Will Shenmue 3 Suck?

[shredingskin]

The only thing that keeps creeping in my mind is that the game may feel "old".

I also really hope they put extra care in the dub, it was charming in the first one (and very forward in time), but something in that level today is a no-go for a 60dls title (specially one that has heavy emphasis on story).

[Yokosuka]

They get my pardon if the Ryo&Shenhua's charadesign turns out to be the replica of the originals.

[mjq jazz bar]

The only thing that keeps creeping in my mind is that the game may feel "old".

I also really hope they put extra care in the dub, it was charming in the first one (and very forward in time), but something in that level today is a no-go for a 60dls title (specially one that has heavy emphasis on story).

I'm going to guess hiring voice actors that aren't horrible or complete amateurs is pretty cost prohibitive, particularly if the game is as full of NPCs as before. As much as we all love Corey Marshall, he isn't the greatest voice actor around, and we already kind of know what to expect from him. Voice acting is the one area I'm pretty certain they're going to fumble (again).

[Bluecast]

I know people are used to the English VA and holds nostalgia but I honestly wish they would only hire Japanese/Chinese VA and just use English subs. I am not one of those that always wants original voices as I typically prefer dub but man the VA for Shenmue is so bad.In this day and age of modern gaming the world is far less forgiving about that. Harder to get new players if well people are laughing at the VA.

[shredingskin]

I do really think it's not a matter of money, but a matter of direction TBH, make them repeat as many times a needed !! Also they need to have native english speakers directing/supervising and not only YS.

Also I think YS said before that they did the dialogue to be "mutable" so it could be used in various ways to give the impression of different responses, so the lines had to be "neutral" by default. Today storage is not a problem anymore, so they can do as many lines as they want without having to make some weird speech system.

[Niowiad]

I am instead the kind of person who always wants original voices. I hope Shenmue3 will have japanese and same thing for HD remasters if they'll be released.

But I think Corey Marshall did a good job as far as acting. In my opinion the problem was how they structured those recording sessions and later editing sessions. The dialogues sound very unnatural because the timing is completely off (rather than lack of acting qualities), probably due to how bad those recorded sentences were later assembled together.

It seriously doesn't sound like dialogues were recorded with two voice actors in the same room interacting with each other. To me it sounds like they had actors record voices in separate sessions, just reading sentences on a sheet without even looking at the cutscene on screen.
I cannot know how things really went, but it doesn't sound like it's the voice actor's fault this time.

I really think they'll do this properly this time. Even though as I already said, I'm definitely going for JAP if available.

[KidMarine]

I sincerely doubt Sony is going to let them release a game with a dub as bad as the originals. I imagine that's one of the things Ryan is advising them on.

[Spaghetti]

It's not Sony's decision.

But all the same, it's not an area YSnet are ignorant to, so I'm not sweating their potential approach to English VA just yet.

Better translation/localisation and direction can go a long way.

[shredingskin]

It's not Sony's decision.

But all the same, it's not an area YSnet are ignorant to, so I'm not sweating their potential approach to English VA just yet.

Better translation/localisation and direction can go a long way.

- What do you mean by "not ignorant" ? Didn't they just make 2 mobile games ? (that I guess were voiceless).

- Fuck localization, I don't want the game changed in any way to appease fucking westernerners (or what they might think that westernerners want). The people that play this game care about japanese games (and in this case also chinese culture).

[Kiske]

Ah. Where to start? Forgive me because this is going to be a very long read!

Let's go then...

No.

[khmlight3]

I'm back! No Shenmue III is not going to suck!

[Spaghetti]

- What do you mean by "not ignorant" ? Didn't they just make 2 mobile games ? (that I guess were voiceless).

- Fuck localization, I don't want the game changed in any way to appease fucking westernerners (or what they might think that westernerners want). The people that play this game care about japanese games (and in this case also chinese culture).

- I'm not sure why you're talking about mobile games. The point is, Shenmue's English dub is highly infamous and it's incredibly unlikely that anyone with a hand in that part of Shenmue III would be unaware of it. In Ryan Payton's case, we know he doesn't like the previous English dubs and desires a better job of it for III.

- Don't go off the rails over the idea of localisation. It's not needed to "appease Westerners", but to pave over the lingual cracks you get when translating for a more natural flow of dialogue.

[elfshadowreaper]

Ah. Where to start? Forgive me because this is going to be a very long read!

Let's go then...

No.

Woah man. Slow down. Give us a tl;dr or something. My time is precious on this earth. Please respect it more.

[shredingskin]

- What do you mean by "not ignorant" ? Didn't they just make 2 mobile games ? (that I guess were voiceless).

- Fuck localization, I don't want the game changed in any way to appease fucking westernerners (or what they might think that westernerners want). The people that play this game care about japanese games (and in this case also chinese culture).

- I'm not sure why you're talking about mobile games. The point is, Shenmue's English dub is highly infamous and it's incredibly unlikely that anyone with a hand in that part of Shenmue III would be unaware of it. In Ryan Payton's case, we know he doesn't like the previous English dubs and desires a better job of it for III.

- Don't go off the rails over the idea of localisation. It's not needed to "appease Westerners", but to pave over the lingual cracks you get when translating for a more natural flow of dialogue.

- The problem is not if they're not ignorant that VA is important, the problem is if they're ignorant on how to make it good.

- There are many types of localizations, I think the vast majority of people expecting the game would like the most 1-1 translation. I just love to see the different idiosincracies in different types of games (It reminds me on how baffled was YS when people where wowed by such a little think like how much ryo said thanks). No need to try everyone sound like a USA citizen IMO (while still sounding convincing). Cutting content that would be a really hard line (thinking about Yakuza 3 vs Yakuza 0 as an example).

[Spaghetti]

- The problem is not if they're not ignorant that VA is important, the problem is if they're ignorant on how to make it good.

- There are many types of localizations, I think the vast majority of people expecting the game would like the most 1-1 translation. I just love to see the different idiosincracies in different types of games (It reminds me on how baffled was YS when people where wowed by such a little think like how much ryo said thanks). No need to try everyone sound like a USA citizen IMO (while still sounding convincing). Cutting content that would be a really hard line (thinking about Yakuza 3 vs Yakuza 0 as an example).

- We won't know until we hear it. As long as they're aware it's an issue (and they do, considering the wide infamy of the English dub), and have people on-staff with a desire to do better (which they have), then that's a good enough start.

- I'm not sure why you're bringing cut content into this. A good localisation does not diminish the game's content or the characters, but does try to smooth out the odd speech patterning of a literal translation. 1:1 without any tweaking where it makes sense would be a mistake, but it's not a binary choice between either that or Ryo screaming "YEEHAW" at the end of a sentence.