"You're awake, your paper man just took the time to change the vocal cords."
Is this reasonable?
This can make a lot of sense. Under the various considerations of game manufacturers, character posters, modeling changes, and even character redoes are commonplace. Therefore, when I woke up, the paper man changed his voice, which was not a new thing.
But that doesn't mean that players can easily embrace these changes, on the contrary, the controversy caused by the game's change of voiceover has never stopped, especially in recent years, players have become more and more concerned about the voice of the game's characters.
From sound memory to CV impression
The sound is memorable, from Joe's helper's carry-on speaker to this year's Cannon PTSD, a symbolic sound will quickly bring the listener to a specific situation, and naturally it is no exception in the game, after all, from the degree of social death of one of the famous campus scenes, "Timi", this sound effect of Tianmei Studio has been successfully engraved into the DNA of the players of "Glory of Kings".
As one of the audiovisual, the dubbing of the character greatly affects the player's gaming experience and also injects soul into the shaping of the character. Therefore, for the game character, the voice is also a symbolic symbol:
The Sword of the Great River comes from heaven;
But some useless flower shelf;
The area ahead, explore it later;
As long as you are in the wind, I can find you;
……
In order to successfully establish this impression, manufacturers have many concerns when choosing dubbing, and adaptability is undoubtedly an important factor in character shaping, but it is also necessary to consider the player's wishes while fitting the design, including the preference for CV.
At the beginning of the rise of domestic two-dimensional games, or for a long time, the dubbing of such games was mostly covered by Japanese CVs. In recent years, Chinese dubbing has been widely used in various games, on the one hand, thanks to the vigorous development of the domestic dubbing industry, widely used in film and television, games, and radio dramas, from the obscurity of living behind the scenes for a long time to gradually becoming well-known. On the other hand, dubbing interviews, voice performance variety shows and information display on social platforms have also further revealed more aspects of CV in front of the public.
Among them, "I Am a Special Voice", broadcast in 2020, provides a stage for the new generation of the dubbing industry to show professional skills and self-personality, and is widely praised among young audiences. Interestingly, many of the voice instructors and students in the show have voiced the characters in the mobile game "Food Language", even if they have not been matched, the follow-up has appeared in the game in the voice of the player, so the variety scene in the eyes of the player may be like this:
CV is no less than the halo effect of film and television stars, becoming another reason for players to understand the character or the pit game. This also makes more and more manufacturers begin to use the domestic well-known CV to attract players, most of the current budget mobile games on the market are not stingy in the dubbing of game characters, and even some games will be marked in the game promotion interface "luxury dubbing lineup" as a game selling point:
However, benefits are often accompanied by risks, and the recognition of the character's voice is an important factor in the popularity of the game, but it has also become a difficult point for manufacturers to change the cooperative team, and in the case of players becoming more and more familiar with the sound, even the ordinary single voice change can no longer be quiet, let alone challenge the player's keen ear with the reason of "the character is cold". Not to mention that the team change has led to a large number of dubbing changes, which is a huge amount of engineering for the manufacturer, and the subsequent new dubbing is difficult to be accepted by the player in a short period of time.
Once the sea was shipwrecked as water
Leaving aside the emotional factors of CV, players cannot easily accept the new voice of the character, the most important reason is that the original sound memory is preconceived, and the established impression is difficult to break.
Just like the white moonlight deceased in the film and television drama, the more deeply the original dubbing is in the hearts of the people, the less friendly it is to the latecomers.
In "Glory of the King", Yang Yuhuan's voice is both cold and tender, which is very popular, but the new dubbing first version of his skin in the Year of the Tiger has caused complaints:
Evaluation of "Yinhu Heart Song" before voice optimization
The controversy subsided after the game's official voice was optimized and a more natural tone was chosen.
It can be seen that it is not only the sense of violation that is difficult to avoid. The worst case scenario is that in the imitation, it can not be synchronized with the original match, and it loses its own advantages. This also affects the objective evaluation of the quality of the dubbing of the latter, because of the preconceptions, when comparing, the original is usually used as the standard, thus amplifying the shortcomings of the latter.
Therefore, some new dubbing will choose to go directly to another style to avoid comparison with the former, but this will subvert the previous impression of the character, which is difficult to be accepted in the early stage, and it is easy to lose the essence of the human setting (felt by the player), and it is easy to appear "Although the new dubbing is also good, there is no previous feeling" evaluation.
After fischer's retinue Oz changed voices in "Original God", he changed from a black friend to a gentle butler. Although players are happy to see the CV change, they even began to find a reasonable reason for the voice change:
But the awkwardness of the new dubbing will still exist, in addition to some players feel that the new dubbing expresses a warmer sense of master-servant friendship, there are also players who think that there is a lack of a little unspeakable feeling, if you have to describe it, it is probably "there is no original Oz for Fischer's words and deeds have been 'numb' this feeling."
The re-establishment of impressions and good feelings is not easy, but as time fades the memory, the initial impression is weakened, and the sense of discord will gradually disappear after the player gets used to the new dubbing, especially for new players who have not been exposed to the original version.
The risks under dubbing diversification
With the rise of the wave of going to sea, in order to open up overseas markets and meet the experience of players in different countries and regions, many games have set up multiple languages to allow players to have a richer experience. However, in addition to most of the unified styles, there are also some characters that will adopt quite different interpretations according to the cultural impressions of different countries. For example, the lawyer character of Yan Zhen in "Original God" is a lively girl in the Chinese version, a mature imperial sister in the Japanese version, and the soft and cute guide character Paimon in the other three versions sounds more like a "little demon" in the English match.
Although there are more choices, often the player will choose the specified language. Just as the different forms of the character will give an explanation of the change in the voice, in the process of language switching, the difference in language will also change the original preset of the character's voice, giving the psychological preparation for accepting the change of the character's voice, avoiding the confusion caused by the simultaneous appearance of different symbols in the same situation. But when players like to be voiced in different versions, they must choose to sacrifice some of the experience. Players then began to appeal for custom character dubbing, but given that this idea may greatly increase the workload of the system, the current feasibility is not high.
At the same time, multiple versions of dubbing will also make manufacturers bear more uncertainty at risk, and the most significant thing at the moment is the negative public opinion of CV. In today's high-profile environment, and in a transparent online environment, the impact of their inappropriate words and actions will also be magnified, not to mention actions that violate morality and the law. Not only do game makers need emergency PR, take down or replace the relevant audio, but characters and games are also implicated to some extent.
The more popular the game, character, CV, the greater the impact on this. This can be seen from the fact that the mascot of "Miracle Warmth" became "dumb" in the later stage, and the network farce in which Lu Shen changed his voice twice in "Love of Light and Night". And this kind of influence in multiple versions of the voice will not be weakened, on the contrary, when there is a problem in one version, it may also affect the appearance time and content of other versions of the character, before Oz changed the CV in "Original God", Fischer did not appear in the character pool for a long time, and another character who once had similar treatment, Reiser, the player speculated that he may also be negatively affected by the crime accused of his English CV.
Although many players have called for the three-dimensional pot not to be carried by paper people, in order to avoid risks and maintain harmony within the game, it is understandable for manufacturers to be cautious. In the wave of public opinion, how to maintain the player experience while eliminating negative effects, the attitude and measures of manufacturers are equally important. Therefore, in addition to obtaining many benefits brought by dubbing, manufacturers must also consider many of the risks when choosing a partner.
New ways to avoid risks
The dubbing of game characters is becoming more and more professional and diverse, reflecting the player's continuous pursuit of the quality of the game experience. The controversy caused by the change of voiceover is the result of the conflict between the willingness of the manufacturer and the player. Manufacturers consider cost, benefit and risk, but players care most about their own game experience, they are willing to participate in the character's life course, but will not grow with the voiceover. Therefore, reasonable reasons for replacement, timely and appropriate aftercare, and most importantly, high-quality new voiceovers are the measures that can most soothe player dissatisfaction.
In addition, in order to reduce risks, in addition to carefully choosing the object of cooperation, game manufacturers also have different routes. In fact, in a game that does not take the character as the main selling point and the concentration of the second dimension is not so high, the impact of CV on the character is not enough to shake the fundamentals of the game. As mentioned above in "Glory of the King", the recent no longer show the CV name and the frequent use of new CV, which largely blurs the connection between the character and the CV, may be because of the team change, or may be in order to avoid the impact of the CV negative public opinion, or there are other marketing plans, it is not clear, but what can be determined is that as a MOBA game, the core gameplay of the king is real-time confrontation, and its wide audience determines that in most players who pay attention to operation and pursue the position, It's more about the strength of the character than on its voiceover.
On the contrary, it is a game that focuses on character development and interaction, especially in many two-dimensional games, where players have established deep feelings with their characters, and part of this feeling comes from the voice of the characters. In more extreme cases, the only binding between the character and the voice, any change in the human design may cause the IP to collapse, in this case, the risk of changing the CV is much greater than that of other games. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully select the partners and conduct risk assessments in advance. To change the CV in a heavy-character game, in addition to being prepared for great controversy and loss, you can only persuade players to adapt to the change with a more sincere attitude and quality content, and wait for time to heal the "wound".