and get better treatment, but he does have the power, maybe the most out of anyone, to make a difference in bettering his own occupation and working life for his close colleagues in the VA field. For whatever misguided reason he attempted the former option in this speech.
It's not so much a matter of Nolan's speech being controversial or disagreeable at its core, its a matter of it purposefully and/or ignorantly giving it at the worst time and place possible.
Yep.
He could have done all of this without appropriating and using "their performance matters more"
It was a statement about his stance on the sag aftra strike. That's cool, that's where he stands. But saying "no this was just an honest, heartfelt tribute to the people who made all of this possible" is a rather naive sentiment.
Who calls the accomplishment of devs, creative directors, programmers a 'performance' unless they intentionally wanted to reference the #performanceMatters slogan?
by pretty much saying "none of our work matters as much as what they do?". That's a weird call to arms
I just don't see the argument where because developers have it worse than voice actors, voice actors shouldn't ask for what they feel they deserve. It's one thing to disagree with what they're asking for (I don't think it's unreasonable personally,) but I'm having trouble following the logic that these demands are less valid because of development conditions.
SAG-AFTRA's only involvement in games is voice acting(and maybe potentially motion capture? not sure how that works), so it's neither their job nor their place to advocate for devs. There would need to be a game developers union that handles their issues. And yeah, I think there should be, but that seems difficult/unlikely given how much competition there is for so many of those jobs. I don't see how the voice actors' demands undermine, devalue, or should be ignored in lieu of the issues game developers face.
Diprosalic
Banned
And how do you think this is going to happen? If the VAs succeed it might inspire devs to follow suite. But if you just dismiss their efforts nothing will happen and the status quo will live on. Fighting for your rights doesn't mean you don't care about the rights of others.
VibratingDonkey
Member
Granted he wasn't explicitly supportive, but I didn't interpret his speech to be against the strike at all. Saw it more like implicit support, that he agrees conditions should improve, with the addendum that improvements should continue beyond actors.
Suppose he could've stood more in solidarity with his specific group, which is currently actively fighting for better working conditions, and is more in need of support at this point in time, but his speech was hardly dismissive or belittling. At least as I recall it.
Suppose he could've stood more in solidarity with his specific group, which is currently actively fighting for better working conditions, and is more in need of support at this point in time, but his speech was hardly dismissive or belittling. At least as I recall it.
Yeah that's basically the message I got out of it.
Oh right. That's...special.
Elvin Atombender
Member
I felt like he was trying to say that even though he is up there getting awards, there are a lot of extremely hard working people in the industry that never get recognized and he wouldn't be there at all if it wasn't for them.
again, he could've said all of that without referencing #performanceMatters in a "their performance matters more" kind of way.
Novel Mike
Member
Of course the strike itself only concerns actors and voice actors here... THEY ARE THE ONES ON STRIKE! They can't fight a battle for developers if developers aren't involved or striking for themselves but what your missing is that if this strike succeeds then it rightly should inspire developers to start doing the same and if it fails then why would developers ever consider striking if it didn't work before?
What you've missed in all this is that the ball has to start rolling from somewhere and right now the only ones who are doing so are the very people Nolan just called out last night and threw mud on.
I already said it a few times already but these are two groups who should be working together and Nolan and many other people in this topic bringing up this US vs. THEM mentality (which is what everyone in this topic is doing when you are saying developers are hurting more/need more help now) is hurting both VA's AND developers and only helps publishers maintain control over both!
Why would a guild or union that represents voice actors strike for software developers? They can only try to enact change for the group they represent. Apparently the voice actors have had enough. When developers decide to unionize and strike or take whatever path they deem fit to enact change then supporting that push would be great, but as it is he's putting down one groups call for change, by saying another group deserves it more.
Shpeshal Nick
aka Collingwood
Wasn't he technically right though?
Plenty of games exist without VO but none without developers.
Plenty of games exist without VO but none without developers.
Yeah, I don't know what's wrong with people.
No, I agree. I was just saying it could be argued that voice actors aren't going to get what they want/deserve until dev side does something because it's easier to write them (the VA's) off .
It was clear as day to me that he was saying that in the end, it IS and ARE the devs behind closed doors who matter more to games than VA superstarts, and he's right. It felt like he was reminding people to not idolize the VAs too much over the actual backbone of the games they star in. These VAs get to spend a lot of time with the guys and gals at the dev teams, they become friends, and being a decent person Nolan would like to see more recognition given to those people as well.
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
Given that the rest of the creative staff *aren't* the ones setting pay and working conditions for the voice and performance talent, what Nolan did was a great way to build solidarity and bolster support the striker's cause within the industry.
Contrary to what some people appear to think, politics is about more than sloganeering and making demands.
It was also a very classy thing for an award winner to share the spotlight with the largely anonymous craftspeople that facilitated his success.
Contrary to what some people appear to think, politics is about more than sloganeering and making demands.
It was also a very classy thing for an award winner to share the spotlight with the largely anonymous craftspeople that facilitated his success.
Darryl M R
Member
People not grasping how Nolan's speech can be seen as undermining VAs is very similar to those that have zero problems with #AllLivesMatters and from my experience with discussing this topic people have to want to understand--not agree--the opposing opinion.
To not understand how Nolan's actions can be interpreted (so you don't even have to agree just comprehend the argument) as undermining the efforts currently being made by voice actors seems very deliberate.
Now you can say you understand and disagree which is fair, but I think most of us can see how his actions can be interpreted two ways. What will be most interesting is to see how industry leaders interpret it. I do feel like most people will be more diplomatic and not discuss it.
To not understand how Nolan's actions can be interpreted (so you don't even have to agree just comprehend the argument) as undermining the efforts currently being made by voice actors seems very deliberate.
Now you can say you understand and disagree which is fair, but I think most of us can see how his actions can be interpreted two ways. What will be most interesting is to see how industry leaders interpret it. I do feel like most people will be more diplomatic and not discuss it.
But that doesn't matter. Like, at all.
Plenty of games wouldn't exist without the engineers at Sony either, or Nvidia, or Chinese workers. Or anyone along the "entertainment-media-supply-chain" that goes from idea all the way to the consumer.
That doesn't mean neither of these groups is allowed to ask for better payment / working conditions.
as others have pointed out, if sag aftra is succesful, it will hopefully lead to similar unionization movements among programmers / developers, who will then get to fight for what they feel they should be receiving.
People saying #allLivesMatter are technically right too. But where does it get us?
Dangansona
Member
EVERYTHING IS AWKWARD AND EMBARRASSING AT TGAs!
SliceSabre
Banned
That doesn't make any sense. If a union for baseball players is striking for better conditions and such why would they also be trying to make an argument for the equipment handlers and stadium groundsmen who don't have a union? In fact that probably isn't wise to do and might piss off the managers and people at the top more and make the strikers have an even harder time. It'd be odd for the VA union to try to go to bat for devs when devs themselves aren't going to bat for themselves and forming a union.
Really? You build solidarity by telling one group they matter more than the other?
It was clear to me from his speech he was devaluing his profession and by extension if there was some sort of strike would be undermining any call for change. That was just me watching the video with no real knowledge of the situation...
... then itt I learn #performancematters is the VA's battle cry and it became even more obvious. I don't know what to say if someone doesn't understand what they just witnessed.
He could have done all of this without appropriating and using "their performance matters more"
It was a statement about his stance on the sag aftra strike. That's cool, that's where he stands. But saying "no this was just an honest, heartfelt tribute to the people who made all of this possible" is a rather naive sentiment.
Who calls the accomplishment of devs, creative directors, programmers a 'performance' unless they intentionally wanted to reference the #performanceMatters slogan?
by pretty much saying "none of our work matters as much as what they do?". That's a weird call to arms
I think like many good works of art, the speech had many meanings. It clearly was revealing his stance on the VO strike, but for the millions of gamers out there who have no idea what that is, or to the developers that don't (which seems impossible but remember many games still have no VO at all) it probably felt like giving credit where credit is due.
Council Pop
Member
He's a scab- there's no other way of looking at it.
He is a voice actor, and therefore there he is obliged to stand with other voice actors to fight for better working conditions for all voice actors.
The fact that he thinks devs need better working conditions too shouldn't weaken his support for VOs. If he GENUINELY cared about devs and other workers in the industry, he could have called on them to unionise, and he could have held up the action by voice actors as an example that all video game workers can follow in order to fight against exploitative publishers for better working conditions. It's totally naive to think that one sector striking is somehow 'disrespectful' to another sector of the workforce. It isn't- voice actors striking will help workers in the video game industry, not harm them.
But let's be honest- Nolan North is in the pockets of the bosses, and he doesn't give a shit about anyone with worse working conditions than him. His statement wasn't pro devs, as most devs support the strike. It was pro publishers, pro bosses.
He is a voice actor, and therefore there he is obliged to stand with other voice actors to fight for better working conditions for all voice actors.
The fact that he thinks devs need better working conditions too shouldn't weaken his support for VOs. If he GENUINELY cared about devs and other workers in the industry, he could have called on them to unionise, and he could have held up the action by voice actors as an example that all video game workers can follow in order to fight against exploitative publishers for better working conditions. It's totally naive to think that one sector striking is somehow 'disrespectful' to another sector of the workforce. It isn't- voice actors striking will help workers in the video game industry, not harm them.
But let's be honest- Nolan North is in the pockets of the bosses, and he doesn't give a shit about anyone with worse working conditions than him. His statement wasn't pro devs, as most devs support the strike. It was pro publishers, pro bosses.
VeryNicePerson
Member
Not sure if I grasp the whole situation, but Nolan has always credited the developers for the insane amount of work related to performance and more.
https://youtu.be/z_KFAbDgJkY?t=30m44s
https://youtu.be/z_KFAbDgJkY?t=30m44s
Meh, there's been a lot of talk about programmers lately. I want to talk about programming that really matters...level design.
family_guy
Member
He showed respect to the people who helped him get where he is today. It was his award speech and it wasn't outwardly offensive so it was fine for me.
CrustyBritches
Gold Member
Once again, comparing a group of people who want royalties for talking into a mic to a group being brutalized for their race is the definition of cultural appropriation and marginalization. How distasteful and racist can you get?
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