Hardensoul
Member
I only watch one trailer because I don't like to be spoiled by them. But I didn't realize it was new VA. But my attention was really more towards the action/combat.
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Hellena Taylor (Voice of Bayonetta) Describes How She was Offered only $4,000 USD to Voice Her Again in Bayonetta 3.
FunkMiller
Gold Member
You can’t compare wages earned in a day to day ‘normal’ job, with the way artists are paid. They‘re work is generally patchy, sometimes with long periods of no work. No royalties are paid either.
Topher
Identifies as young
If she is smart, no.
Which is why the list of games/media that most voice actors perform in is usually quite extensive and they often handle multiple voices in the same game/episode/movie. That is true for even the most famous voice actors. So I keep going back to asking the question why isn't Hellena Taylor doing more work? She says she is broke, but she hasn't work as a voice actress in 8 years. I just find it strange that the voice of Bayonetta can't get work.
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I Master l
Banned
After all this drama i am sure the game will sell more not less
Rykan
Member
Hard to say, really. The fact of the matter is that B3 introduces a new playable character, and it's currently unclear how much voice work we are talking about. She said it was 4k "For the entire game" but we simply don't know how much work that really is.
That said, It's pretty common for Hale to take on roles in "smaller" games. She was in No More Heroes 3 as well. It's important to keep in mind that that is the ballpark Bayonetta 3 is in. Contrary to her ridiculous claim at the start of the video, Bayonetta is not this super popular or profitable franchise.
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Jeff Spicoli
Member
I understand, buy everybody Is saying like 4000 € Is garbage.
Its not.
Its a lot of money
Werewolf Jones
Member
She lives in London.
It's an entirely different way of living compared to the rest of the country.
You don't know how much that $4,000 covers, under a week's work, it's great, for four to six months work, not so good.
darrylgorn
Member
She sounds pretty winded.
Maybe they thought she wasn't actually worth doing the VO.
Maybe they thought she wasn't actually worth doing the VO.
Jeff Spicoli
Member
I agree
Mr Branding
Member
Can’t wait for this game. I’m a wait for a sale kind of guy but this is a day 1 for me.
LazyParrot
Member
I used to live next to a guy who did voiceovers for radio and TV, he got 500-1000 bucks for a single 30 second ad, and that was about 20 years ago. 4000 for an entire game seems incredibly low.
SmokedMeat
Gamer™
$4,000 seems like chump change for videogame voice work. I wonder what other voice actors get paid? Like the guy who does Kratos and has to say “Boy!” 26,000 times.
Topher
Identifies as young
Christopher Judge. Talk about an iconic voice. His "indeed" line from Stargate still resonates. Dude has been TV and film for decades now. I doubt he is cheap. But I'd say the same thing about Jennifer Hale.
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YeulEmeralda
Linux User
4k is something you'd expect for an indie game shame on you Nintendo.
Ogbert
Member
Trazyn the Infinite
Member
So here is what we know:
A voice Actress whose only major role is Bayonetta (who also, according to IMDB, hasn’t worked SINCE Bayo 2) claims she was offered 4 Grand for her reprisal of the role.
Platinum hires Jennifer Hale, a much more expensive voice actress who is very clearly pro VO Actor Rights and is part of a Voice Acting Union.
I will still wait for full information, but this doesn’t scream to me of “Platinum being cheap” but that Platinum was paying an actress exactly what she was worth.
A voice Actress whose only major role is Bayonetta (who also, according to IMDB, hasn’t worked SINCE Bayo 2) claims she was offered 4 Grand for her reprisal of the role.
Platinum hires Jennifer Hale, a much more expensive voice actress who is very clearly pro VO Actor Rights and is part of a Voice Acting Union.
I will still wait for full information, but this doesn’t scream to me of “Platinum being cheap” but that Platinum was paying an actress exactly what she was worth.
hemo memo
You can't die before your death
They didn’t officially denied it did they? Why would she lie about that exact amount which can be easily proven wrong? I side with the actress on this one.
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VolticArchangel
Member
$4K is absolutely lowballing for a character like Bayo, and the sassy british persona which Hellena DID "create".
David didn't say anything about Kiefer or Kojima if my memory serves me right. What are you inferring here?
David didn't say anything about Kiefer or Kojima if my memory serves me right. What are you inferring here?
Trazyn the Infinite
Member
They didn’t deny the money, but given what I just laid out - why would I side with the actress? She was paid what she was worth. They literally went to someone from a very well known voice acting union and someone who costs *far* more. If they wanted to be cheap, they wouldn’t have done that.
Gambit2483
Member
They clearly didn't want her either. Its not like she demanded some crazy amount, its that they offered her a ludicrously LOW (sub $4k) amount to begin with. This is the 3rd entry of a multimillion dollar brand, Bayonetta is one of Patinum's biggest IPs and they basically offered her a ham sandwich and a coke. It's the idea that the are ok with ditching their long established English voice actors for whatever reason but treat their Japanese voice actors as gold.
I don't know how much Japanese voice actors in general get paid but I'm fairly certain they pay their most established ones fairly well, I.e. DBZ, One Piece etc
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Neff
Member
He's mostly only like that on Twitter. At some point he got sick of people asking him the same boring questions over and over and created his current no-nonsense online persona. His old Tweets are shockingly civil and accommodating, he used to go out of his way to engage with fans until they abused his time. He requested people to search his history before they asked questions and they frequently ignored him. Can't blame him for getting fed up with it.
If the convention circuit was that important to Taylor (and it sounds like it probably was), she should just have swallowed her pride and taken the gig, especially with nothing happening for her in acting since Smash.
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Gambit2483
Member
Do you think Troy Baker or Noland North would do the entire game for less than $4k (their initial offer)?
I don't know why people keep trying to lump this game in with some random hourly gig of a no-named game. Established actors doing Established roles aren't punching in time sheets.
ManaByte
Banned
SAG Interactive/Video Game Rates
SAG Interactive Scale Off-Camera: Up to 3 voices / 4 Hours $902.00
SAG Interactive Scale Off-Camera: Up to 6-10 voices / 6 Hours $1,804.25
For an entire game it‘s low.
Madflavor
Member
At least this has been an interesting experiment in finding out how dumb and/or young a lot of people are on here. It's a weird situation to be in to have to explain to someone why Talent and Entertainment are highly valued in our society, and the concept of experienced performance artists not getting paid the same way an hourly burger flipper does. It'd feel more appropriate to have to explain that if a 5 year old asked.
If anything this sounds like what some people on here really take issue with is someone making in two days, what takes them 1-2 months to receive, and there's some underlying salt there.
Rykan
Member
Go look up in how many games Troy Baker has been in and how many Nolan North has been in. She has been in just a few games and most of them have been as Bayonetta.
Bayonetta is a low selling franchise and the amount of work we're talking about is probably 16 hours or less.
Reizo Ryuu
Member
Sounds like the GAF experience.
ManaByte
Banned
He demands people Tweet at him in Japanese and blocks anyone who Tweets at him in English.
rabbity-thing
Member
The strength of her work on the first two games was not just doing a posh accent. I can say, with no hyperbole whatsoever, that her voice in the original games is literally the only thing that makes the garbage-tier camp even remotely bearable. The script for this game is such a nightmarishly stupid parade of ham-fisted dialogue that finding a way to deliver it while making it enjoyable, cool, and tonally pitch perfect is something that should not be taken lightly. She made the character work. Full stop.
Neff
Member
I know, that's why I don't read him anymore. But he used to be enthusiastic and courteous with all of his fans, regardless of language.
The second game is entirely dependent on the first story-wise, and Kamiya has hinted that the third game will maximise what was built on in the first two.
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Killer8
Gold Member
It doesn't even matter how many receipts from industry experts us people coming to Hellena's defense bring to the table: GAF armchair experts with the corpo cock firmly down their throat will still insist "ThErE iS nO wAy To KnOw If ThIs Is TrUe!"
She was low-balled and forced out the role no matter which way we cut it.
ManaByte
Banned
I mean you can literally go to SAG-Aftra’s site where they list their scale (minimum accepted pay) numbers.
Trazyn the Infinite
Member
Meanwhile we have GAF white knights like you coming to her defense while having no idea if what is being stated is the full truth.
You are just as pathetic, mate.
Jim Ryan other Clone
Banned
They thought Helena is worth 4000 and they offer her that amount.
Rykan
Member
And I'll continue to be skeptical as long as "EnTiRe GaME" continues to be used as a vague metric, or "iconic". "Entire Game" is meaningless. It doesn't say anything how much work is involved.
Oh and just because this "conspiracy" keeps getting suggested or hinted at: She's not "Forced" out of the role. She's a contractor. If you want someone else to voice your character in your next game, you just hire someone else. You don't have to send throwaway offers to previous hires.
hemo memo
You can't die before your death
No. They thought she could do nothing about it and it backfired and now reported at IGN and other websites which will lead Nintendo to probably think twice before doing business with them.
Trazyn the Infinite
Member
Not sure how it backfired. They offered someone what they thought they were worth, she refused, they got someone more expensive. I don’t think Nintendo will give a toss about her or the situation. Within a month everyone will have forgotten anyway.
Jim Ryan other Clone
Banned
Why this threads of drama get so much traction? A voice actor that was trying to find work and reprice her role got an offer that was not acceptable for her and she did not take the job, why is there an outrage??
Nintendo or platinum can offer how much they want if there is no one to take it they will raise the offer. Now my guess is they didn't want her and that was their way to tell her that we don't want you by offering something very low. But still I don't know how many days you need to work to finish a game like Bayonetta. Up to a month is good money.
There many people that work in big companies even in this forum, we are middle company and my boss made 4-5 millions last year.. why he didn't gave me some royalties, I worked hard and made sure he gets the millions... Wtf is that mentality. I got payed my salary and that's it. I have to make tik tok now I guess.
Nintendo or platinum can offer how much they want if there is no one to take it they will raise the offer. Now my guess is they didn't want her and that was their way to tell her that we don't want you by offering something very low. But still I don't know how many days you need to work to finish a game like Bayonetta. Up to a month is good money.
There many people that work in big companies even in this forum, we are middle company and my boss made 4-5 millions last year.. why he didn't gave me some royalties, I worked hard and made sure he gets the millions... Wtf is that mentality. I got payed my salary and that's it. I have to make tik tok now I guess.
Kazekage1981
Member
How much did Grey DeLisle get for Jeanne?
For a main character in a video game you're looking at least about two weeks worth of full day sessions. Most average out at a month with longer titles going up to six months. You're vastly underrating how much work goes into voicing.
hemo memo
You can't die before your death
It backfired because when they outsource a game they don’t expect to get negative news unrelated to the quality of the game but the bad management of that studio and how they handle situations like this. Nintendo prioritizes their image. This isn’t a good look for them.
Jim Ryan other Clone
Banned
Yes now Nintendo is crying because a clown is outraged. Come to real world, the HR and Marketing will get some more work this week and next week you won't even remember this case of abuse from the japanski..
No one is braking a long standing relationship for a clown on TikTok.
brian0057
Banned
> Platinum offers a deal.
> She rejects it.
> Platinum raises the offer and presents it again.
> She rejects it again.
> Platinum says "fuck it" and hires someone else for, more than likely, a higher price. Thus, implying that it isn't just about money.
> Both the actress and Platinum are calling each other "liars", so who knows what is true or not.
You (and a lot of people) are hellbent on saying this is a problem and not what can literally be described as every monetary transaction in human history.
And both Nintendo and Platinum will continue to work (be it together or separate) while Hellena is burning those bridges.
gradient
Resident Cheap Arse
You're pulling those numbers out of your arse.
Here Helena states that for Bayo 1 it took 4 days at one 4 hour session per day. So 16 hours spread across 4 days for a full game..
Trazyn the Infinite
Member
The “outrage” stems mostly from white knights trying desperately to prove how evil people are and how “hard working voice actors/actresses are not getting paid fairly” while most of the sane people are suggesting to wait for the full story and tell the whiny twitter slacktivists to piss off.
We don’t *know* if what was offered is “very low”. How many lines of text were there? How many days of recording would there be? How many hours of recording? If they didn’t want to work with her, they wouldn’t have offered her a contract. They went with a well known VO Activist who is part of a VO Union and costs significantly more, given what she was paid for previous roles in other games.
I just don’t get it. Life is unfair. people will make more than you no matter what you do and what hard work you put in. Instead of crying/whining/bitching about it, these people should be putting in the effort and improving their own lives, not childishly demeaning others for what they think they deserve.
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