There is a little diff in those 2 so who cares 
More effort changing out voice lines than customization for SL. Feels bad.
Ye they made him a joke in KH3 and basically turned him into a damsel in distress. Hopefully he gets some spotlight in Master of Masters saga.
It’s fair enough for Blizzard to do that I suppose. I can’t say I particularly like the new voice actor better, but if he had been there all along the character would have been sold pretty much just as well, so I’m fine with it. He does a good job.
I do think American culture has become very messed up though - again, cancelling/deleting someone and their works because someone alleged that he did something bad. I understand there’s video evidence in the form of an unwanted awkward kiss, but… idk. That doesn’t quite fit “grooming” to me.
If he is innocent I hope he sues for defamation and wins and, as for me, I am tired of this corporate Californian cancel culture. It’s toxic. It keeps destroying people. A lot of them, too, I mean is this the first time this has happened this year at Blizzard? I’m not sure.
EDIT: It should also be noted that the people who made the allegation specifically asked for him not to be cancelled, so this is all a bit ironic, really.
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It’s pretty different, the two teams will be different, and the VA might even be working from their own recording studio at home, I know I do, at which point it is pretty much just a figurative ‘Copy Paste’ and voila, new voice for character. The VA work itself is a lot harder than people think, but the implementation of it into game is a lot easier.
Returning to the subject at hand, Thank the Gods I live in England, and Richard III gave us the concept of “Innocent until proven Guilty”. This said, I can kind of see why they took that move, in most businesses, people suspected of some misdoing are suspended. With a VA it is different. He wasn’t a Blizzard employee, most VA’s get contracted to do a piece, paid PCH (Per complete Hour) after which point the contract is over and done. Neither party has any obligation to the other. So it isn’t like the dude was fired or something. They simply did not take up a new contract with him. Which is actually fair enough, sometimes company’s do that, even for completely innocent reasons. Chris Metzen obviously voices Thrall, but he also used to voice Varian Wrynn, until Metzen needed to cut some of his VA work to spend more time with his family. Lor’themar’s VA has changed also, not because of any wrongdoing, but the original VA could not meet contractual requirements due to working on other stuff. If I got an offer from Pixar to do some work for them (Hah! As if!) I wouldn’t be able to accept it, because I have a contract with an author to do their audiobooks. It’s just how it works.
If all the allegations are false, then they can always contract him again, and change his voice back. The current VA isn’t going to be effected by this, they’ve already been paid. That’s how it works. You’re not even on a retainer fee. You do your contract, and that’s it. The reason Metzen still voices Thrall is not because he works for Blizzard (Although the fact that he used to is probably a strong factor), it is just a ‘gentleman’s agreement’ that Blizz have first dibs on his time.
Now the concerning thing about this, is that Blizzard have not applied the same logic to the racist sexist Madeleine Roux, and still represent her in game. Now there, there is incontrovertible proof that she made those comments. Again, she was a contracted worker, her contract with Blizz is (Hopefully) over. The problem is, they still have that NPC in place, and have not announced that they are severing ties, and some Blizzard Employees have even defended her disgraceful behaviour. This is clearly some sort of double standard.
So it isn’t like he was fired, or dropped by Blizz, just that they gave the contract to someone else, if you see what I mean?
For future voice lines, that would work. Not for every voice line in the game, including going back to old to ‘redo’ so to speak. Feels a bit off to go back to all those old lines and change them out including paying extra time for a contract but hey. As previously mentioned, Swifty’s NPC was removed and that was something I was against when it was announced since it was removed before Swifty was even able to reply to any kind of allegations. Not reinstated. So there is very much a double standard being held there, even for people that do not work for them; they still haven’t EVER come out and went ‘oh my bad we made a mistake’ and reinstated anything as of yet. Until they do, it’s kind of my stance on it.
I know what you mean about VA being perhaps ‘easier to implement’ in a way but I’m more memeing on the fact there’s ZERO effort being made on character customization for SL than anything else because of course anything else including VA work and implementation would be far greater than zero.
Quoted for truthiness.
Better tell Nick Ferrari, Judy Finnigan and Vanessa Feltz, all columnists for the Daily Express…not exactly a bastion of Lefty rhetoric…that their columns lambasting men, after the abduction and murder of Sarah Everard, were bang out of order too…
Daily Express. Seen who owns them? Same guy who tried to shut down all Australian social media from posting news, and that it should all come from Newscorp. I am not surprised…
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The Express is owned by Reach Plc, not the Dirty Digger…the spat between billionaires Murdoch and Zuckerberg, over FB freeloading News content created by others, is an entirely separate issue.
You are letting your personal experience cloud your judgement on this matter.
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These people being removed are their staff and they should be protected until proven to be bad actors in court.
No one should be thrown under a bus based on unproven allegations. For example, I could go to your employer and say that you did X, Y, Z when i know you didn’t. And then they’d fire you, “protecting their other employees.” lol
It’s just crazy how allegations are taking as proof and people lose it all before it even goes to court. And if/when they clear the name, the damage is long done.
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I read about it a few days ago.
Listened to the new VA and can say: they could have done better. Sure, if you don’t concentrate on it, I guess one can say its close… but to me he just doesn’t have the same vibe as old Kael’thas.
I do think they jump the gun too quickly but I can also understand it… However! They do like their double standards over there. One would hope for a bit more consistency.
If it were me: I’d just kept the old voice lines, even when going forward with someone else.
As to the person, well it’s for the justice system to find out. Either he’s guilty or not.
What I more meant, is that the Daily Express and Daily Mail both operate in the same way, they sell outrage to people. Facts don’t matter. Outrage sells. Doesn’t matter if it is Right or Left, Outrage sells…
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From what i could gather there were court cases against him since well over 2 years now. All have been lost. No info (from what i could see) in regards of the current one. However im not that much invested in it.
However there must be done something that if someone gets accused and is proven innocent that their status gets restored. By law. Like forcing companies that changed due to allegations to revert their changes. Whether he is innocent or not is not for me to decide.
As for Blizzard: They are riding on a train of double standards anyway. Especially with Shadowlands.
They’re not though! They’re emphatically not their staff at all. They are private contractors, that is how VA works. The VA who did Kael’thas is not a Blizzard employee…
Now I agree with the ‘Unproven allegations’ bit, but as I stated, plenty other VA’s got replaced, not because of any allegations, but just because they had a set contract. Which they fulfilled. Blizzard then paid them. Done Deal.
If they choose to replace your work, then sure, your pride might be hurt a little, but you have -Still been paid for your work- That’s like saying you’re annoyed at a company that you voluntarily resigned from. That VA had a specific contract, which had expired by the end of TBC, Blizzard is not obliged to get them back in, nor are they equally obliged to go back and do more work for them.
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Didn’t he voice the character in SLs though?
True…the more important issue however, is whether or not the outrage is in fact justified, over a very real social problem.
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Ah well, that is an entirely separate issue, and usually, no, no it is not justified…
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Yes. So? Hes still not part of Blizzards staff. Hes a contracted voice actor. Guy is lending his voice to a lot of things. Be it animations, anime, games, movies etc.
Look at Chris Metzen for instance. He has officially left Blizzard. He is however still voicing thrall and probably also gets paid for it. Voice Actors in general are not part of a staff but get contracted. At least the good ones. Because they dont need to stick with company as the companies reach out to them all the time.
The guy has been involved with the company for a long time and would have likely still had an active contract with the company when whatever allegations where thrown about.
But they just threw him under the bus the soon as someone said boo about him.
In companies I’ve worked at, contracted people are seen as part of the firm, esp. if they’ve been around in one form or another for a long time.