Why Games Don't Have More Duel Audio?

[wicked ryoko]

I think that more games should have the option of being able to play it in english, and still listen to the japanese voice acting.  I know they can do it, they did it in the original .hack games.

I have nothing really against dubs, though some voices in games I hate, I like hearing stuff in it's original language.  Kinda like I was hoping they'd do with Final Fantasy IV DS.  Asside from a few voices, I just didn't like the overall voice acting.  The game's great though, so I'll keep playing.

[Seejay]

Final Fantasy IV DS has been undubbed. I can't seem to find a link to the patch though. There are a few torrent's with the cracked rom around though. You'll need a DS backup cartridge of sorts. It should be legal, providing you own an original copy of the game. It really depends on what country you live in though.

[Rmarques]

I think that more games should have the option of being able to play it in english, and still listen to the japanese voice acting.  I know they can do it, they did it in the original .hack games.

1- It requires more space on the disk, which may not be available.

2- It's a feature that only a very small (yet extremely vocal) segment of the audience wants, and many publishers may think that it's not worth it.

[Cless]

Space constraints aside, I've also heard that apparently they have to pay extra to license the Japanese track. Something about the voice actors having to be paid again. Not sure of the details on that.

Anyways, I love the VA that I've heard in FF4 DS. What I've heard sounded completely flawless, but I haven't gotten to the one voice everyone seems to hate with a vengeance (Cid)...

[Rmarques]

Space constraints aside, I've also heard that apparently they have to pay extra to license the Japanese track. Something about the voice actors having to be paid again. Not sure of the details on that.

Actually I think you're right. I know that's the case with animation at least, shouldn't be too different for games.

[Kajitani-Eizan]

space on the disc and paying licensing fees (probably expensive, since japanese VAs are supposedly so much more respected/well-paid!) would be it.

[Craymel]

I'd also like more dual audio tracks for games. I wish all games that are brought over from other countries did this.

[wicked ryoko]

space on the disc and paying licensing fees (probably expensive, since japanese VAs are supposedly so much more respected/well-paid!) would be it.

Actually, from what I've read, japanese voice actors don't get paid as well as you might think.

http://www.riuva.com/?p=111

[Rmarques]

Actually, from what I've read, japanese voice actors don't get paid as well as you might think.

http://www.riuva.com/?p=111

It largely depends on the voice actor. However, the licensing fees can still be pretty expensive, especially since there's no set price for these things.

[Kajitani-Eizan]

ah. well, that settles that. so basically, licensing fees would be expensive (irrelevant?) because the japanese companies are being idiots.

space on the disc is likely the biggest reason, then.

[Carnivol]

I can probably give 3 reasons for this, two of which have already been mentioned

A: Licensing
-The costs of licensing additional Audio might be too high.
-The original voice acting license is not valid for international use.

Solution:
-Original audio should've been licensed for international use from the start.

B: Space
-The storage medium does not house enough available space to store multiple audio tracks.

Solution:
-Find a compression/technical work around. Many Xbox 360 games so far, using Dual Layer DVD format, have had more audio languages (or audio dialog in general) than you can shake a stick at. Also, there's no shame in using multiple discs, if absolutely necessary. Anyone who dares to disagree with that can just shut up as they obviously haven't been around for long or should be spending their time getting in shape, as they obviously are so out of shape that they can't stand the thought of maybe once during a period of 10 hours+ of gameplay to get off their ass in order to swap disc.


C: Translations
-In many cases, the translated scripts for games often contain lots of editing in order to more appropriately convey a message in the target language, making the localized assets not synchronize very well with the original Audio.

Solution:
-In a perfect world, a game would contain both a set of "localization" subtitles and a set of "original audio" subtitles. Somewhat like how you find dubtitles and subtitles on DVDs.
-Drop the dub, which is not exactly a desirable thing to do when selling a product in one of those countries where the majority for some reason hate every single language that is not their own.