We reported recently how two Zenless Zone Zero actors were replaced without prior knowledge, as they held back their services due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, where performers are seeking protection from their employers against AI exploitation.
Now it’s Genshin Impact’s time to make the headlines, as a slew of performers have turned on newcomer Jacob Takanashi, who’s prised the role of Kinich from original actor John Patneaude.
As Patneaude explains on social media, he’s been “withholding voiceover services during the SAG-AFTRA strike because HoYoverse wouldn't offer Al protections in the form of a SAG Interim Agreement”.
As a result, the character has remained silent in all recent Genshin Impact updates.
“Now, obviously a recast is not what I wanted,” he stressed. “I’d hoped that any progress behind the scenes would be made and I could come back safely, or that if recast auditions went out my colleagues wouldn’t read for them.”
And therein lies the crux of the storm: someone else did read for the role.
In his own statement, incoming actor Takanashi said that he’s “grateful for the opportunity to carry the flame from the previous flame bearer” and that he has “big shoes to fill”.
But these comments haven’t gone down well with the rest of the English cast.
Corina Boettger, who plays Paimon, said this “wasn’t a passing of the torch”.
Keqing star Kayli Mills went even harder, stating: “This is actually kinda diabolical. If you need the money, at least take the role uncredited. This just comes off as an easy grab for clout. It’s not a good look.”
It’s worth stressing at this point that, despite joining the English cast, Takanashi is based in Japan and therefore is not a member of any striking American unions. It’s also worth adding that he’s received plenty of support on social media, in addition to the abovementioned criticism.
Actors get recast all the time, of course, but that’s usually due to artistic or scheduling reasons. In this instance, Patneaude has effectively lost his job because he’s fighting for better working conditions.
But does incoming actor Takanashi deserve such vocal and public hostilities for taking the role? Especially when he’s based in a different country and thus not bound by the same union rules as his American colleagues?
At the end of the day, Genshin Impact has been a lesser game lately due to the lack of voice acting. And while we agree workers rights should come ahead of the quality of any given product, we’re not convinced the public assault on Takanashi is the right way to go about this.
Comments 35
I look forward to the comments here being totally respectful to both the original and new VAs and not attacking the new person at all!
It's a bit harsh on the new guy. I can see why the voice actors are upset though. I'd want to protect my job too if all I had to do was turn up and read a script into a microphone.
America is not the only English speaking country in the world and the longer this strike goes on the more of this we will see.
SAG-AFTRA making the actors unavailable for work will just mean the work goes elsewhere.
I don't think folks from other countries not part of that organisation should be vilified for taking offered work
"Genshin Impact Community in Flames..." The hyperbole is really getting a bit tiresome.
@Absymbel I mean, it was pretty rough on social media overnight. Lots of bickering, arguing, and strong opinions.
The community is starting to turn against the SAG-AFTRA Union. What started as AI Protections has turned into a nightmare of mafia-like behavior.
TLDR: If Hoyo signs the agreement, the non-union VA's must either join the union or be recast after a certain amount of time. Many of them are outside the US and can't join the union, anyway.
@DonkeyFantasy Hoyo is based in China where using AI voices of real people in entertainment is already illegal. So this strike is pointless.
It's about Money, not AI.
The fear of AI is just gonna give rise to more uses of AI just as the fear of "Big brother" and CCTV ensured it filled cities faster.
The new VA has nothing to do with the strike and I'm sure he's got bills to pay. They should be blaming their union reps not him.
@Kelrics90 I thought that was only if it was done without their consent.
When a job like this can be done from anywhere with power and an internet connection, prolonged strikes don't make a lot of sense.
I get what they're trying to do, but it's not like they're highly-skilled factory workers with deep knowledge of specialized machines who are difficult to replace on-location. They don't have the leverage to drag this out like laborers of yesteryear did.
@IntrepidWombat Agreed and doesn't this have great potential too? VA's can take on multiple jobs and focus on one while their AI counterpart does the others (albeit for a lesser fee). It shouldn't be all doom and gloom the robots are taking our jobs. The legendary Batman VA is still getting jobs after his passing and I'm guessing the proceeds go to his family.
This story is much more complicated than many news outlets are suggesting. A really good write up on Reddit and clarified in the comments by a VA member of SAG-AFTRA. It's worth a read.
@themightyant Thanks for that. I clarifies a few things.
I know very little about the situation, but as far as I understand this game is not even covered by the SAG-AFTRA strike, so anyone withholding their work is doing it of their own accord. That seems pretty wild to me.
The guys attacking the new actor are an absolute disgrace. He’s not a strike-breaker or something, just a presumably normal guy auditioning for a role that was available.
I don't get the bullying.
Sure, someone wants to protest by not doing the job but they also want to bully others for taking the job? What kind of tyranny is this?
One of my coworkers escaped from a country where the government forces a union upon you and you can't opt out, at least not without spending a lot time filing some lawsuits and even then most judges rule against you because "it might hurt the rights of other workers"
I already had a low opinion on unions, hearing his story and reading all this SAG-AFTRA drama just proves to me that unions hurt workers more than a bad company ever will.
Good luck to the new voice actor. They made themselves available and they have been rightly rewarded for that.
He doesn’t deserve the hate, but even so it makes it abundantly clear that the recasting in ZZZ is in fact due to the ongoing strike despite Hoyoverse’s claims to the contrary.
It’s funny how they genuinely see their players as stupid, apparently.
@CielloArc I support the idea of Unions, and believe that companies replacing the unionized employees is not ethically or morally right. That being said many unions have been out of control over the last few years and have lost support from much of the public, myself included.
I don’t support dissolving unions, but they’re often behaving like kids who didn’t get the best toy for Christmas. That’s not what a union is for.
The Luddites once thought they could destroy machines. They thought they could halt progress. The thing is that AI realistically is just too useful.
Humans will always choose the most convenient path. Anything that makes life easier. I'm not going to say that they should just submit to having their voices taken but this seems like a losing battle.
AI will continue to have a bigger and bigger impact and honestly, in some instances, I can even see it being a good thing. When you talk to a character in a less important event for example...those lines of dialogue usually aren't voiced anyway. Now with AI, they would be voiced all the time. No line of dialogue, no matter how small, would need to go without a voice to accompany it. I do hope that they can come to an agreement rather than fight over its existence because AI just isn't going anywhere.
This would not be the first time that union action ended up hurting the people it was supposed to help. If you're going to go on strike, be aware of the risk, and don't assume that everyone will always take your side just because you're a union - not everyone blindly trusts unions. Sometimes unions kill the company they're fighting and EVERYONE loses their job.
That said, I don't know enough of the details of what they're striking for to have an opinion, honestly. I DO know that I'm annoyed playing Genshin where some characters have voices and others are silent (due to the voice actors being on strike), and I just want the d@*& thing settled already, and as a consumer I don't care too much which way it's settled. Is that short-term thinking that could come back to bite me later? Maybe. But I don't care. Figure out how to get back to work, already.
Lol Mihoyo be like "So you don't want this job? Alright, we're searching for a new VA. Thank you and good bye" 🤣
I mean , did he expect the company to let him hold up their franchise? Of courese he got replaced , not like he's entitled to the role anyways.
I mean it sucked for the voice actor, but in the end of course they’re going to be replaced if mihoyo can’t agree with sag-aftra. It sucked for the player too but there’s no way the player will stop playing the game just because the characters voice is different.
I still remember getting annoyed that snake voice actors (david hayter) is replaced way back when metal gear solid 5 come out, lol.
Who cares?
Like really?
I get that people are worried about losing their jobs due to AI (many many people are currently dealing with the same worries) but they are fighting the inevitable. Voice acting in video games will not be a thing done by humans in any new production. Going on strike for protections will only really work for the biggest name characters in the biggest franchises.
So they are saying nobody else should have work? The guy basically refused to do his job, so they gave it to someone else. The real scandal here is the pressure this, perhaps well intentioned, mob is putting on others.
And using the word “prised” is totally unacceptable in my opinion.
Unlucky. Sometimes they'll call your bluff. No one is irreplaceable. On the other hand AI is going to ruin most things.
@thefourfoldroot1 That's them showing which side they're on without saying which side they're on.
Yeah people don't take kind to scabs.
@DonkeyFantasy What an unnecessary trivialisation. You could say the same about all artistic jobs and it would be stupid. If it genuinely is so easy then why aren’t you an acclaimed voice actor?
"It’s worth stressing at this point that, despite joining the English cast, Takanashi is based in Japan and therefore is not a member of any striking American unions."
Period. That distinction matters. Takanashi’s casting has nothing to do with the SAG-AFTRA strike—he’s based in Japan and isn’t part of any American union.
HoYoverse games aren’t union projects, and union actors who took roles in them did so at their own risk, knowing SAG-AFTRA typically forbids members from working on non-union jobs. While protecting VAs is important, expecting a global company to adhere to a US-centric framework—and blaming a non-union actor for taking a legal job—is misplaced outrage.
@ShadowofSparta well said. But such opinions are all too common. The less someone knows about something, the more certain they are that they're right.
I am absolutely fine with it. As I've played in English from the start and have problems reading on screen text whilst trying to watch the cutscenes and so on, it's far too late for me to get used to another language. So I fully welcome a new voice actor for the role of Kinich (or anyone else who hasn't been working) of course these VA's should have protection against AI, but that's their problem not Hoyo's (who I have heard set up with another company that does have the protections in place and many actors moved to there) if you're not going to work for whatever reason whether your a voice actor or any other type of employee, you're going to lose your job. You're not only effecting your life by not working as a VA but everyone else who's dependent on your voice for a role. So as I've said, I fully support any voice actor who takes on any roles of current non-spoken characters. Lantern Rite this year was honestly ruined by the lack of voice acting in English, I think only 3-4 characters actually spoke and it ruined what looked like a good story.
@ATaco if you're good enough at your job (such as English Itto VA) you're not likely to be replaced as that level of character cannot be replaced by a machine anytime soon. So work whilst you can because eventually you'll be redundant as a voice actor. Make as much money so you can retire comfortably when you are eventually replaced. Everyone can be replaced, workers, partners, children. Everyone.
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...