Topic: Nintendo Switch --OT--

Aside from the high quality of the port itself, it also seems to include new costumes, previously released DLC, optional waggle motion control options, and is releasing at a budget friendly $39.99 price point.

I don't usually double-dip on games I've purchased on other platforms, but I'm tempted, man.

But yeah, whatever platform it's on, this game needs to be experienced.

Got Trails from Zero in the mail yesterday and played it for a bit. I genuinely became joyful when I heard the recognisable Falcom music in the game. Even though it was only a year ago since I finished Trails of Cold Steel IV, for some reason it feels like ages ago since I played a Legend of Heroes game. Not to mention that it feels great to be playing this series on a handheld again. Absolutely wonderful! Takes me back to the ToCS 1 and 2 days on Vita.

Now I just have to get used to the sprite-based graphics and Japanese voice overs. It's probably going to take some time but it shouldn't be an issue for me.

Well here it is. Most assumed it was because of scheduling conflicts or because Jennifer Hale has more star power. She said a lot here with very little.

She was initially offered less than $4K as a flat rate before they offered her that.
I actually find that hard to believe as the voice itself as important as the character.

$4k as the voice of a project in development since 2017. I actually can’t believe that’s how little VAs get paid & I think it was Platinums way of giving her the finger.
She also mentioned that the first 2 games & I assume the re-releases made over $450million not counting merchandising.

Bayonetta was a massive reason I even purchased a Switch. I’ve lost interest in most other Nintendo IPs outside Pokemon, so this is a bummer.
I won’t not play the game, but it’ll have to be a second hand purchase a couple of months from now than Day 1.

She’s going to get sued like crazy over this I imagine.

I have no idea what would be considered fair, but $4000 seems very low considering she's voicing the lead role of popular game. Also, all it takes is 66+ copies sold for the developer to make $4000 back.

When doing voice recording for Bayonetta 2, she worked for four days in four hour sessions. Assuming the amount of voiced dialogue is similar for the third game, that'd be around 4K for sixteen hours of work, which seems to be a pretty standard level of pay for voice talent that's not top-of-the-line (I'm sure Jennifer Hale is probably being paid more than this).

While I can't say how much money the franchise has or has not made, it has sold fairly modestly. The first two games struggled to crack a million units each. There's a reason Nintendo had to fund the development of the sequels, considering how they've performed, so it's really not accurate to characterize them as big money makers, either.

Did she deserve a larger offer than the relatively modest one she received? Maybe, maybe not. Obviously Platinum doesn't feel she's as crucial to the success of the series as she herself does. It's absolutely her right to turn down an offer she feels is beneath her, of course, but to then launch a social media campaign to tank the game's sales as a form of petty revenge is... well, unprofessional doesn't even begin to describe her conduct here. I also find her comments about the actress who took over the role to be tasteless, to say the least.

Whatever else happens, it's hard to imagine she'll ever get much work in this industry again. Employers will take one look at this debacle and realize that hiring her is a potential liability. And that's setting aside the potential legal trouble she's in by violating an NDA she signed.

Since they got a voice actor they’re clearly paying enough to get the game voiced. The lesson of this is. Don’t contact someone you can’t afford. Even if they previously played the same character.

@Ralizah NDA’s only happen when you sign a contract which she clearly didn’t.

I doubt anyone will bother to contact her with jobs below her pay grade anymore but she probably doesn’t mind.

@Ralizah I don't have any experience in how any of this works, but when I read about this on Twitter the other day, I felt pretty much the same was as you do.

First of all, this is just her side of things. We haven't gotten a statement from either PlatinumGames or Nintendo about this. Yet people are quick to jump to her defense and even cancel their pre-orders of Bayonetta 3 without even fact-checking this. She hasn't provided any evidence that that's how much she was offered. She could be lying for all we know, even though I'm aware that she doesn't gain much by doing so. Furthermore, why did she wait until now to disclose this information, mere weeks before the game's launch? That screams sabotage to me.

As I said, I don't know anything about how this works but I was very surprised to see how easily people decided to believe her and defend her when there's only her word to go on. We don't know anything about her circumstances, we don't have any facts or comments from the companies. Not to mention that if she was truly serious about this, she wouldn't have started a Twitter campaign telling people to not buy the game weeks before release. It's definitely not the best way to go about this.

@Ralizah The red flags for me are saying things about her new VA, wanting people to kill the games sales in a series that already very much struggles to hit 1m if its lucky, and the amount of money she thinks the games have made?

$450m for two games and some re-releases, because she stressed its game sales only, means at $60 a pop, which the games arent always that expensive, the minimum total sales for both games are......7.5 million copies.

Somehow, and dont quote me on this, but I dont quite think its that high.

Plus, at the end of the day, Nintendo's involvement in this, disregarding their prior practices in the field, is simply to license the IP from SEGA, give Platinum a budget, and Platinum decides how to spend that budget. I assume Platinum either wanted rid of her, or didnt ask for more money. But given they got a more expensive union actor....that likely wasnt the issue.

There's something screwy going on with Platinum. First Astral Chain comes out, and they give the IP to Nintendo when it sells well, likely in exchange for some money. They expand massively, build their own game engine for Project GG, which is a live service game that's still a complete mystery, they make Babylon's Fall that shows they arent good at that kind of thing, Nintendo offers to completely publish The Wonderful 101 and they say no for some god forsaken reason, leading to them needing to crowdfund an already finished damn game, and now this game took 5 years with big money behind it?

Something's real fishy here. Plus they were actively advertising themselves as buyable a while ago.

@Ryall In one of her video tweets she states: "I'm not afraid of a non-disclosure agreement. I can't even afford to run a car. What are they going to do, take my clothes?" So she signed something, at some point, that she's apparently violating.

Aside from bit parts early in her career, her only major role of note is Bayonetta, so this is clearly not a matter of an established actress being too big for what a small company was willing to pay her, lol. SHE initiated contact with Platinum, talked to Hideki Kamiya directly, and was offered $4000 to voice the role.

The person she's being replaced with, Jennifer Hale, is a huge name in the biz. I'm sure she probably cost more.

@LtSarge Considering she directly urges people to boycott the game, she clearly timed the release of these tweets to try and do maximum damage to the game's launch sales.

She could be lying, I guess, but if she's trying to lie to exact revenge against a former employer, this seems like an oddly restrained and specific complaint to lodge. I'm inclined to believe her, but that doesn't really make what she's doing any better. She wasn't mistreated or anything. The offer she received just wasn't as high as she wanted, and she apparently failed to negotiate a higher one.

As to why she's engaging in this sort of self-destructive campaign in the first place, she mentions dealing with depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation, and she seems pretty unstable throughout the videos, so I imagine that has something to do with it. This is not the behavior of a psychologically healthy person.

@Haruki_NLI Yeah, the $450 million figure seems truly bogus to me. These games struggle to be profitable to begin with.

I'm pretty sure Astral Chain was published and funded by Nintendo from day one.

What gets me about Platinum is that, despite how hard they failed with Babylon's Fall, they've stated they plan to go forward with more live service projects.

Don't have much to say about this Bayonetta situation in particular but I'd say voice actors as a whole are pretty undervalued and underappreciated and the gaming community is incredibly ignorant of what actually goes into voice acting.

I can only imagine 90% of the comments in the article Nlife no doubt has up is about this is great pay and she only needs to belt off a few lines before clocking off 😕

@HallowMoonshadow Voice actors should absolutely be paid more.

But I also can't help but feel those comments are coming from people who, like myself despite being management in retail, only earn that much money after doing 12 weeks, 6 days per week, 12 hours per day. So I can understand the view of "That's a lot of money".

This ''Hellena'''s words DISGUST me. She managed to make herself the center of attention as if she is the one who bleed to make this game possible, as if she is the one who had to work in lockdown and face delays upon delays, as if she is the only va and english is the only language of the world.. I've been a diehard platinum fan my whole life and played every single game except only 3. She managed to turn the hate to Hideki Kamiya who is right up there with Shigeru miyamoto, hironobu sakaguchi, hieaki itsuno, kojima and eiji aonuma in my book. She created this toxic dark online bandwagon against him and platinum as if they did something terrible to her. She would get 4k for working 1 week while others worked years and years and years on this game. It seems more than fair to me, like I said English is not the only language of the world. I fear for the future of platinum because nothing is going well for them anymore and it will be a really sad day for me to see them get canceled especially if it is for such a stupid little reason such as this. (PS: the main reason I even bought a switch was to play astral chain and Bayonetta 3.)

No discussion allowed!
She had to email Kamiya to even get the ‘improved’ offer. Imo they just low-balled her knowing they were always going to go with Hale.

Kamiya basically thinks he’s Kojima at this point.
He really just shouldn’t have said anything. I imagine Bayo3 will be 90+ on meta & even though it’s not a big seller they’ll lose more than enough sales for them to have paid Hellena properly.

@HallowMoonshadow It’ll hardly affect the overall sales. 67+ full priced copies lost would’ve paid for the improved offer of 4K. It’s more the negativity that now surrounds the game.

@Arisen Clearly not an amateur https://m.imdb.com/name/nm0773321/ . There’s a reason she was chosen for the job. She’s a pro & nailed the audition. They didn’t just get somebody off the street.

@JudgeDredd I'd buy that for 50. Pence.

@Fight_Teza_Fight Like I said bayonetta is the only thing she's done for the last 12 years in VA (If you even count her appearances in anarchy reigns and 3 lines in smash is an actual job). This is definitely not her job she is desperate for clout and she is a symbol of a personality I hate. Greed, Lies, Hypocrisy.

@Arisen Who even are you.

@Fight_Teza_Fight That's true. But we all know what happens with capitalism. You find talent, bleed it dry for pennies because theres no alternative, move on. It's a shame. Most people are talented in their jobs but dont get proper renumeration, but if they did, prices for things would go up because companies wont dare sacrifice profits, and thus the extra money people earn doesn't amount to anything in the end.

But hey, its the best we got.