The Shin Megami Everything Thread

[Mortificator]

"The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly" was filmed without sound and dubbed post-production

The same is true of all video games (except those that use live-action FMV) and of all animation. As with a dubbed film, the voices you hear aren't audio recordings made concurrently with video recordings, but dubs produced to suit what's happening-on screen.

[xbl0x180]

"The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly" was filmed without sound and dubbed post-production

The same is true of all video games (except those that use live-action FMV) and of all animation. As with a dubbed film, the voices you hear aren't audio recordings made concurrently with video recordings, but dubs produced to suit what's happening-on screen.

No. Catherine was made first using a Japanese voice cast; it was intended to be heard in that language. The game was not made with an English voice cast in mind, nor was it released concurrently in Japan and North America (unlike the film I referenced). Hence, it was intended to be heard in Japanese and it was later re-dubbed using an English voice cast.

[Rebel Ninja]

I assume the UK release will just be a direct port of the US version, so the original Japanese voiceovers will not be included. I wonder if the rest of the European countries that the game is being released in will get the US dub with subtitles or a localised dub.

[Elixir]

Surprised that more people here aren't playing this game, especially considering the difficulty.

[xbl0x180]

Surprised that more people here aren't playing this game, especially considering the difficulty.

I'm not. Gamers here freak out if a game is fractions of seconds too fast or too slow in comparison to the original arcade. There are also a few anime watchers who like subbed stuff

[Mortificator]

"The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly" was filmed without sound and dubbed post-production

The same is true of all video games (except those that use live-action FMV) and of all animation. As with a dubbed film, the voices you hear aren't audio recordings made concurrently with video recordings, but dubs produced to suit what's happening-on screen.

No. Catherine was made first using a Japanese voice cast; it was intended to be heard in that language. The game was not made with an English voice cast in mind, nor was it released concurrently in Japan and North America (unlike the film I referenced). Hence, it was intended to be heard in Japanese and it was later re-dubbed using an English voice cast.

This "intended to" stuff doesn't have anything to do with your line I quoted or my reply. There's no argument against all game and cartoon voices being dubbed, because by their nature, there's no concurrent audio to record.

As for the developer's intent, they released it with a Japanese dub in a country where Japanese is the most common language and with an English dub in a country where English is the most common language. It seems they intended it to be heard in the language spoken by the player.

And "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" was not released simultaneously in Italy and the U.S.

[Elixir]

Surprised that more people here aren't playing this game, especially considering the difficulty.

I'm not. Gamers here freak out if a game is fractions of seconds too fast or too slow in comparison to the original arcade. There are also a few anime watchers who like subbed stuff

How is this related to what I said?

[xbl0x180]

Surprised that more people here aren't playing this game, especially considering the difficulty.

I'm not. Gamers here freak out if a game is fractions of seconds too fast or too slow in comparison to the original arcade. There are also a few anime watchers who like subbed stuff

How is this related to what I said?

1. You are surprised more people here are not playing the game, considering its gameplay difficulty.
2. I'm not surprised by its lack of popularity here, considering this game is an alteration of the original.
3. That is how the comments are related.

[Elixir]

Uh, I own both versions, and the difficulty was adjusted in both for the better. Do you really think people aren't playing this game because the difficulty was adjusted from the Japanese version?

[xbl0x180]

This "intended to" stuff doesn't have anything to do with your line I quoted or my reply. There's no argument against all game and cartoon voices being dubbed, because by their nature, there's no concurrent audio to record. As for the developer's intent, they released it with a Japanese dub in a country where Japanese is the most common language and with an English dub in a country where English is the most common language. It seems they intended it to be heard in the language spoken by the player.

And "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" was not released simultaneously in Italy and the U.S.

You're right, it was not released concurrently. It's a 3-hour film that took longer to dub in various languages during post-production. It was planned to be released in Italy and internationally even before it was filmed. Also, they were using a combination of American and Italian actors who would be able to do their own voices. The film was intendedly recorded without sound for whatever reason(s).

Are you saying Catherine was planned to be released in North America before it was made and they had chosen the voice actors with that in mind at that time? There's a distinction between original intent and going back later on to alter something (i.e., George Lucas comes to mind). This game sounds like the latter situation.

[xbl0x180]

Uh, I own both versions, and the difficulty was adjusted in both for the better. Do you really think people aren't playing this game because the difficulty was adjusted from the Japanese version?

Gamers may have a misconception about the difficulty level for both versions of the game. Remember the spat gamers were having about DeathSmiles not having the correct slow-down? I'm guessing a few might think it also happened with this game's difficulty level.

[Elixir]

I remember Deathsmiles having the slowdown removed from the US version, people didn't like this, so it was patched. In similar vein, Catherine was patched because a lot of people found the difficulty to be too hard.

Thanks for proving my point.

[xbl0x180]

I remember Deathsmiles having the slowdown removed from the US version, people didn't like this, so it was patched. In similar vein, Catherine was patched because a lot of people found the difficulty to be too hard.

Thanks for proving my point.

"Proving your point"? Hahahah... uh... you're welcome?

[Mortificator]

Are you saying Catherine was planned to be released in North America before it was made and they had chosen the voice actors with that in mind at that time? There's a distinction between original intent and going back later on to alter something (i.e., George Lucas comes to mind).

Well, I doubt that the possibility of a North American release never crossed the minds of the dev team while they were working on the game. What I'm saying is that the choice of language wasn't an artistic decision, like it was with titles such as Ico or PaRappa. I don't see any indication that the devs went over all the world languages and picked Japanese because it best suits Catherine. The artistic decision was in having some words heard by the player instead of read, and to facilitate that, the voice acting that's included is in the language that's most likely to be understood by the players in that region.

It's OK if you like the Japanese voices better, though.

[xbl0x180]

Are you saying Catherine was planned to be released in North America before it was made and they had chosen the voice actors with that in mind at that time? There's a distinction between original intent and going back later on to alter something (i.e., George Lucas comes to mind).

Well, I doubt that the possibility of a North American release never crossed the minds of the dev team while they were working on the game. What I'm saying is that the choice of language wasn't an artistic decision, like it was with titles such as Ico or PaRappa. I don't see any indication that the devs went over all the world languages and picked Japanese because it best suits Catherine. The artistic decision was in having some words heard by the player instead of read, and to facilitate that, the voice acting that's included is in the language that's most likely to be understood by the players in that region.

It's OK if you like the Japanese voices better, though.

I only like the original voice cast. By extension, I like all original voice casts when it comes to movies and television shows (with a handful of exceptions). As a video/movie collector, there is nothing worse than to hear something was dubbed/changed/altered. I equate it to panning-and-scanning of movies "to fit your screen," colourising black-and-white movies, censoring and editing, and a number of other problems.

Another analogy would be, dubbing is like eating sushi made of fried rice and cooked fish using a fork

[BulletMagnet]

Another analogy would be, dubbing is like eating sushi made of fried rice and cooked fish using a fork

In otherwords, it accomplishes the exact same purpose just as capably, but offends purists just the same.

[Damocles]

...and how often is the original Japanese voice acting fucking atrocious? I can't help but think that people hold original dubbing in such high regard because they can't understand it.

I don't watch much anime, but when I do there often seems to be a disconnect between the emotion depicted on the screen and the sound I'm hearing.

[BryanM]

Another analogy would be, dubbing is like eating sushi made of fried rice and cooked fish using a fork

So... you can actually taste the food instead of a clump of ice?

[xbl0x180]

Another analogy would be, dubbing is like eating sushi made of fried rice and cooked fish using a fork

In otherwords, it accomplishes the exact same purpose just as capably, but offends purists just the same.

Correctomundo.

It also boils down to a matter of taste. I have no beef with people playing this game or watching dubbed material (or eating Americanised foods!), but whenever I voice my intense dislike of dubbing, you'd think I raped their sisters and mothers or something

[Obiwanshinobi]

...and how often is the original Japanese voice acting fucking atrocious? I can't help but think that people hold original dubbing in such high regard because they can't understand it.

I hold it in high regard because:
a) The language pleases me phonetically
b) I like the voice talents (recognise many of them, have my favourites etc.)

I don't watch much anime, but when I do there often seems to be a disconnect between the emotion depicted on the screen and the sound I'm hearing.

You just might be unfamiliar with the foreign language's generic intonations. Foreign body language (and its cartoony depictions) also may be confusing (for example, in anime you can quite often see the characters smiling faintly when they are apparently displeased with something).
I don't want to sound too apologetic, but since you've not given any examples, I can only speculate like that. The only downright shitty case of Japanese voice acting I've heard recently was Hotsuma's brother in Shinobi for the PS2. Tenamonya Voyagers I watched last week didn't have great voice acting, but it was far from atrocious.

[Elixir]

Found a box art parody on pixiv, thought you guys might like this, so I reupped for those without pixiv accounts. http://imgur.com/a/Ogpnq

[BulletMagnet]

This guy was right - boobs really do have the power to cross most any boundary.

[antron]

"The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly" was filmed without sound and dubbed post-production, and the movie premiered pretty much concurrently with the Italian dub. In some instances of dubbing in various languages, a few of the actors did their own voices in both languages.

and it looks like shit because of it. (but didn't stop me from watching it 4 times one weekend)

[xbl0x180]

This guy was right - boobs really do have the power to cross most any boundary.

I NEED THIS GAME

[MX7]

Where is Catherine actually set? They seem to have English sounding names. So perhaps an English language, American accented dub won't lead to as much cognitive dissonance as the Persona games.

The thing that annoys me most about dubbing is that it invariably done by Americans in an American accent. So there's two disparate planes of exoticism clashing uneasily with one another. Perhaps I just don't like American accents, and bemoan the inevitability and the ubiquity of their presence in a dub.

One of the best dubs I have ever seen is on the UK DVD of Ichi The Killer, which is a film about gangsters. The dub sounds like a British gangster film. It's a wonderful conceit, and one that fits in well with the multi-lingual/transnational themes of the film. Of course, I still see the original language track as being inherently preferable, like most cinephiles, but at least the dub does somethig different.

"Awight Kakihara, wot the fuck are you playin' at" etc etc

TL;DR It's absolutely ridiculous that, in this day and age, we're not getting a choice of wjat language we hear in the game. Hopefully there's an option to turn off the voices, a la Persona.

[xbl0x180]

Where is Catherine actually set? They seem to have English sounding names. So perhaps an English language, American accented dub won't lead to as much cognitive dissonance as the Persona games.

The thing that annoys me most about dubbing is that it invariably done by Americans in an American accent. So there's two disparate planes of exoticism clashing uneasily with one another. Perhaps I just don't like American accents, and bemoan the inevitability and the ubiquity of their presence in a dub.

One of the best dubs I have ever seen is on the UK DVD of Ichi The Killer, which is a film about gangsters. The dub sounds like a British gangster film. It's a wonderful conceit, and one that fits in well with the multi-lingual/transnational themes of the film. Of course, I still see the original language track as being inherently preferable, like most cinephiles, but at least the dub does somethig different.

"Awight Kakihara, wot the fuck are you playin' at" etc etc

TL;DR It's absolutely ridiculous that, in this day and age, we're not getting a choice of wjat language we hear in the game. Hopefully there's an option to turn off the voices, a la Persona.

Oh, man, I love British gangster movies on accents alone. I just watched Football Factory and could not fathom this movie being dubbed in any other language, no matter the kind of talent that's involved

[iconoclast]

Just finished this game up (got 1000/1000 on it too). Overall, I thought it was great, but I did have a few problems with it. For starters, there are some stages where luck plays a big role - Obelisk being the most obvious. Some randomness is fine, but sometimes it gets to the point where you're dead and there's nothing you can do about it because the mystery blocks, monster blocks, or the random block pattern completely ruined the path you were building toward. That's just poor design.

I liked the story and characters, but I was still a little disappointed by it. I won't get into spoilers, but some of the revelations and endings were kinda dumb. The True Katherine ending in particular, which feels like the "real" ending to the game, was completely unbelievable. I actually thought the True Catherine ending was the best out of all of them, even though I like Katherine more. Oh well.

Hmm, what else... the art and graphics are great, the soundtrack is awesome, the dub is okay (hit & miss), and I absolutely hate Rapunzel. But like I said, I still enjoyed the game a lot. Getting golds on Hard was a nice challenge and very fun to complete, especially since I don't play puzzle/action games like this often. It was a nice change of pace.

[cj iwakura]

The game's set in an 'unnamed American city', according to Atlus staff. Always had that impression, since all the text in the bar is in English.


And I loved the game to death. My only complaint was(aside from the dumbed down difficulty for the US version) is that there's not enough branching paths as a result of the in-game decisions.

Beyond that,it's wonderful.

[Rebel Ninja]

There's lots of news from Atlus regarding the future of the Persona series.

Persona 5: It is in development however it won't be getting released in the near future. While Catherine was built with the Gamebyro engine, Persona 5 will use an internal engine.

Release:TBA

source:http://www.siliconera.com/2011/08/30/pe ... some-time/


Persona 4: The Golden: This will be a port of Persona 4 for the Playstation Vita. There will be 1.5 times as much voice work as well as new songs. New characters will be added to the game including Marie. You’ll also be able to call for help if you’re having a hard time in the game’s dungeons by utilising the online functions of the Vita.

Release
Playstation Vita(JP): Spring 2012

source: http://www.siliconera.com/2011/08/30/at ... tion-vita/


Persona 4: Ultimate in Mayonaka Arena: This is a fighting game being developed by the same team from Arc System Works who did Blazblue. It takes place two months after Persona 4 and will continue the game's story.

Release
Arcade(JP): Spring 2012
Xbox 360 & PS3(JP): Summer 2012

source:http://www.siliconera.com/2011/08/30/bl ... ting-game/

[ryu]

persona 4 was fantastic, so i'm pretty skeptycal towards persona 5. i'm not sure if they can add much more to the concept without taking things away somewhere, and who knows if they won't fuck up the characters again (most of the characters in p3 are downright horrible).
and let's pray to some god they won't have all characters look like the new char in p4vita.

with that in mind i'm also not sure of the vita game. it'd be the reason for me to buy the handheld if they can add enough new gameplay-related content, but i don't see them doing that yet. the new character looks horrible and kana hanazawa makes me look forward for an english dub for the first time in a videogame.
and unlike with perona 3 it's not like they can do a lot of improvements to pacing and playability with this.

the fighting game looks cool, though i can't imagine the p4 party members kick their own asses. that plot twist in the answer was bad enough.

here's some low res famitsu 'scans' for anyone who cares