It's hilariously bad voice acting, but what's the story behind it? I have localization for the games was rushed which is why they never bothered to translate Zero's attacks, but I'm not sure about that.
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Why was the voice acting in Mega Man 8 and Mega Man X4 so terrible?
- Thread starter Uzumaki Goku
- Start date
Those early (ps1,saturn,disc based) era voice acting days for all video games weren't exactly the greatest :/
The majority of voice work back then just wasn't held up to today's standards.
Before you click this, just know I absolutely LOVE this game and it's one of my favorite's of all time, but just..... this is what we got in America at least. I'm assuming Japanese voice work was far better.
The majority of voice work back then just wasn't held up to today's standards.
Before you click this, just know I absolutely LOVE this game and it's one of my favorite's of all time, but just..... this is what we got in America at least. I'm assuming Japanese voice work was far better.
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It was the 90s. Game publishers didn't care about voice acting quality. There are some standouts like MGS1 and Fear Effect, but even those have problems.
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I always figured that people saw video games as just kid's toys back then, and nobody put any effort into voice acting or took it very seriously.
In Japan it was different. Well, not the kid's toys part - the older crowd definitely still thinks that - but the attitude around voice acting. I don't think dubs really started catching up until the late 2000's. (Personal opinion)
Also, especially for a game like Mega Man, where the VA is a minimal piece of the game, it would be considered a low priority.
This is all just conjecture on my part, though.
Zero's HOO-HAH-HUH! and "It's not over yet!" are burned into my brain. I have an unironic fondness for the voice acting in X4 even if it is objectively bad. Sigma's super hammy villain voice could have been great with better direction.
In Japan it was different. Well, not the kid's toys part - the older crowd definitely still thinks that - but the attitude around voice acting. I don't think dubs really started catching up until the late 2000's. (Personal opinion)
Also, especially for a game like Mega Man, where the VA is a minimal piece of the game, it would be considered a low priority.
This is all just conjecture on my part, though.
Zero's HOO-HAH-HUH! and "It's not over yet!" are burned into my brain. I have an unironic fondness for the voice acting in X4 even if it is objectively bad. Sigma's super hammy villain voice could have been great with better direction.
Weird because Mega Man Legends released the same year as X4 and the VA work was miles above that.
Standards were different and it was common to cast English-speakers that were readily available in Japan. Resident Evil and House of the Dead 1 and 2 both have this effect in spades as the aesthetic choice was to just subtitle English-spoken dialogue. One actor, Dean Harrington, has mentioned that when he did work he often only got to see sketches and given basic direction on how to speak for his game roles, and sometimes he would be asked to record for multiple games a day without really knowing what he was working on or having a lot of context into what the character was saying.
I read somewhere that DC Douglas(Wesker's RE5 voice actor) said that the original Resident Evil's voice acting was bad because you had a Japanese director directing English speaking actor and going with whatever takes he thought sounded good.
And they would mash multiple takes into a single clip and get stuff like the "don't open that door" line.
I remember wondering why they couldn't just get the cartoon voice actors. I had no concept of budgets or unions back then.
Don't get me started on that. The MM cartoon blew my little kid mind. I caught the listing one day in a TV guide.
"Megaman? Nah, it can't be that Megaman...."
But it was. I figured that MM was a well-known game, but never imagined that he was that popular, like Mario or Sonic. And the cartoon launched to no fanfare either! So weird!
But by the time MM8 was released, the cartoon was over for nearly 3 years. And I didn't know about the cutscenes either (nor requiring a memory card instead of using passwords. Doh!). The game will always hold a place in my heart. After all, it's the game that's made me leave a sole N64 household and join the PS family.
I'd like to use this opportunity to remind (or inform) you that Mega Man and X's MM8/X4 voice actress is, today, the CEO of a prolific Japanese tourism company.
I'm pretty sure they treated it like the 90s Godzilla films and used whatever English speaking people they had on hand in either Japan or other Asian countries.