I lack witty title, oh noes!

[samatethecookie]

I think PS2 is on its last leg. Whenever scenes change, during game play or cut scenes, it lags. It takes a full minute to change scenes. I can always get another PS2, but it surprises me because I've had this PS2 Slim for a long time and it's breaking on us now. :\ (I suspect it's because my little sister never turns off the console when she's done playing them. I almost always find it running for hours, without anyone using it, whenever my sister plays a game and forgets to turn it off. PS2, PS3, the Wii, anything that can play a game. I wish the PS2 had these controls to lock someone out of the PS2 console, because it's starting to get on my nerves, not to mention how expensive these consoles were.)

I was playing Kingdom Hearts 2, and the only real thoughts I have on it is my aggravation over the voices of the Final Fantasy characters. Some of them are just awful.
(a) Mae Whitman can never be Yuffie to me, because whenever she opens her mouth, all I hear is, "HI, I'M KATARA." (Which isn't a bad thing! It's just that Whitman has one of those voices that never escapes you once you've heard her play one character.)
(b) Cid sounds like he's sixty instead of forty-something. I get that he's older than the other characters, but he's not that old.
(c) Aerith. Every voice Aerith's had with the exception of Crisis Core has been terrible. Why can't they figure out which voice actress suits her? She's had three in total so far, and all of them sound too ridiculously soft-spoken. And her voice actress in KH2, Mena Suvari, sounds like she had a head cold, and as though she wasn't even trying with her lines. :\ Please, ppl, stick with Andrea Bowen from Crisis Core from now on.

The only voices I don't cringe whenever I hear them belong to Leon, Cloud, and Sephiroth. (Well, the second game for Sephiroth, since they realized casting a member from the pop group N*Sync to play an extremely popular, menancing villain like Sephiroth wasn't exactly a good idea, and thankfully picked up George Newbern to play Sephiroth since then.) There's Tifa and the others, but I haven't really heard their voices yet, and I forget what they sound like in the Kingdom Hearts series.

And I realize I'm rambling, so I'm going to end this entry with a completely random realization that I haven't been reading a lot lately, which disappoints me greatly. I think I'm going to start getting around to House of Leaves, BUT I AM SCARED, YOU GUYS.

On that note, Sev, I just found something related to our little inside jokes.



Please tell me I'm not the only one who immediately thought of anti!Cais traumatizing his daughter yet again if he ever saw this book.

Comments

[bringthefate.livejournal.com]

Doesn't Mia do the voice of Tinker Bell now? I didn't watch a lot of Avatar but I do remember watching Tinker Bell and thinking how she sounded like Yuffie...personally I prefer Christy Carlson Romano's voice in KH1 for her. I was annoyed when they gave Cid...a redneck sounding voice...I don't know why but that seriously isn't how I pictured his voice...Aerith. I love the girl but yeah they need to pick a person and stay with it dammit! Tifa has the same voice actress as she did in Advent Children.

[samatethecookie.livejournal.com]

She does play Tinker Bell now. For me I have the same problem I have with Yuffie in this game that I do with the new Tinker Bell. Whitman's not Tinker Bell or Yuffie. She's Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender! It's like the girl who played Helga from Hey Arnold, or the woman who played Phil and Lil from Rugrats. You can't picture them playing anyone else because their voices are that distinct, and once you've heard them play one role, you can't separate them from that one character. xD; I preferred Romano too. She played Kim Possible and all, but when she was playing Yuffie, you didn't automatically connect the two characters.

I don't mind Cid having a redneck sounding voice, because I always imagined that voice for him, but do they have to make him sound much older than he really is?

I think the problem Aerith has with voice actresses is that they keep picking up voice actresses that, in my humble opinion, just don't connect with her. Her actress in Crisis Core did it right, and I really hope Bowen continues playing Aerith IF THEY EVER REMAKE FFVII, and you know it's totally going to happen. But her other actresses just suck. Especially Suvari; she sounds bored whenever she's playing Aerith.

[http://users.livejournal.com/beyondheroism__/]

I'd argue about the Phil/Lil lady as she is Kath Soucie and Lola Bunny sounds nothing like Lil Deville and neither of them sound like Miriam Pataki. I mean, Kath's voice is recognizable, but not as... permanent as Mae's Katara.

(hahaha sorry for butting in BB!)

[samatethecookie.livejournal.com]

That's true! I forgot that she played Miriam and Lola. Usually when I recognize Kath's voice, she's playing a kid and I automatically go, "PHIL AND LIL, STOP HAUNTING MEEEE."

Mae's voice... yeah, I can't buy her as Yuffie or anyone else. She's always going to sound like Katara to me. I think it's because I heard her play Katara first. If I heard her in Kingdom Hearts first, I probably would've watched Avatar and go, "What the hell is Yuffie doing in here."

Man, I wish there were more voice actors like Tara Strong who can play, like, five different roles and you'd never realize it's her.

[http://users.livejournal.com/beyondheroism__/]

Yeah, Kath's kid voice is pretty recognizable and I feel the same way. I can also recognize Tommy Pickle's voice actress when she dubs over kids.

IDK, I think if it'd been backwards I wouldn't have noticed, but I heard Katara's voice for YEARS and then Yuffie came back in KH2 and I was like: "WHAT IS THIS." Especially since she didn't really do anything to change it.

Haha, I can actually recognize Tara strong pretty easily. I think the best voice actress who plays multiple characters is Tess McNeille. <333

[samatethecookie.livejournal.com]

I was just thinking the same thing about Tommy Pickle's voice actress, too!

No, she didn't do much to change her voice for Yuffie, and it's sort of the same thing with Tinker Bell. There's subtle differences, but not enough to tear herself away from Katara.

I can usually pick up Tara's voice whenever she plays characters with quiet, raspy voices, because they all sound like Raven to me. But usually her roles kind of sneak up on me because I'm slower on connecting a voice to a specific actor/actress unless it's someone like Mae.

I almost forgot who Tress was until I googled her. But she's great, too! <3 I knew the same voice actress played Aminaiacs' Dot and Hama from Avatar, except I kept forgetting Tress' name.

[asylumiss.livejournal.com]

I would go mental if someone left my ps2/3 on for hours.

Ah Kingdom Hearts 2 and the phone-in performances with the FF characters. I'm still not sure how I feel about redneck Cid but maybe I expected a... gruffer voice.

I think the problem with the shuffling of Aeris voice actors is that Square-Enix seems to have become disillusioned with Aeris and are catering to fandom's idea of Aeris as the 'healer archetype' even though she's a subversion of that trope and it might explain her characterisation in Crisis Core

To me they all sounded bored to be there. I guess it isn't helped much by the dialogue they're given. Seriously the dialogue between Cloud and Sephiroth was so cringe-worthy I WANT TO SMACK WHOEVER WROTE IT

[samatethecookie.livejournal.com]

I get HELLA MAD whenever I see the console's been left on. It's one of my pet peeves.

I think the problem with the shuffling of Aeris voice actors is that Square-Enix seems to have become disillusioned with Aeris and are catering to fandom's idea of Aeris as the 'healer archetype' even though she's a subversion of that trope

I was thinking about that and yeah, I agree with this point a lot. Square-Enix seems to forget who this character is. I'm glad they didn't turn Tifa into the opposite of her archetype--well, okay, they covered her up in Advent Children, but she still gets to be Tifa--but I really wish they'd remember the character they created and give her proper justice.

Her characterization in Crisis Core did bother me a little. I remember laughing because she said to Zack at some point, "I AM SCARED OF THE SKY. IT IS BIG AND SCARY AND I FEEL LIKE IT IS SWALLOWING ME UP." I sort of got what she was talking about, but really, Aerith? Considering you're the last of your kind, you're going to get stabbed in the gut by some guy with a Messiah Complex, and you have to stop him and Meteor from destroying the world, you've got bigger issues than the omniscient sky above the plate.

I love Kingdom Hearts, but admittedly some of the dialogue in the game is a little annoying, especially whenever the bad guys are talking. They emphasize THE DARKNESS by repeating that word over and over again. Hearing Sephiroth repeat everything the Nobodies and Ansem already said was a little silly, because that's not how he talks. (And dude, if he's going to taunt Cloud, I prefer "Get on your knees and beg for forgiveness" over "YOU HAVE DARKNESS IN YOUR HEART." Because he's Sephiroth and he can get away with that shit.)

[asylumiss.livejournal.com]

I was really annoyed that she couldn't identify Zack as a SOLDIER when she first met him. I have trouble believing she's THAT ignorant.

Oh god Sephiroth is another character that I think Square are having trouble with. In FFVII he ignores Cloud for the most part but ever since Advent Children it feels like they have to play up the idea that THESE TWO ARE FATED NEMESIS' DESTINED TO FIGHT WHEREVER THEY CAMEO but really it was mostly hate from Cloud and indifference from Sephiroth. So I see his cameo appearances as AC!Sephiroth rather than FFVII!Sephiroth :/

[samatethecookie.livejournal.com]

I was really annoyed that she couldn't identify Zack as a SOLDIER when she first met him. I have trouble believing she's THAT ignorant.

lol, that scene would've make sense if Zack wasn't wearing his SOLDIER outfit. Eyes alone can't really say much, but the guy was parading around in Shinra gear. XDD (Also, I need to replay the game, because I forget little scenes like that after awhile.)

I have mixed feelings on the Cloud and Sephiroth battles. I can see why Sephiroth would want to fight Cloud and hate him, since Cloud did ruin his plans to conquer the world, and he'd certainly take notice of the guy who got in his way. And I'm a sucker for their scenes. But that doesn't mean it doesn't get tiresome after Advent Children, Kingdom Hearts, and Dissidia. I'd like to see Cloud follow Sephiroth around, yelling, "LET'S SETTLE THIS I HATE YOU BLAH BLAH BLAH" and Sephiroth just going, "ffff whatever, man, you're just going to be my slave once I'm the God of this world" like the good old days, but I doubt Square-Enix is going to do that unless they remake FFVII.

(And if they ever remake FFVII--they can't do it now, because they don't have the time in between game projects and it'd be an extensive project, but there's still rumors floating around--they ought to replay the entire game themselves and stay true to the canon as much as possible. Because I will be pissed if they make any drastic changes.)