And everyone here hates this.
But at the same time they think meritocracy is wrong.
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Wargroove (Chucklefish) is receiving criticism for casting white actors for its POC characters(Dev respond, see threadmark)
- Thread starter GSR
- Start date
But at the same time they think meritocracy is wrong.
The person you quoted didn't say meritocracy is wrong they simply said it doesn't actually exists.
I rather them not hide it though you know?
I think that looks worse. But maybe I'm wrong
One, you don't need law experience to become a politician for one. It has nothing to do with being "fine" with it. Political systems all have ways of electing leaders (democratic or not) and those requirements dont all necessitate a law degree or even any degree.
Two, you're obviously not arguing in good faith bringing up this stupid comparison.
Bingo.
Couldn't put it better myself.
I would hate to be the PR representative of this game's marketing. Somebody's a loser in this situation no matter how you try to resolve this.
Well considering this happens a lot, who's to say.
I'm just mad at the voice talent out there being passed over regularly for this.
Also those of you that aren't a shade of Black or Brown that see no problems with this?
Congrats you're a part of the problem
Yeah like I have nothing against Laura Bailey, but what screams best person for the job about her as Kat in gears of war versus an actual latona actress. She's not doing some amazing over the top job that makes me scream "she's the one". It's just she's a hot name right now like your Troy bakers etc and they get roles because of name recognition
He's quite well established so I'm guessing he's over their budget.
I bought Wargroove because I loved Chucklefish's other products and wanted to support.
Wargroove isn't exactly a hot off the shelf vidya game and is the opposite of a blockbuster. Big names would be awesome to get. It does not, however, prevent them from hiring POC VA to support the game.
So it was certainly not a great decision and I'm sure they regret it already. It is not comparable to Uncharted above which should have exactly zero excuse for similar actions and should be held more accountable. In 2019, you have to be more aware of that.
Wargroove isn't exactly a hot off the shelf vidya game and is the opposite of a blockbuster. Big names would be awesome to get. It does not, however, prevent them from hiring POC VA to support the game.
So it was certainly not a great decision and I'm sure they regret it already. It is not comparable to Uncharted above which should have exactly zero excuse for similar actions and should be held more accountable. In 2019, you have to be more aware of that.
Devs Response
Why the fuck would you blindly pick the VA using only audio files? Is that common in the industry?
I dont see an issue with this tbh. How do people feel when games get localized into different languages?
Some people simply pick the voices based on samples and not anything else.
Don't know if it's common, but isn't it sort of the equivalent to not having a picture in a résumé?
I mean, at the end of the day, their voice is the only thing that's going to be heard by the audience.
Edit: Hmm, but not looking at the back catalogue/profile? That doesn't sound like standard practice for recruiting.
A good example is Overwatch. They actively go out of their way to cast VAs who represent the race, nationality and ethnicity of their characters. Not everyone is 1:1 but they try to get them as close as possible for the sake of diversity and also authenticity especially when the heroes speak their native language.
While I personally am not 100% against the "colorblind" casting choices, I do appreciate whenever devs go out of their way to get a VA that is as close to the character's race/nationality as possible if they can help it.
While I personally am not 100% against the "colorblind" casting choices, I do appreciate whenever devs go out of their way to get a VA that is as close to the character's race/nationality as possible if they can help it.
This. If the company has an interest in diversity, their efforts need to extend behind the scenes as well. To create a diverse industry means actively pushing to make it so when opportunities to do so present themselves. If you're creating an Asian character, then write down to cast call for an Asian VA.
If anything, they are probably more progressive than the average person
If the issue is that theres no diversity in the actors they hire, then I agree. If the issue is that thry have white people voicing non white characters. Then I dont.
User Banned (Duration Pending): Dismissing concerns of representation over a series of posts, concern trolling
I don't really see the problem here.It is good to have diversity, but it is wrong imo to force it all the time. Positive discrimination has some issues too.
If not mistaken it is an indie Dev with limited resources so they may have gone for affordable options or maybe known voice actors that fitted their budged, or maybe the ones that they considered good for the job just happened to be white?
Not really a fan of them because a previous issue work that worker that wasn't payed, but maybe this just happened because the circumstances led to it.
Wasn't the actor behind Kratos in GoW black for example? As long as he did the job as pretended (and he did a great work) does it really matter? The clue here is same opportunities for everyone, no restrictions because of tone of skin or anything else. And just choose the one that fits the job better.
If not mistaken it is an indie Dev with limited resources so they may have gone for affordable options or maybe known voice actors that fitted their budged, or maybe the ones that they considered good for the job just happened to be white?
Not really a fan of them because a previous issue work that worker that wasn't payed, but maybe this just happened because the circumstances led to it.
Wasn't the actor behind Kratos in GoW black for example? As long as he did the job as pretended (and he did a great work) does it really matter? The clue here is same opportunities for everyone, no restrictions because of tone of skin or anything else. And just choose the one that fits the job better.
Difference being with a resume or university admission, you're not there for your ethnicity but based on your expertise and knowledge. Here with visible PoC representation, the best is to go for actual representation by casting PoC actors otherwise it's whitewashing and doesn't address the employment opportunities that PoC face.
This has been a problem for a while in the games industry. Also recently:
As much as I loved Judgment, like come on lol
At least they got Greg Chun to voice the main character
As much as I loved Judgment, like come on lol
At least they got Greg Chun to voice the main character
Well,reading their statement it just seems that they just choose blindly and it happened that the ones they liked are white. It could have been the opposite and would people complain?
Based on their response they didn't know if the VA were POC or not. They just went off audio clips.
I'm game for more diversity, but I also think VAs should not be limited to their race (etc.) If someone can pull off a voice then more power to them and their skills.
I mean I don't think they really even chose those people they might have a pool of VAs they look at and probably have them tagged with what they can do and this is what it ended up as.
What it sounds like is they didn't even meet face to face so they literally have no clue who the faces of their VAs are so really they wouldn't have ever of known.
This was the first thing I thought of. While who they got to play Nadine did a fantastic job, it was still pretty shitty.
Oh I'm commenting generally on the VA industry not necessarily on this specific case but this should illustrate to everyone that a color blind approach to anything doesn't lead to racial equity!
The sentiments here really show if the industry follows what a lot of you think. Literally every voice talent would be white while you all claim meritocracy isn't a sham.
The problem is that in an industry where the overwhelming majority is white, a "colour blind" approach is bound to result in mostly, or all, white actors.
Many orchestras have implemented blind auditions, and it increases the number of women in the orchestra, because it eliminates unconscious bias against women in the audition process. For voice actors, blind casting might be a good idea if you're trying to cast the best voice actors, rather than the most beautiful voice actors, because you'd avoid the halo effect (where physical beauty causes people to rate a person's other traits higher). I can see why someone would think that this was a good idea.
Of course, people of different races don't really have different voices, and POC are underrepresented in the industry, so the particular problem that they ran into was foreseeable. They could have done something to mitigate it, like asking their agency to reach out to POC when seeking people to audition. But they didn't, and as a result they made a mistake that they should probably do more to own up to ...
I think the response is pretty good actually. Owning the problem with no caveats and no blame throwing elsewhere. It does seem like they will change their method moving forward.
I think I may be at odds with Era on this, but I am not seeing the harm in taking the dual approach of "anyone can voice anyone if they're the best for the role, but you want to make a lot more effort to scout out underrepresented pools so you're not just reaching into a pool of white dudes and proclaiming your done."
It is very difficult to reach equity. The only way imo is that we must create the tools so everyone has the same opportunities and then choose the one that fits without prejudging.
Even choosing blindly doesn't work to by only looking at the results we are also prejudging the ones that got the job in this case
