CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

I saw this story on Gamespot...

http://www.gamespot.com/news/2005/04/14/news_6122298.html

Gamespot News wrote:-the vocal marriage between actors and games may be silenced. According to online trade Web site Variety.com (registration required), the contract between the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists with game publishers expires tomorrow.

Apparently, it's not just a simple case of adding a zero to the contract and continuing with the process. Because the use of top-tier actors and SAG members in games is relatively new, the gaming industry has little experience negotiating deals with outside agencies and hasn't formed any collective bargaining agreement or representative organization to deal with such issues.

According to Variety.com, the current contract pays actors on a one-time basis without residuals, something that doesn't fly with the movie biz. With some games reporting opening weekends that make Hollywood jealous (according to Microsoft, Bungie's Halo 2 topped $100 million on its first day of sales), actors may be asking for royalties for their contributions.

Man, the gamin' industry has been taking some possible fatal blows, lately.

Good. I

Volt wrote:Good. I hope it crumbles to the ground,

So something good can be reborn. For once I'm not being negative without a reason, this time it's not just me. It's a mutlitude of blogger and industry staff that are worried about the Game Industry's "SUCKyness".

It's about 2 feet away from crumbling into nothing. So many reasons, so much to explain I don't even want to get into it. But simply said, Wait a while before you buy that nex-gen console.

Yeah, I know, the future is clear as mud and a mess like mud. M$ at GDC really scared the freak out of the game developers and Nintendo at GDC received glazed over eyes with their "innovative" ways.

No offense and I respect that you are studying game design, Volt, but I'm really glad I opted away from the actually making of games. That's going to be some hard work and I don't think I can be a help there. -So, I picked a path in Management and Advertisement, because that's what the industry sorely lacks and needs a lot better of.

Games had top-notch voice actors? When did this happen? How long did I sleep? O.O

No, seriously, it doesn't matter to me. I can count on one hand the number of games that I thought had high quality (English) voice acting. Those games would be:

Lunar 1 and 2
Final Fantasy X
Brave Fencer Musashi

That's about it. I WOULD have put in Star Ocean 3, but sorry, Farleen's voice disqualifies it. Anyone who's played knows what I mean.

I've already heard the bottom of the barrel voice acting wise. Star Ocean 2, Samurai Legend Musashi, Legaia 2, Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits, etc. Sorry, but if this is "high-quality" voice acting, this article doesn't faze me at all. It can't possibly get any worse.

There are a fair number of games with high quality voice-acting, mostly American games, though. Man, I am really a video game geek, because I remember voice actor names better than some of those Hollywood stars.

Anyways, here's a list of the top of my head...

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II
Halo
Halo II
Splinter Cell
Beyond Good and Evil
Pyschonauts
Metal Gear Solid Series
Star Craft
War Craft III


Old School:
Day of the Tentacle
Sam and Max
Grim Fandango

The future

Volt wrote:I wasn't there sadly, a lot of my teachers went, but I was too busy studying to read up on it, what happened with MS and Nintendo?

Heh, I'm probably the only here who did this, then... I watched the keynote speeches from M$ and Nintendo.

Microsoft: J. Allard preached about the industry getting bigger and better. Better I question, bigger I don't. Small Developers, heck most developers cringed at the words bigger. Bigger cost. Bigger Teams. Bigger range of hours. Companies are estimating costs will reach $20 million per title.

Then, he went to talk about how this is the "HD era". Translating to: "You're games for the X-box 2/360/Xenon will be HD or die" Then they gave out HD TVs to butter the crowd as they left.

Also, there was the customization speech, which basically means M$ is forcing people make games actually use the X-box features. Custom soundtracks and the like.

Basically, the whole keynote address was "good news" to the consumers and more work for the developers.

This didn't really bother me to much, until M$ said they'd be showing off the X-box 2 on MTV first. *shakes head* Wonderful.

Nintendo:

Nintendo basically showed off a bunch of novelty ideas, but Mr. Iwata gave a very good speech about Video Game, even though he was sick that day. Aside from the fact that the Revolution will be backwards compatible and have Wi-fi capability out of the box, there wasn't much else. Just some Nintendogs and Electroplankton (which is more of a musical toy, then game).

:lol: Don't you get it... That's exactly what I'm waiting for. Think about it guys, if the game industry crashes, that means the Christian department can move in that's exactly what I'm silently waiting for. Everyday I hear something new about Developers leaving and bad news. This is good news for us.

I've got a lot of things planned, all of them are very realistic and things NO one has ever tried in the industry. There's a lot of concepts and gameplay structures that have remained untapped. When you think about it, it's like "OMGosh that is so cool why didn't anyone else think of that?!"

The future is bright for us. I'm just waiting patiently.

Ah, a true Revolution. Good luck. I'm not going to make a prediction on wether the industy will fall or not, until I see the consoles.

The Cons

Volt wrote:The Consoles don't matter.

Well, maybe not so much for the X-box 2 and PS3, because they are straight forward systems, like the past. Now, the Revolution is another story. That's the one I'm really worried about. First off, the controller. If it's a big customizable touch-screen controller like Mr. Iwata has hinted, Nintendo is guaranteed to lose. Second, the code names. If Revolution isn't scary enough, try their codenames for their chipsets... Hollywood and Broadway. Nintendo has always been gameplay first and cinematics for polish. So, what's with these names?

Finally, Mr. Iwata has a creepy smile. You know, the I've got something crazy planned gleam.

Look at the games, The Game Industry is growing Bigger and Bigger, but not Better. Games have taken a plung, game quality has declined steadily over the last 5 years, and a LOT during the past 2 years, it's getting worst.

I really disagree and agree. Yes, the market is overloaded with crappy movie advertisement games, overall crappy titles, and THQ has managed to break Tetris. Very sad. Perhaps, the high cost of next generation will cut down of this. Publishers might think twice before throwing money into the fire. Doubtful, but maybe.

Personally, nonetheless, I had a blast last year..... Metal Gear Solid 3, Halo 2, Kotor II, Paper Mario, Far Cry, Unreal Tournament '04, Ratchet & Clank: Up your Arsenal, Warhammer, Ninja Gaiden, Burnout 3, Mario Tennis, Pikmin 2, Metroid Prime 2, and Ace Combat 5. More than enough to keep a poor college student, like me, busy. I haven't seen a decrease in quality, not in the good game crowd, at least. I'm enjoying the games as much as my SNES and NES days.

Note: I wasn't much of a fan of the N64 and PS days. The Darkages of gaming for me, there.

Yeah MS said all games MUST be xbox live capable. Not meaning you have to make your game multiplayer over xbox, but what they're trying to do is make it so that you can connect to xbox live, and if your freind is playing Tomb Raider 8 it'll tell you. Or you upload your tomb raider 8 scores online. Stuff like that. Just simple things, takes about a day to implement them into the game, and very inexpensive.

And it's a waste of time, nevertheless, if you ask me. -But, I'm the jaded person who could care less about the LIVE "community" or any online game community. For online, I just jump in and play. This isn't the developers fault, it's the gamers. Almost everyone's immature or tick off at life. So, I ignore the chat box, mute the voice, and play some music.

I'm worried about nintendo, I really want them to be #1 in this one. I've somewhat given up on Sony, Microsoft is really pushing quality, but NexBox isn't going to have a hard-drive, MS Reps made a statement, "Not everything needs to be stored on a hard drive, streaming media is used for lots of things"... so there you have it.

Now, I would be absolutely over joyed if Nintendo touches gold again, too. -And I'm really worried about them, too. They are the reason games are fun, if you ask me.

Game will look more realistic but... nothing good will come of it. I find Psone games are more fun than PS2 and Xbox games combined. The Old-School games were awesome, becasue it was about ratios and proportion. We forgave the characters when their mouths didn't move becuase we knew it wasn't posible to be that realistic, we knew the capabilites and limitations and our minds focused on what was possible and it was fun.

So far, game just keep getting better to me. Sure, I'll always have my rants, because no game will ever be perfect. Yes, I love the old school (SNES and NES) games and it's always fun to revisit them, but I still find this generation just as fun. ....and most defiantly funner in general than the last (N64 and PS).

The 128 bit era came along and we're complaining about everything, becuase graphics are being put over gameplay. And when GamePlay is put over Graphics we are still not happy, becuase the experience isn't complete.

I think the online comminities have a lot to do with all the complaining. Better gameplay is still here. Take Resident Evil for example. Resident Evil 4 is far beyond the previous Resident Evil games, in terms of gameplay. Yet, I find the cheesy acting and dialogue unchanged. So yes, there is always something to complain about.

If Games are getting more like Hollywood Movies, then a Crash is 100% on it's way. Hollywood is one big joke, with crapp being released at the box office every week.

Heh.... that reminds me, I've yet to place one foot into a movie theater this year. I use to be a big movie goer and now I could care less.

On the other hand, this is good, After every Industry Crash, there's always a revolution in that section. A renaisannce.

As long as the games are fun and immersive....

Link Antilles wrote:Well, maybe not so much for the X-box 2 and PS3, because they are straight forward systems, like the past. Now, the Revolution is another story. That's the one I'm really worried about. First off, the controller. If it's a big customizable touch-screen controller like Mr. Iwata has hinted, Nintendo is guaranteed to lose. Second, the code names. If Revolution isn't scary enough, try their codenames for their chipsets... Hollywood and Broadway. Nintendo has always been gameplay first and cinematics for polish. So, what's with these names?

Nintendo, sadly, has been on the downward spiral for a long time. They're now infamous for making "innovative" features that are practically useless and not well-received by the gaming community. Unfortunately for the gaming community, Nintendo may not realize "innovative" does not always equal "good" until they're bankrupt...which would be kind of sad. I'm a big Cube fan, but the decision to forego online play was a BAD move. I'm not a big online gamer either (I've only played Halo 2 online), but I know that it's a big thing for most gamers. So to ignore online play is to ignore a sizable majority of the gamers out there, which is one of the reasons Xbox did well, I think (Halo being the other).

These things you say about the Revolution frighten me. Maybe someone will get intelligent and get Iwata out of there.

I really disagree and agree. Yes, the market is overloaded with crappy movie advertisement games, overall crappy titles, and THQ has managed to break Tetris. Very sad. Perhaps, the high cost of next generation will cut down of this. Publishers might think twice before throwing money into the fire. Doubtful, but maybe.

And that's what I'm hoping for, too. If the cost of games increases, then a lot of the craptastic third-party games might vanish, and the good, solid companies will be able to continue, making a decrease in the amount of crappy games. However, sadly, it may squelch a lot of the good small titles, such as Wild ARMs or Legend of Legaia. Not hugely popular titles, but good games from small companies, and those will be less frequent if game costs increase.

Personally, nonetheless, I had a blast last year..... Metal Gear Solid 3, Halo 2, Kotor II, Paper Mario, Far Cry, Unreal Tournament '04, Ratchet & Clank: Up your Arsenal, Warhammer, Ninja Gaiden, Burnout 3, Mario Tennis, Pikmin 2, Metroid Prime 2, and Ace Combat 5. More than enough to keep a poor college student, like me, busy. I haven't seen a decrease in quality, not in the good game crowd, at least. I'm enjoying the games as much as my SNES and NES days.

Last year was indeed a good year for games. I still play my old SNES and NES too, but not as much as I play my PS2 and Gamecube. And if the old games were TRULY better, it would be just the reverse. The quality of good games has remained good, except in the case of Final Fantasy X-2.

And it's a waste of time, nevertheless, if you ask me. -But, I'm the jaded person who could care less about the LIVE "community" or any online game community. For online, I just jump in and play. This isn't the developers fault, it's the gamers.

Yeah, the things Volt mentioned just seem to be pointless add-ons to me too, not interesting at all. I'm not much of an online gamer either, so that may be part of it. At the worst, having to put all those features in could possibly result in longer release dates for games at the expense of the features which really aren't that useful but are required because "M$ says so."

Now, I would be absolutely over joyed if Nintendo touches gold again, too. -And I'm really worried about them, too. They are the reason games are fun, if you ask me.

I disagree slightly, I think Atari is the reason games are fun. But I realize that Nintendo is what truly brought gaming into mainstream houses, so they are just as much (if not more) responsible than Atari. That's why I'll be sad if Nintendo goes under because of poor marketing decisions.

some games in America have been tapping into the anime voice acting pool to get their stuff dubbed, like Xenosaga episode 1 using almost every actor from Bang Zoom's VA pool. Does this article apply to them too, or are they just talking about games where big name actors supply the voices, like with Kingdom Hearts?? Maybe this is actully a good thing. If the American gaming industry can't hire American actors to dub voices in games anymore, they might be forced to release video games with the japanese langauge track and subs, which is what some people have wanted for a long time.

They could just get s

I could care less whether games have "top-notch" American voice actors who have contracts with the screen actor's guild/etc. "Star power" in the US means squat to me - I don't care about the names involved, as long as the acting is actually GOOD (not this FFX, Megaman X7 voice acting poop) I wouldn't give a 2nd thought about who's doing the voices - like Volt ad Rocketshipper said, they could get up and coming actors, or (gasp) leave the Japanese voice tracks 100% INTACT. (I'd cry tears of happiness if this became the norm)

I'm sick of all these new graphics/voices/online features put into video games these days. There hasn't been a game made in a LONG time that I've enjoyed as much as FFIX for the PS1, Kirby Superstar for the SNES, or Grandia II for the Dreamcast. Everything's been poop lately - every company's trying to outdo some other company's graphics or outdo this feature or that campability, it seems like they've given up on stuff like character development, plot concepts....gameplay in some cases...=/

It would be nice if they just have someone who can act in the English voices and doesn't cause you to cringe in pain. I wish more games had the option to have the origianl Japanese track as well as the English like the Bouncer. Sometiems the English track is painful to listen but also sometimes its fun to have the Japanese track to listen to. I was happy when the disk that came with Xenosaga II with the FMV's from the first game had the Japanese track on it. It was fun to hear what the original voices were like. And I agree that in Star Ocean Farleen's voice was absolutely terrible. I doubt they could have found anyone worse.

And Bill Gates also didn't have the proper format for footnotes/endnotes in his word prossessing programs as my history professeurs pointed out at my University many times.