Voice actress Hellena Taylor, known for playing Bayonetta, has taken to Twitter to dispute a claim made by PlatinumGames. Earlier this month, it was revealed that the role of Bayonetta had been recast, and that Jennifer Hale would be taking over for Hellena Taylor, because of scheduling conflicts making it difficult to reprise the role, at least according to PlatinumGames. However, shortly after that announcement, Taylor posted a series of video messages on Twitter, explaining that the decision had nothing to do with any difficulties in regard to timing or scheduling, and instead was due to the fact that Platinum offered only $4,000 for her to voice act the entire game. She then asked for Bayonetta fans to boycott the game, and instead take the money they would have spent purchasing the game, and donate it to a charity.

I understand that boycotting this game is a personal choice and there are those that won’t, and that’s fine. But, if you are someone who cares about people, who cares about the world around you, who cares about who gets hurt with these financial decisions, then I urge you to boycott this game.

Taylor says she only wanted a livable wage for her performance and fair payment for the time and effort that voicing the protagonist of a video game franchise that has sold over $450 million dollars. PlatinumGames had made Taylor reaudition for the role of Bayonetta, because "sometimes voices change with time", but she was once more chosen to voice the title character in Bayonetta 3. After she was given the part, though, she was given "an insulting offer" by the company. This prompted Taylor to send a letter to the director of Bayonetta 3, Hideki Kamiya, who sent her back a "final offer" of $4,000 to voice all the lines in the game.

Friends, Worldlings, Bayonutters. Hear ye!#PlatinumGames #Nintendo #Bayonetta #Bayonetta3 #Bayonutters #Boycott #NintendoEurope #NintendoAmerica #NintendoJapan pic.twitter.com/h9lwiX2bBt

— Hellena Taylor (@hellenataylor) October 15, 2022

She also spoke about Jennifer Hale, who will be the voice of Bayonetta in the upcoming game, and that she wishes her well, but that she also believes that Hale "has no right to say she is Bayonetta". Taylor mentioned that speaking up about this was a breach of her non-disclosure agreement, but that she has nothing of monetary value to be taken, so she decided to speak up.

Hideki Kamiya responded to the claims with a chain of various Tweets, and a wave of blocking people who Tweeted at him--something he is known to do--to the point that it got him temporarily restricted on the platform. His main reply to Taylor was, "Sad and deplorable about the attitude of untruth. That's what all I can tell now. By the way, BEWARE OF MY RULES", and while the latter half of the message sounds like a threat, it is moreso likely referring to Kamiya's tendency to block Twitter users for breaking his "rules".

People online were upset by this, and some even were blaming Jennifer Hale for taking the role at all. Hale has not yet made any comment on the matter, though she has notably liked numerous Tweets that claim she can't speak on the matter due to NDAs, or that she was unaware of the drama in the first place when she was cast. Other voice actors in the video game industry offered their input, such as Sean Chiplock, who said the $4000 appeared to be "union rate", and that he was paid "approx 2,000-3,000" for his work voicing Revali, Teba, and the Great Deku Tree in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Meanwhile, he says his two offscreen lines in the film Detective Pikachu earned him more money than his work on BOTW, and that even voicing characters in the indie game Freedom Planet was worth more than the voicing roles in BOTW, because unlike video game voice acting work, he was given sales royalties from the role.

 

[nhamokid]

I never played Bayonetta so I don’t know if the voice has importance. There are very few characters I have attachments that I would notice if the voice changed. All the rest, I don’t really care, most of the time I fast-skip dialogues and just read subtitles.

Calling for boycott and hostaging my morals are so low. Of course, the Cancel Culture Cult will back this.

 

[sarkwalvein]

Won't boycott shit. Kthxbye.

PS: fuck cancer culture.

 

[CMDreamer]

I believe people here are becoming less intelligent.

Voice acting is not only the sessions she makes for the game. It's the trailers that will appear later, with dialogue that she won't re-record, as it will be spliced from past sessions.

It's the possibility of the game being released in future platforms, remastered/remade and using the same audio bites.

Damn, people, she knows how the industry rolls, and wants to be compensated while protecting the work done for the future.

This isn't something new, and the Bayonetta team should be smarter and make a different kind of contract, where she could have been more part of promos, adverts and be a state for the character, like some said, correctly as what happens with Michael Ironside.

I feel people in HR in artistic mediums are retarded. With social media, we know in a second who voices the characters and from their on, they become ingrained in our minds and are hard to dissossiate.

Very poor management, I'd say. It would be preferred they coming up and state that they wanted a new voice and move on, instead of asking the original voice to audit for the part she done previously multiple times.

I'll boycott the game. Like the two before.

Even if her voice appears on the many remakes that might come afterwards, she has already been payed for her work, or else, she would've had wanted to boycott the previosly released games too. Unless their contract specifies that she will receive payment for whatever happens to the franchise after its original release, she can't argue that she wasn't payed properly. She's trying to boycott the game because legally she can't do anything.

Whatever happens to the franchise after she does her job and gets paid for it, it's not of her concern as she doesn't hold the right for the IP. Just for her voice acting, which, again, got paid for.

And no, people are not less intelligent here, but more free minded and more crucial about what they support and/or agree with.

They don't just take blind steps because they were told to.

 

[MagnesG]

I'm not going to watch all her videos again but iirc she said she had to train for 7 months? That's a hell of a lot more work than the 4 hours of actual recording time people here are claiming. Also someone in the twitter replies did the maths and it works out to something like 70 copies of the game. The game will sell millions of copies but they can only afford to give her the money from 70 copies? I agree with Linuxares

Nah, the woman who created Bayonetta did all the designs, even mentioning about how her voice would sound like. She's easily replacecable. The 3d modelers, animators, sound engineers did much more work than her 16 hours studio sessions.

It's not like they got her in mocap (other people's work too) and did the works for months, it's just a couple of days' work. Why should we be concerned about her training when she can't even get other roles by herself?

 

[UltraDolphinRevolution]

I´d do it for 800$. Done voice work before. I don´t have twitter. Someone contact the Japanese boss for me pls.

 

[linuxares]

I´d do it for 800$. Done voice work before. I don´t have twitter. Someone contact the Japanese boss for me pls.

You aren't a british woman I guess?

 

[elpapadelospollitos]

I´d do it for 800$. Done voice work before. I don´t have twitter. Someone contact the Japanese boss for me pls.

Don't lie, you'll do it for free

 

[Deleted member 586536]

It's kinda gross to see how many people don't seem to understand WHY this is a problem.
4k is not enough period. She does contract/sub-contracted work. She has to pay and handle taxes. Along with that, VA's don't have stable jobs. Once their thing is up, they're looking for the next thing. And it was 4k for THE ENTIRE GAME. Not 1k per session or something like that.
People also don't seem to understand how strenuous voice acting is. Most Unions when possible (if it is unionized work) intentionally cap it at 4 hours so the VA doen't destroy their voice. 2 hours if it's recording screaming voice clips.

My guess is that they wanted to cheap out on the VA cost. pitched low. And when talyor dropped. they were confident they could find a replacement.
And then they struggled to do so with the incredibly low pay, breaking said confidence. Hale comes in, the managers realize that it may be their last shot after frying the bridge with taylor and all previous runner ups. And either Talyor vouched for a better price. Or, the managers raised the rate they were willing to pay as deadlines crept up.

edit:
Also too, Hale would have no idea what's going on. She had no idea as to why the role was open given by her likes on twitter.
Edit 2: for clairty, it's per session. so 4 hours of work per session. and your usually paid per session if it's unionized work.

 

[UltraDolphinRevolution]

Don't lie, you'll do it for free

I honestly would not. As Nothereed has stated, voice work is tough, man. I have to go easy on my vocal cords trying to mimic a woman for hours. No comparison to hauling bricks in construction during a 36°C summer day. I mean those construction workers get a work out for free while we normal folk have to pay gym fees. In addition, they get a nice tan. And due to discrimination, there are almost no female construction workers. Believe women. Things need to change. We need to speak up!

 

[wartutor]

So i refused to do the job for the money. Someone else does it. I throw a huge temper tamtrum and break a non disclosure and call on the toxic culture that is cancel culture. Now im never going to get another job again and probably get sued for breaking a contract. I hope this bitch never gets another job in Voice Acting again and ends up flipping burgers at Mc. Donalds.

It's kinda gross to see how many people don't seem to understand WHY this is a problem.
4k is not enough period. She does contract/sub-contracted work. She has to pay and handle taxes. Along with that, VA's don't have stable jobs. Once their thing is up, they're looking for the next thing. And it was 4k for THE ENTIRE GAME. Not 1k per session or something like that.
People also don't seem to understand how strenuous voice acting is. Most Unions when possible (if it is unionized work) intentionally cap it at 4 hours so the VA doen't destroy their voice. 2 hours if it's recording screaming voice clips.

My guess is that they wanted to cheap out on the VA cost. pitched low. And when talyor dropped. they were confident they could find a replacement.
And then they struggled to do so with the incredibly low pay, breaking said confidence. Hale comes in, the managers realize that it may be their last shot after frying the bridge with taylor and all previous runner ups. And either Talyor vouched for a better price. Or, the managers raised the rate they were willing to pay as deadlines crept up.

edit:
Also too, Hale would have no idea what's going on. She had no idea as to why the role was open given by her likes on twitter.

So they have to pay her more so she can sit around until the next "gig". How about a job to help pay for shit during hour down time. Bitch dont deserve shit

 

[DJPlace]

no wonder video games are getting less dubs cause of asshole's like her... (stares at the old voice actress of norie from neptunia series)

 

[DarknessPlay3r]

I believe people here are becoming less intelligent.

Voice acting is not only the sessions she makes for the game. It's the trailers that will appear later, with dialogue that she won't re-record, as it will be spliced from past sessions.

It's the possibility of the game being released in future platforms, remastered/remade and using the same audio bites.

Damn, people, she knows how the industry rolls, and wants to be compensated while protecting the work done for the future.

This isn't something new, and the Bayonetta team should be smarter and make a different kind of contract, where she could have been more part of promos, adverts and be a state for the character, like some said, correctly as what happens with Michael Ironside.

I feel people in HR in artistic mediums are retarded. With social media, we know in a second who voices the characters and from their on, they become ingrained in our minds and are hard to dissossiate.

Very poor management, I'd say. It would be preferred they coming up and state that they wanted a new voice and move on, instead of asking the original voice to audit for the part she done previously multiple times.

I'll boycott the game. Like the two before.

Incredible, I agree with this and it's really sad to see.

It's one thing to be offered that for a brand new IP that has no track record of sales or brand recognition of any kind. However I INSTANTLY though of Futurama and Joe DiMaggio saying fuck no to the same *kind* of situation as this.

I put apart of the quote in bold because this is what it all comes down too. This is the 3rd main entry in this franchise, she is experienced in the role at this point, and with who she is working with. Yet she shouldn't be paid a penny more than if she was doing this for the first time?

I'd LOVE to know how many of you after putting in time at your job and be 100% ok with being paid the same amount at someone else who just started, and then have your employer say: we don't have to give you any kind of raise as we can just pay this other person a starting wage to do it instead. Doesn't mean anything that for the past length of time YOU were the one helping the business make more money as things you took part of became successful.

I doubt one person here would be ok with that.

We have ZERO information on just how much more was more. Clearly it was typically corporate bullshit of fuck and exploit the *normal* workers that are like most of us.

The fact a large percent of the comments are against the core principal of what this is about is fucking incredible. This thread should be filled with comments asking for more information because this kind of shit is why unions became a thing in the first place, and why the "gig" economy badly needs something like it to protect the working class, like 90% of the users here are.

Seriously, this is why GBATemp does so well because it caters to working class people like us, and helps us fight back against getting fucked and exploited by these companies as their consumers.

God forbid anyone get paid more than the minimum possible, unless it's you and you alone? Then fuck them right?

 

[Deleted member 586536]

I honestly would not. As Nothereed has stated, voice work is tough, man. I have to go easy on my vocal cords trying to mimic a woman for hours. No comparison to hauling bricks in construction during a 36°C summer day.

Based on your thinking
You believe:
Artists are dumb because they sit in all day
mathematicians are dumb because they lift pencil or chalk waaah
Book writers, pfft, they sit in all day, can't be that hard
Scientists don't do anything, especially chemistry scientists they just sit in all day.
Man none of them are doing burly work like a manly man.
Is that your argument? Because if so it's absolutely stupid one at that.

 

[LainaGabranth]

I'm probably going to have a take a bit controversial among the pro-union (read: based and economically literate) crowd here so lemme preface by saying that all voice actors (and all workers frankly) should be unionized. Now, all of that said, I have to confess I'm really hesitant to just take her word at this because the whole ordeal is "he said, she said" shit all over again. I'd like to wait for further info but I'll be holding off my purchase until I know what really happened, if ever.

 

[whitesword7]

anyone who just blindly listen to an angry lady like this is a sheep. sorry but I’ll never do any boycotting when buying games.

Hope she got sued to oblivion, at this point her career is basically over, who would want to hire a loose cannon like her that can easily broke NDA?

 

[Noctosphere]

Guess I'll "acquire" it in a way that'll displease that video game company

 

[UltraDolphinRevolution]

Based on your thinking
You believe:
Artists are dumb because they sit in all day
mathematicians are dumb because they lift pencil or chalk waaah
Book writers, pfft, they sit in all day, can't be that hard
Scientists don't do anything, especially chemistry scientists they just sit in all day.
Man none of them are doing burly work like a manly man.
Is that your argument? Because if so it's absolutely stupid one at that.

No, that is not my point. She thought she was irreplaceable. Turns out she was wrong. Now she is crying about it.
You brought up the "it is hard work" argument. I just ridiculed it. I have done both labor-intensive work and things like voice work. No comparison.

People don´t get paid based on how hard something is. It´s a question of supply and demand.

 

[Noctosphere]

No, that is not my point. She thought she was irreplaceable. Turns out she was wrong. Now she is crying about it.
You brought up the "it is hard work" argument. I just ridiculed it. I have done both labor-intensive work and things like voice work. No comparison.

People don´t get paid based on how hard something is. It´s a question of supply and demand.

so in your opinion, all voice actor of a main character should be paid 4k$ for a whole video game?

 

[Deleted member 586536]

People don´t get paid based on how hard something is. It´s a question of supply and demand.

That's false since no fucking person on this planet except executives and managers go "I like creating advertisements"
And that's extremely lucrative.

Post automatically merged: Oct 17, 2022

You brought up the "it is hard work" argument. I just ridiculed it.

And I'm ridiculing your "it's not that hard, it's not physically strenuous and not engaging every muscle in my body" argument, since it's obviously stupid. A task doesn't have to be physically strenuous involving every muscle to be hard work. Otherwise again, by your own logic, programming wouldn't count as "hard work" and we both know that's also just as as stupid and false.

 

[ZER-O]

Kamiya got blocked from Twitter

Spoiler

what threats? no more Sequels? Hold The Game Hostage?, he doesnt like Fans at all
and yes, this is more then just money involved, there must be somethng else and Kamiya is withholding his cards

this is ironic coming from a man telling people on Twitter to fuck off and calling them brainless insects because they tried to communicate in Eenglish Language
the most logical reason behind her soft firing is to replcace her with a younger Voice Actress