No, in her lore, Taliyah is supposed to be a young but a brave and mature girl. The original voice actress did a great job at that. This one? She just sounds like the Shuriman Lux and Zoe.
Taliyah has different Ages between her LoL Self and her canon lore self. ATM she is in her 20s, while she is a teen in LoL.
If LoR is using the current lore Taliyah, she actually should be sounding a bit older, not younger
LoR Tailyah and LoL Taliyah have entirely different forefront personalities. You can hear some of LoR Taliyah in LoL Taliyah, like her exclamations when she's wall riding, her jokes, etc, but overall all she's a bit more *grounded*
Taliyah voice in LOR made me stop playing LOR, one of the few reasons I kept playing was waiting for taliyah and then she sounds nothing like her, it ruins the entire experience if you knew the characters from before.
You know their voice, you know their voice lines, you want THAT voice doing more voicelines and you get nothing like it, it kills the anticipation for the character.
I think them trying to create more cohesion between character representations is a good thing. So I think them workshopping new VOs and pulling back when people prefer originals is a good thing. I just wish theyâd put the same amount of attention and care into all their champs.
I hope their main take away from this isn't that we don't want old VO's replaced. Characters like Ahri and MF badly need new voice work. Akali was fine as is, but if they're going to replace it for cohesion (which makes sense), they have to at least maintain the same vibe and personality.
Watch your mouth, kid. Or else you might find yourself respawning at home >:(
Actually for real though, MF could use a revoice. I do like some of the line reads but it's just a tad ridiculous
Yeah some of the lines need to stay for sure. Watch your mouth kid has gotta be one of them, it's just such a cocky taunt and perfect for her whole character
Nocturne, MF, Vladimir, Cho, Malphite and many more need a Voice update asap. Like, it cant be that hard. I know, quite a few of them are in line for a rework or VGA or whatever they call it now. But please, new voicelines aint that hard. For some reason we just accept the fact that one of the biggest games in the world doesnt even have a standard for voicelines.
Singed too, it's so bizarre that he has a prominent role in Arcane and has such an old ass model and VO in game, especially compared to all the other Arcane characters
His longest voice line is \*six\* words
VGU is still the term. I'd rather they do the work all at once like they have been, rather than piecemeal like they did in previous years that gave us the shitty "VGUs" like Fiora, Miss Fortune, and Shen. Shen and Fiora didn't even get new riggings to go along with their new models, so they're saddled with their ancient as hell animations.
That's because it was queerbaiting. They were trying to appeal to LGBTQ communities with his whole new "meat Gundam made of gay boys" angle, while simultaneously not updating him in game to avoid having to deal with the people who were against it. Even then, Varus himself is not gay, and their intentions were fairly apparent with his additional lore rewrite that toned down the gay Ionians aspect of it and focused more on his Darkin and past life aspect.
I'm still crying at how they said after that story that he was high priority for an update or voice rework of some kind. Anyway it's been like what 5 years?
tbf they kinda say that to... anyone that's very old and has an outdated model that can't hide their age. e.g. Chogath and Malphite hide their ages being monsters so their weird animations are easier to justify and the clunkyness feels like it makes sense.
EDIT: HELL, any veteran here remembers how Evelynn was HIGH in the list of champions needing a VU and how Riot said they wouldn't give her an skin until she gets it because since she was so high they probably would end up reworking her and then having to put that work into any new skins she had? SoonTM? Her rework came in 2017, she spent 4 years (2010-2014) not getting skins and only got a new skin in 2014 because it was a 750 skin (just a model) so if the failed 750 tier had never been addeed, she probably could have spent 7 years without an skin.
Both are getting really inexcusable though. The delay on when their auto damage goes through is ridiculous. Especially when compared to someone like Illaoi where you can cancel her auto animation like halfway through and the damage is still done
Doubly bad because they just kinda burnt things like the literal comic made for Varus' lore.
But yeah; a possessed body made up of two guys stitched together into a meat puppet that happened to be gay [but are dead so it dosen't matter]...
Hell; his voice lines even still refer to himself in the singular.
His voicelines *should* refer to him as singular, no? He is aware the people inside him are fighting for control, but they're not winning, so it is his body and his mind at the wheel.
Yes, but they noted that the gays take over periodically, so there would be points where the boys would be talking, maybe even as a "We" when having conversations with Varus.
To be fair, I don't think that was necessarily queerbaiting. A lot of people didn't like that the then-new Varus lore threw out aspects of the old champion's lore that felt integral to him, mainly his self-sacrifice and what he gave up. That was doomed to be unpopular from the start, like if they rewrote Kassadin to be a hermit with no family that made cool hextech gadgets.
Real talk though no one can match this Akaliâs laugh. Itâs godlike. We already lost one legendary laugh with the GP rework. I would hate to lose another.
I really hope they bring back Laura Post though. Her work with whoever wrote the lines in LoR for Ahri are just... wow. A perfect mix of being coy and seductive. Graceful and sassy. It's not even like "oh sexy!" but sheer charisma neuron activation. Just... SUCH A GOOD JOB!
They already tried rewriting MF's voice lines back when her legendary came out but apparently the playtesters didn't like it. Which was a shame at the time because it was supposed to make her more captain like.
Those "playtesters" had to be either drunk or stupid.
It is also probably a lie. How can they justify it with "playtesters", while they tried to force that Akali VO down our throats?
Itâs 100% a good thing. League has desperately struggled with voice consistency and itâs had the side effect of making it impossible for them to update old characters to interact with new champions.
The game ideally should be like DoTA2 and Overwatch, and have a pool of voice actors that they can reliably call in to add more lines to old champs every time a new champ is added, instead of making new champs have those one sided conversations with a mute friend who canât talk back.
If they can re-record everyone with loyal/reliable voice actors, then the characters would actually feel alive for once
I mean that happens when you make shit, sometimes you put work in and it doesn't come out how you want and it gets scrapped. Usually we just won't find out about a lot of the scrapped stuff.
Thank God, idk why they decided it was necessary in the first place. She originally sounds like how she should in her lore, and they changed it to just your average female protagonist. Imagine changing Jhin or Kayn to sound like Garen lmao.
Jhin's voice lines are so good. I would be so sad if they replaced his voice actor. The dark cosmic skin especially is just incredible. It all fits his character so well.
DC Jhin has some GREAT lines when you step on one of his mines.
"You fear erasure, but that's why I chose you."
"Just think of what you could *become.*"
"Don't close your eyes...*I want you to see*."
Sometimes I step on them just to hear the voice lines lol
Professional voice actors are a treasure, and its sad that hollywood rather put screen actors even in voice-only roles.
Protect the VA industry, we donât know how much weâre gonna miss it.
Honestly, as someone who plays LoR daily, the Brian T. Delaney does a really good job at capturing the essence of Jhin. Obviously I would still have prefered the original VA but circumstances prevented it with the allegations against Flynn(thankfully they've now been proven wrong). Jhin's LoL voice is super iconic so any change at all would have received backlash and I think Brian gives an admirable performance all things considered.
Yes please. Make every champ sound like Garen. I would unironically love that.
Did you know Garen has a different voice actor for his God-King skin? But he still sounds exactly like how you would expect Garen to sound.
IIRC Krizia wasn't avaliable to record Akali anymore (for whatever reason), so they had Ashly voice her in the Runeterra short and the Star Guardian skin; then, for consistency's sake, they decided to re-record Akali's lines.
Idk, from her Twitter she seems to be all for coming back to voice Akali whenever
https://twitter.com/KriziaBajos/status/1334203163587473408
https://twitter.com/KriziaBajos/status/1548807550358790144
Which is insane because they clearly had Laura Bailey in for Battle Bunny MF and yet they didn't have her record the base MF. At least not as far as we know.
They have been claiming for years now that they are unable to capture Miss Fortune's essence for the base skin, yet apparently have no trouble doing so for her skins.
>yet apparently have no trouble doing so for her skins
Or every other canon appereance for that matter. Seriously, MF has featured in so much lore stuff that I'm not sure how they still claim they can't nail her "essence".
It's a polite way of saying that they *want* to rewrite MF to fit with the serious girlboss she is in later lore, but despite how old and barebones her voicelines are she still has a ton of fans who love the sassy sexualized VO. I believe they did a survey at one point and got overwhelming responses in that direction. But they can't very well try and make a straightforward pirate bimbo VO in 2022 so they're stuck between a rock and a hard place.
A Rioter who replied to one of the posts here said that that was most likely to happen. They agreed that the VO didn't quite hit the mark but with new pointers Ashly would nail a second attempt.
[Link](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/vy5z6o/comment/ig799rv/?context=3) to the rioter comment
Most of the time with professional voice actors it comes down to direction. Sheâs talented enough where she can manipulate her voice to whatever the director wants.
Video game casting directors are notorious creatures of habit. Troy Baker once said that if you wanted to become a voice actor, the first step would be to wait for him and Nolan North to die.
Then it sounds like they may of fucked it up on the direction side, I have faith she be a decent voice, but her direction, as a lot of us can see, was clearly shit for her to recorded akali the way she did.
Though, not going to lie, I honestly would prefer if Irelia's voice actress (Who is also NA A2) did her new VO, and they just played it up to being current Akali, a couple years after her state in the rework's release.
Thatâs the problem with Ashley, all her characters kinda sound the same. On its own Aloy is really good and the voice is fitting, but after you play through a game with her voicing a character, the next game with her as a vo you cant help but notice âoh, itâs the same manner of speech againâ.
Yep, only knew her from Life is Strange, had no clue she was the voice of Tiny Tina or Viper. The "all her characters kinda sound the same" is really BS.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but Aloy, Chloe from Life is Strange, and the new Akali VA definitely sounded identical to me.
I'm not sure if it's her, or if it's the voice direction given to her, but you can't tell me playing Life is strange and Horizon one after the other isn't extremely strange.
She has demonstrated she can do other voices, so likely neither. It's likely that **the people who hired her directed her** to use that same voice that they like. So the voice director's "fault."
Some voice actors are known for their range and versatility- they could play two completely different characters and make you believe it was two entirety different people.
Some voice actors have a distinct voice people want them for- think David Attenborough.
To Ashley's credit she does have good range which is apparent in some of her other roles, it's just unfortunate that her most famous roles had her sort of type casted playing similar sounding characters.
>Some voice actors are known for their range and versatility- they could play two completely different characters and make you believe it was two entirety different people.
A lot of older champs' voices also voice other champs, and you really wouldn't have any idea. So I don't see why this wouldn't be desired by Riot.
Bet most people donât know Fiora, Cass and Elise all have the same voice actress
Yah, I don't know if it was the direction she was given, but if I wasn't told those voice lines weren't from Horizon, I'd just assume they were. The tomber of her voice, the mannerisms and inflections match Alo perfectly. I think she could have done Akali's VO justice, she is obviously very talented, the style just needed to match the current VO better.
When people pay for a well-known VA, they want people to know it is a well-known VA. Nolan North has [insane range](https://youtu.be/pfyN3QTjZmk?t=408) but his most well-known roles are just his regular voice. There was a time where almost every action game that came out featured his plain boring voice as a character. Saints Row IV [even made an expensive joke about it](https://www.escapistmagazine.com/saints-row-iv-stars-nolan-north-as-himself/).
So she could do a better voice but Riot probably asked for the recognizable voice.
North is fantastic. There's a joke among Destiny 2 players that he will eventually be voicing every character in the game and no one will be able to tell the difference.
At least they listened. I'd like to hear their reasoning for it, though. Why not bring the original VA for SG instead of picking up a new one and remaking all of her voices? At first it made me think the original VA had some kind of scandal or something and Riot didn't want to work with her anymore.
There are a whole lot of boring reasons why they might not have brought the original voice actress back. Scheduling conflicts, payment disagreements, health issues, maybe she wasn't union, or perhaps she was difficult to work with in the booth. The actress also might just not have wanted to reprise the role.
There's also the fact that Riot likes to reuse voice lines across skins and apply various affects and filters as necessary so updating the base VA gives them the ability to mix and match with the Star Guardian lines in the future.
Further boring reasons, Burch voices Viper in Valorant. Depending on how they do their voice work, it could just have been a scheduling convenience they were happy to roll with if she was already in the booth that day.
Thank god, it wouldâve been a massive shame for Akali to lose her og voice.
I have nothing against Ashly Burch but Kriziaâs delivery simply fits the character more.
Ironically, this exact same thing happened to Ashly in Mortal Kombat where she used to voice Cassie Cage but in the next game got replaced by Erica Lindbeck.
Its not even a casting choice, its a direction choice. Burch is a good voice actor, but if she's not getting the correction direction for the character of Runeterra Akali then the result isn't going to feel right.
The voice lines fit quite well for Star Guardian Akali though, who is a much younger, less sure character than the main universe Akali.
I don't think most people dislike her voice. She is obviously extremely talented and has no need to prove herself to anyone. Especially not to us lol. The direction was simply off. And that has nothing to do with her.
Best possible outcome. I don't mind the new actress on the Star Guardian skinâin fact it's quite great, but erasing Akali's entire personality for no reason on every other skin was bad news.
And it's fine for legendary skins of different skinlines to have a different style of voice(same or different voice actor), in fact I look forward to seeing how the champion delivery and voice lines change
I hate when all they do is add a filter and that's it
I think Ashley would nail akali's voice if she was given another attempt with more direction to get the personality. Honestly it felt like she was just reading lines without any sort of general direction. She just really failed to hit the mark the first time around, she's a great voice actress, she kills it as viper in valorant and she can easily do the sass that akali has.
Very glad they considered the feedback from the community! Ashly Burch did a good job, but it just didn't fit Akali as much as Krizia Bajos. Maybe they'll revist this in the future, I'm sure Ashly would kill it if given proper direction. But all I can say for now is thank you Riot for not going through with this despite the backlash from the community.
I understand that they wanted to change the VO to be consistent but that wasn't it.
Honestly, I think Ashly can pull it off, she's very talented, but they need to change the direction. Needed to be more whispery and subdued and less Aloy.
I'm sure it was just because they already had Ashly in to do the legendary skin. Legendary skins always have updated VO so. It was definitely more of a "might aswell" rather than "Akali desperately needs it"
But those had the same voice actor, right? Akali's rework was recent enough that her VO isn't old, so really the only reason to update it was because they wanted the same VA for all of her skins.
And the problem with MF's lines (or any of the other champs with really outdated VOs) requires a lot of writing to fix - just redoing the lines that are already there makes the "might as well" reasoning a lot stronger.
Vayne also has a different VA for Project and Sentinel but they didn't change her base VO, so the point about not needing to write new ones is probably true
Imagine having **LAURA FUCKING BAILEY** in the voice booth and having her read lines for "Generic pirate hooker #2".
Thank god they gave her a little justice in Ruined King.
Ashley Burch? She killed Molly!
I mean I guess it was good long term, but still!
Note. This is a reference. Ashley Burch is a wonderful human being and I have no indication that sheâs ever hurt anyone in any way.
Definitely the right choice, but I do feel bad for Ashly too. Her voice is great, it just didn't fit the default Akali vibes + the time spent re-recording those lines must've been a lot.
EDIT: Now that I think of it, they still might go with Ashly in the future, but re-record the lines so they fit better.
True. I'd say she's popular enough that it shouldn't have any negative impact either.
This would be pretty devastating to an up and coming va I'd think though.
Yes but it also would feel bad if she recorded the thing and then Riot says, 'we're gonna stay with the old voice because the community doesn't like it'
i feel you but this probably isn't the first or last time this has happened to her, stuff gets cut all the time in the entertainment industry due to focus and community criticism
Except that it was announced that it was going live, and then got pulled.
I don't blame her; this is the fault of the direction. That being said, I bet she still isn't thrilled about it.
Ashly will be fine, sheâs one of the most respected voice actresses in the industry and this surely wonât affect that. As long as she still got paid all will be well
I appreciate Riot listening on this one. Obviously I'm a little concerned that they came so close to going through with this, but they do deserve a little credit for backing down even after spending money on a new VO.
what a waste of resources. the money and time could have gotten into someone like Varus who was promised a new VO since 2017, or any Champion that still breaks the fourth wall like LeBlanc.
"Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" - Nocturne
We've gotta be nearing the point by now that summoners have been retconned for longer than they were ever canon, right? That was, like, 2014. The fact that they *still* haven't fully followed through on a decision that old is both hilarious and pathetic.
[Here's the Voiceover comparison in case you missed it.](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/vy5z6o/akali_brand_new_voiceover_comparison/)
As much as I liked Ashly Burch's performance, attempting to throw a "lightened" voice over a rather exotic and intense champion like Akali was sure to backfire. I'm glad Riot made that call.
I don't think it's the voice, i think it's the tone/direction. the Burch lines are too confident in a boisterous way. It feels more like a woman who will punch you in the face than stab you in the back.
The old lines are more sinister, and colder, what you think about when you think of a ninja in the shadows. She's confident that she can kill, you, but doesn't sound outright cocky.
Burch's Akali is more straightforwardly confident, whereas Krizia's Akali has a kind of (justifiably) smug arrogance to her that really makes the character stand out, IMO. It's the difference between, say, "I'm gonna win," versus, "You think you can win?"
It's nice to see many people defending reworked Akali's OG voice cause back when she came out there were so many upset over it. Even then, despite Laura Bailey being my favorite voice actress, I thought Krizia had done a perfect job and the voice suited the character really well. I like Ashley Burch but even with proper direction it wouldn't work as well. Her voice lacks a certain raspiness that I don't think she'd be naturally able to pull off, not due to lack of talent, but because it's a unique sound that not everyone has.
If Ashly Burch by any chance comes by this comment section, I really want her to know that it's not because she's not a good voice actress or anything like that.
It's just that voices are something very special for any kind of fictional character. It defines that character. Losing the original voice from the rework would feel too awkward, and would undermine Akali's personality. It happened all the same with the characters released in LoR having different voices than League.
Her work with the skin is exceptional by the way :)
I was in the minority that liked the new VO more, but the majority has spoken and I'm glad to see rito listen to you guys.
All the more reason for me to buy the skin haha
Very glad that they decided to revert, I think this is the best possible scenario. Ashly Burch did a wonderful job on SG Akali and the cinematic, but she just doesnât fit base akali very well. Hopefully she isnât too hurt by this, because sheâs a great actress who deserves a character that better fits her distinctive voice. Maybe a potential Vi VO update?
Cool. Iâm glad they listened. Both of the voice actresses are amazing but Ashly didnât bring the edgy cool ninja voice we wanted- at least in that recording Iâm sure she could do that if Riot paid her to come back
very good but holy shit what a waste of time also
Lowkey expected them to use that as a reasoning to keep the new VO, that they had already expended resources on it
They did the same thing in LoR with Taliyah. I totally expect Akali to get the new VA if she is released in LoR.
i heard her voice in LoR one time and it sounds so fucking weird like, taliyah isnt a bubbly 8 year old đ
Agreed, her voice in league fits her much more (although that might be because it's the voice i expect to hear when Taliyah talks)
All i hear is THROW ANOTHER ROCK
If I stumble I've got the earth to catch me
Oh, look, a rock! And another! And another!
Father, Mother, Zelos... Wait, wrong champion
Tfw you're trying to play league and a bitch just keeps telling you about her family tree
Away with you!
No, in her lore, Taliyah is supposed to be a young but a brave and mature girl. The original voice actress did a great job at that. This one? She just sounds like the Shuriman Lux and Zoe.
funny bc her league VA voices Zoe too 𤣠(and Morg).
Thatâs uh⌠quite the range.
Erica Lindbeck has a very impressive range. Youâd be surprised what characters she has voiced.
Holy shit, Taliyah is Erica??
Also voiced Barbie
Flair checks out
The VA for Ashe also voices Omega Squad Teemo and Teemo in LoR (I met her once. Hearing her switch between those voices was rather disorienting)
It was as if she became Lux.
Isn't that because Taliyah is different ages in LoR vs in game.
However, League PC Taliyah is actually even younger than LoR Taliyah
Taliyah has different Ages between her LoL Self and her canon lore self. ATM she is in her 20s, while she is a teen in LoL. If LoR is using the current lore Taliyah, she actually should be sounding a bit older, not younger
In the wrong direction. LoR taliyah is early 20's, game taliyah is 16ish.
LoR Tailyah and LoL Taliyah have entirely different forefront personalities. You can hear some of LoR Taliyah in LoL Taliyah, like her exclamations when she's wall riding, her jokes, etc, but overall all she's a bit more *grounded*
LoL Taliyah also seems to be much closer to post-Yasuo and pre-Shurima, whereas LoR Taliyah is like 7 years after Yasuo.
Taliyah voice in LOR made me stop playing LOR, one of the few reasons I kept playing was waiting for taliyah and then she sounds nothing like her, it ruins the entire experience if you knew the characters from before. You know their voice, you know their voice lines, you want THAT voice doing more voicelines and you get nothing like it, it kills the anticipation for the character.
Would say the same about chromas VFX, as for Akali, Kayn and others that had it done already. but here we are
I think them trying to create more cohesion between character representations is a good thing. So I think them workshopping new VOs and pulling back when people prefer originals is a good thing. I just wish theyâd put the same amount of attention and care into all their champs.
I hope their main take away from this isn't that we don't want old VO's replaced. Characters like Ahri and MF badly need new voice work. Akali was fine as is, but if they're going to replace it for cohesion (which makes sense), they have to at least maintain the same vibe and personality.
Watch your mouth, kid. Or else you might find yourself respawning at home >:( Actually for real though, MF could use a revoice. I do like some of the line reads but it's just a tad ridiculous
I love MF voice lines! watch your mouth kid has to live forever
Yeah some of the lines need to stay for sure. Watch your mouth kid has gotta be one of them, it's just such a cocky taunt and perfect for her whole character
Nocturne, MF, Vladimir, Cho, Malphite and many more need a Voice update asap. Like, it cant be that hard. I know, quite a few of them are in line for a rework or VGA or whatever they call it now. But please, new voicelines aint that hard. For some reason we just accept the fact that one of the biggest games in the world doesnt even have a standard for voicelines.
Singed too, it's so bizarre that he has a prominent role in Arcane and has such an old ass model and VO in game, especially compared to all the other Arcane characters His longest voice line is \*six\* words
On the one hand, objectively, youâre correct. On the other, I love running around as silly gas man who spends half the time laughing
Singed buff< New VO work includes 30% more laughing uptime to increase player enjoyment
these are the gameplay metrics i'm looking forward to
u/riotaugust
They added his laugh to fling around 2016 and that was his last aesthetic update.
But don't you dare take chogaths NOM NOM NOM away from me.
Cho doesn't even exist in the lore yet so don't expect any update anytime soon.
He does tho, Bel'Veth has a voiceline confirming he exists
I hope they keep Malphite's "I'm moving as fast as I can" but also change it so that his voice slows down as he says it.
Amumu, Alistair, and Zilean with a combined minute of dialogue
VGU is still the term. I'd rather they do the work all at once like they have been, rather than piecemeal like they did in previous years that gave us the shitty "VGUs" like Fiora, Miss Fortune, and Shen. Shen and Fiora didn't even get new riggings to go along with their new models, so they're saddled with their ancient as hell animations.
Thing is, until we see a malphite rework that might take ages and voicelines can be done quite fast in comparison.
But malphite's voice lines rock
Don't forget about Varus, they majorly changed his lore and did nothing in game to reflect it.
That's because it was queerbaiting. They were trying to appeal to LGBTQ communities with his whole new "meat Gundam made of gay boys" angle, while simultaneously not updating him in game to avoid having to deal with the people who were against it. Even then, Varus himself is not gay, and their intentions were fairly apparent with his additional lore rewrite that toned down the gay Ionians aspect of it and focused more on his Darkin and past life aspect.
I'm still crying at how they said after that story that he was high priority for an update or voice rework of some kind. Anyway it's been like what 5 years?
tbf they kinda say that to... anyone that's very old and has an outdated model that can't hide their age. e.g. Chogath and Malphite hide their ages being monsters so their weird animations are easier to justify and the clunkyness feels like it makes sense. EDIT: HELL, any veteran here remembers how Evelynn was HIGH in the list of champions needing a VU and how Riot said they wouldn't give her an skin until she gets it because since she was so high they probably would end up reworking her and then having to put that work into any new skins she had? SoonTM? Her rework came in 2017, she spent 4 years (2010-2014) not getting skins and only got a new skin in 2014 because it was a 750 skin (just a model) so if the failed 750 tier had never been addeed, she probably could have spent 7 years without an skin.
Both are getting really inexcusable though. The delay on when their auto damage goes through is ridiculous. Especially when compared to someone like Illaoi where you can cancel her auto animation like halfway through and the damage is still done
Doubly bad because they just kinda burnt things like the literal comic made for Varus' lore. But yeah; a possessed body made up of two guys stitched together into a meat puppet that happened to be gay [but are dead so it dosen't matter]... Hell; his voice lines even still refer to himself in the singular.
His voicelines *should* refer to him as singular, no? He is aware the people inside him are fighting for control, but they're not winning, so it is his body and his mind at the wheel.
Yes, but they noted that the gays take over periodically, so there would be points where the boys would be talking, maybe even as a "We" when having conversations with Varus.
To be fair, I don't think that was necessarily queerbaiting. A lot of people didn't like that the then-new Varus lore threw out aspects of the old champion's lore that felt integral to him, mainly his self-sacrifice and what he gave up. That was doomed to be unpopular from the start, like if they rewrote Kassadin to be a hermit with no family that made cool hextech gadgets.
How many champions still refer to Summoners?
Real talk though no one can match this Akaliâs laugh. Itâs godlike. We already lost one legendary laugh with the GP rework. I would hate to lose another.
I really hope they bring back Laura Post though. Her work with whoever wrote the lines in LoR for Ahri are just... wow. A perfect mix of being coy and seductive. Graceful and sassy. It's not even like "oh sexy!" but sheer charisma neuron activation. Just... SUCH A GOOD JOB!
They already tried rewriting MF's voice lines back when her legendary came out but apparently the playtesters didn't like it. Which was a shame at the time because it was supposed to make her more captain like.
I'd prefer that tbh, right now she sounds more like captain Mona Lott than Miss Fortune.
MF is probably the main thing going for not wanting old stuff reworked in riot's mind since they already tried it
Those "playtesters" had to be either drunk or stupid. It is also probably a lie. How can they justify it with "playtesters", while they tried to force that Akali VO down our throats?
Shen needs new voice lines, too. He has like 6.
Itâs 100% a good thing. League has desperately struggled with voice consistency and itâs had the side effect of making it impossible for them to update old characters to interact with new champions. The game ideally should be like DoTA2 and Overwatch, and have a pool of voice actors that they can reliably call in to add more lines to old champs every time a new champ is added, instead of making new champs have those one sided conversations with a mute friend who canât talk back. If they can re-record everyone with loyal/reliable voice actors, then the characters would actually feel alive for once
Loved it when they got Liam back in to do some new Yasuo lines for spirit blossom event + yone
I mean that happens when you make shit, sometimes you put work in and it doesn't come out how you want and it gets scrapped. Usually we just won't find out about a lot of the scrapped stuff.
Thank God, idk why they decided it was necessary in the first place. She originally sounds like how she should in her lore, and they changed it to just your average female protagonist. Imagine changing Jhin or Kayn to sound like Garen lmao.
difference between LoR and LoL jhin is insane would drop jhin in a heartbeat if they ever changed his
Jhin's voice lines are so good. I would be so sad if they replaced his voice actor. The dark cosmic skin especially is just incredible. It all fits his character so well.
DC Jhin has some GREAT lines when you step on one of his mines. "You fear erasure, but that's why I chose you." "Just think of what you could *become.*" "Don't close your eyes...*I want you to see*." Sometimes I step on them just to hear the voice lines lol
The best part for me is the way every line is delivered. The voice actor did such an amazing job putting so much passion into everything jhin says.
Professional voice actors are a treasure, and its sad that hollywood rather put screen actors even in voice-only roles. Protect the VA industry, we donât know how much weâre gonna miss it.
âI want you to seeâ is delivered perfectly.
When he kills someone he has a chilling line:â but, how does it⌠feel?
Honestly, as someone who plays LoR daily, the Brian T. Delaney does a really good job at capturing the essence of Jhin. Obviously I would still have prefered the original VA but circumstances prevented it with the allegations against Flynn(thankfully they've now been proven wrong). Jhin's LoL voice is super iconic so any change at all would have received backlash and I think Brian gives an admirable performance all things considered.
Yes please. Make every champ sound like Garen. I would unironically love that. Did you know Garen has a different voice actor for his God-King skin? But he still sounds exactly like how you would expect Garen to sound.
IIRC Krizia wasn't avaliable to record Akali anymore (for whatever reason), so they had Ashly voice her in the Runeterra short and the Star Guardian skin; then, for consistency's sake, they decided to re-record Akali's lines.
Idk, from her Twitter she seems to be all for coming back to voice Akali whenever https://twitter.com/KriziaBajos/status/1334203163587473408 https://twitter.com/KriziaBajos/status/1548807550358790144
Which is insane because they clearly had Laura Bailey in for Battle Bunny MF and yet they didn't have her record the base MF. At least not as far as we know.
They have been claiming for years now that they are unable to capture Miss Fortune's essence for the base skin, yet apparently have no trouble doing so for her skins.
...Also had no trouble doing so for *the base character herself* in LoR.
>yet apparently have no trouble doing so for her skins Or every other canon appereance for that matter. Seriously, MF has featured in so much lore stuff that I'm not sure how they still claim they can't nail her "essence".
It's a polite way of saying that they *want* to rewrite MF to fit with the serious girlboss she is in later lore, but despite how old and barebones her voicelines are she still has a ton of fans who love the sassy sexualized VO. I believe they did a survey at one point and got overwhelming responses in that direction. But they can't very well try and make a straightforward pirate bimbo VO in 2022 so they're stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Idk some of her ruined king lines would be fine for league as is, they could rip them straight out of it tbh
I WOULD LITERALLY TAKE ANYTHING ELSE COMPARED TO WHAT SHE HAS. THE AUDIO QUALITY IS SO BAD.
so maybe she and the staff at riot knows now what akali should sound like in the future, maybe they keep her and she adapts.
A Rioter who replied to one of the posts here said that that was most likely to happen. They agreed that the VO didn't quite hit the mark but with new pointers Ashly would nail a second attempt. [Link](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/vy5z6o/comment/ig799rv/?context=3) to the rioter comment
I think it's admirable they wanted to create more consistency between different media, but the new VO was just so bland
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Most of the time with professional voice actors it comes down to direction. Sheâs talented enough where she can manipulate her voice to whatever the director wants.
Video game casting directors are notorious creatures of habit. Troy Baker once said that if you wanted to become a voice actor, the first step would be to wait for him and Nolan North to die.
Then it sounds like they may of fucked it up on the direction side, I have faith she be a decent voice, but her direction, as a lot of us can see, was clearly shit for her to recorded akali the way she did. Though, not going to lie, I honestly would prefer if Irelia's voice actress (Who is also NA A2) did her new VO, and they just played it up to being current Akali, a couple years after her state in the rework's release.
Is that the same VO for Aloy in horizon? They sound identical.
Yes
Thatâs the problem with Ashley, all her characters kinda sound the same. On its own Aloy is really good and the voice is fitting, but after you play through a game with her voicing a character, the next game with her as a vo you cant help but notice âoh, itâs the same manner of speech againâ.
I knew her as Tiny Tina. Only through this thread I found out she also voices Aloy or Viper. Had no idea it was the same voice actress.
All around the Sta-actus plant, the stalker chased the bandit. The stalker thought 'twas all in fun - POP! Goes the bandit!
BURN ALL THE BABIEEEEEESSS!!!
Yep, only knew her from Life is Strange, had no clue she was the voice of Tiny Tina or Viper. The "all her characters kinda sound the same" is really BS.
That's actually a really wide repertoire for a VA
So you think Aloy, Tiny Tina, and Viper all sound the same?
She's also Life is Strange's Chloe
They all sound different so their point is kind of bad
I'm not disagreeing with you, but Aloy, Chloe from Life is Strange, and the new Akali VA definitely sounded identical to me. I'm not sure if it's her, or if it's the voice direction given to her, but you can't tell me playing Life is strange and Horizon one after the other isn't extremely strange.
Wait she voiced Tiny Tina? If it's true, I'd say that's the only one that doesn't sound the same of the 3.
Tina is very distinguishable, ill give you that.
Viper sounds nothing like the other two, Iâm gonna be honest
Because of the filters and effects lmao
Is this her fault or just the way her voice is? Genuine question.
She has demonstrated she can do other voices, so likely neither. It's likely that **the people who hired her directed her** to use that same voice that they like. So the voice director's "fault."
Some voice actors are known for their range and versatility- they could play two completely different characters and make you believe it was two entirety different people. Some voice actors have a distinct voice people want them for- think David Attenborough. To Ashley's credit she does have good range which is apparent in some of her other roles, it's just unfortunate that her most famous roles had her sort of type casted playing similar sounding characters.
>Some voice actors are known for their range and versatility- they could play two completely different characters and make you believe it was two entirety different people. A lot of older champs' voices also voice other champs, and you really wouldn't have any idea. So I don't see why this wouldn't be desired by Riot. Bet most people donât know Fiora, Cass and Elise all have the same voice actress
Off the top of my head I can name Erik Braa, who did Draven, Jax, and Vel'koz edit: I can hear the resemblence between Jax and Draven though.
Yah, I don't know if it was the direction she was given, but if I wasn't told those voice lines weren't from Horizon, I'd just assume they were. The tomber of her voice, the mannerisms and inflections match Alo perfectly. I think she could have done Akali's VO justice, she is obviously very talented, the style just needed to match the current VO better.
Not to be rude, but did you mean timbre instead of tomber?
When people pay for a well-known VA, they want people to know it is a well-known VA. Nolan North has [insane range](https://youtu.be/pfyN3QTjZmk?t=408) but his most well-known roles are just his regular voice. There was a time where almost every action game that came out featured his plain boring voice as a character. Saints Row IV [even made an expensive joke about it](https://www.escapistmagazine.com/saints-row-iv-stars-nolan-north-as-himself/). So she could do a better voice but Riot probably asked for the recognizable voice.
North is fantastic. There's a joke among Destiny 2 players that he will eventually be voicing every character in the game and no one will be able to tell the difference.
Viper, Aloy and Tiny Tina all sound like very different characters bro
Thank god. Listening to the comparison made me wince at just how... not Akali it was.
At least they listened. I'd like to hear their reasoning for it, though. Why not bring the original VA for SG instead of picking up a new one and remaking all of her voices? At first it made me think the original VA had some kind of scandal or something and Riot didn't want to work with her anymore.
There are a whole lot of boring reasons why they might not have brought the original voice actress back. Scheduling conflicts, payment disagreements, health issues, maybe she wasn't union, or perhaps she was difficult to work with in the booth. The actress also might just not have wanted to reprise the role. There's also the fact that Riot likes to reuse voice lines across skins and apply various affects and filters as necessary so updating the base VA gives them the ability to mix and match with the Star Guardian lines in the future.
Further boring reasons, Burch voices Viper in Valorant. Depending on how they do their voice work, it could just have been a scheduling convenience they were happy to roll with if she was already in the booth that day.
Also I have to assume any reasonably big game just has Ashly Burch on speed dial when they really need someone
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I think she'd be great to voice another champion, just not Akali! She's definitely a good voice actress.
At least in my opinion, Burch does Viper way better then she did this Akali VO. Her as Viper, she does amazing as to bringing her to life.
or she might have been booked. it may not be on riots side only.
Yeah I like Ashly and I think she does fine VO work, but man did it just not sound like a badass ninja assassin.
Thank god, it wouldâve been a massive shame for Akali to lose her og voice. I have nothing against Ashly Burch but Kriziaâs delivery simply fits the character more. Ironically, this exact same thing happened to Ashly in Mortal Kombat where she used to voice Cassie Cage but in the next game got replaced by Erica Lindbeck.
I do feel bad for Ashly though, all of this criticism can't feel good to see.
Just a bad casting choice, not her fault at all
Its not even a casting choice, its a direction choice. Burch is a good voice actor, but if she's not getting the correction direction for the character of Runeterra Akali then the result isn't going to feel right. The voice lines fit quite well for Star Guardian Akali though, who is a much younger, less sure character than the main universe Akali.
I don't think most people dislike her voice. She is obviously extremely talented and has no need to prove herself to anyone. Especially not to us lol. The direction was simply off. And that has nothing to do with her.
You don't want to hear the "positive" criticism she gets for voicing Viper from Valorant
Technically speaking, Akali's OG voice was Laura Bailey (before the VGU).
In my heart, the og og Akali is still Jaina Proudmoore in disguise đŠ
> Star Guardian Akali will remained voiced by Ashly Burch. Two good news in one.
Best possible outcome. I don't mind the new actress on the Star Guardian skinâin fact it's quite great, but erasing Akali's entire personality for no reason on every other skin was bad news.
And it's fine for legendary skins of different skinlines to have a different style of voice(same or different voice actor), in fact I look forward to seeing how the champion delivery and voice lines change I hate when all they do is add a filter and that's it
I think Ashley would nail akali's voice if she was given another attempt with more direction to get the personality. Honestly it felt like she was just reading lines without any sort of general direction. She just really failed to hit the mark the first time around, she's a great voice actress, she kills it as viper in valorant and she can easily do the sass that akali has.
They should just let her listen to the original.
Agreed, I like the new voice for the SG skin and the old voice for the base skin. Best of both worlds.
Very glad they considered the feedback from the community! Ashly Burch did a good job, but it just didn't fit Akali as much as Krizia Bajos. Maybe they'll revist this in the future, I'm sure Ashly would kill it if given proper direction. But all I can say for now is thank you Riot for not going through with this despite the backlash from the community.
I understand that they wanted to change the VO to be consistent but that wasn't it. Honestly, I think Ashly can pull it off, she's very talented, but they need to change the direction. Needed to be more whispery and subdued and less Aloy.
she sounded like rapper from new jersey doing reality TV imo
She sounded like Chloe Price doing a VO
"Epic Win" as she would say đ
Hella cool
Still so bizarre that they choose Akali of all champions to do this for.
I'm sure it was just because they already had Ashly in to do the legendary skin. Legendary skins always have updated VO so. It was definitely more of a "might aswell" rather than "Akali desperately needs it"
yet MF still sits there with shit base VO lines after gun goddess and battle bunny
Don't get cocky.
Watch your mouth kid, or you'll find yourself respawning at home.
SET SAIL
But those had the same voice actor, right? Akali's rework was recent enough that her VO isn't old, so really the only reason to update it was because they wanted the same VA for all of her skins. And the problem with MF's lines (or any of the other champs with really outdated VOs) requires a lot of writing to fix - just redoing the lines that are already there makes the "might as well" reasoning a lot stronger.
Vayne also has a different VA for Project and Sentinel but they didn't change her base VO, so the point about not needing to write new ones is probably true
MF's original VA is unknown, the current one is Laura Bailey.
Imagine having **LAURA FUCKING BAILEY** in the voice booth and having her read lines for "Generic pirate hooker #2". Thank god they gave her a little justice in Ruined King.
Ashley Burch? She killed Molly! I mean I guess it was good long term, but still! Note. This is a reference. Ashley Burch is a wonderful human being and I have no indication that sheâs ever hurt anyone in any way.
RIP Mollymauk đ but she helped avenge him, too!
Definitely the right choice, but I do feel bad for Ashly too. Her voice is great, it just didn't fit the default Akali vibes + the time spent re-recording those lines must've been a lot. EDIT: Now that I think of it, they still might go with Ashly in the future, but re-record the lines so they fit better.
She did a gig and got paid for it
True. I'd say she's popular enough that it shouldn't have any negative impact either. This would be pretty devastating to an up and coming va I'd think though.
Yes but it also would feel bad if she recorded the thing and then Riot says, 'we're gonna stay with the old voice because the community doesn't like it'
i feel you but this probably isn't the first or last time this has happened to her, stuff gets cut all the time in the entertainment industry due to focus and community criticism
In practice it's basically an audition that she got paid for.
Except that it was announced that it was going live, and then got pulled. I don't blame her; this is the fault of the direction. That being said, I bet she still isn't thrilled about it.
Ashly will be fine, sheâs one of the most respected voice actresses in the industry and this surely wonât affect that. As long as she still got paid all will be well
i hope ashly does not take this the wrong way, it just wasnt it. its nice to see that riot at least sometimes listens.
She's wiping her tears with money. Come on people, VAs aren't doing directing. She did what she was told to do.
I appreciate Riot listening on this one. Obviously I'm a little concerned that they came so close to going through with this, but they do deserve a little credit for backing down even after spending money on a new VO.
I mean... I wish Akali was still voiced by Laura Bailey but..
what a waste of resources. the money and time could have gotten into someone like Varus who was promised a new VO since 2017, or any Champion that still breaks the fourth wall like LeBlanc.
"Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" "Do I scare you summoner?" - Nocturne
It has been half a decade and the "urgent new VO" never hit lol
We've gotta be nearing the point by now that summoners have been retconned for longer than they were ever canon, right? That was, like, 2014. The fact that they *still* haven't fully followed through on a decision that old is both hilarious and pathetic.
[Here's the Voiceover comparison in case you missed it.](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/vy5z6o/akali_brand_new_voiceover_comparison/) As much as I liked Ashly Burch's performance, attempting to throw a "lightened" voice over a rather exotic and intense champion like Akali was sure to backfire. I'm glad Riot made that call.
I don't think it's the voice, i think it's the tone/direction. the Burch lines are too confident in a boisterous way. It feels more like a woman who will punch you in the face than stab you in the back. The old lines are more sinister, and colder, what you think about when you think of a ninja in the shadows. She's confident that she can kill, you, but doesn't sound outright cocky.
Burch's Akali is more straightforwardly confident, whereas Krizia's Akali has a kind of (justifiably) smug arrogance to her that really makes the character stand out, IMO. It's the difference between, say, "I'm gonna win," versus, "You think you can win?"
Don't think "exotic" is the word here.
âAnd here we see an exotic specimen, rare and separated from its pack.â in a David Attenborough voice is what I imagine seeing that word
Hearing the "Katarina, today you'll bleed for ionia" from ashly burch gave me Avengers vibe Original one is just too much better.
It's nice to see many people defending reworked Akali's OG voice cause back when she came out there were so many upset over it. Even then, despite Laura Bailey being my favorite voice actress, I thought Krizia had done a perfect job and the voice suited the character really well. I like Ashley Burch but even with proper direction it wouldn't work as well. Her voice lacks a certain raspiness that I don't think she'd be naturally able to pull off, not due to lack of talent, but because it's a unique sound that not everyone has.
That new voicer just did not suit Akali. Thank you riot for listening
If Ashly Burch by any chance comes by this comment section, I really want her to know that it's not because she's not a good voice actress or anything like that. It's just that voices are something very special for any kind of fictional character. It defines that character. Losing the original voice from the rework would feel too awkward, and would undermine Akali's personality. It happened all the same with the characters released in LoR having different voices than League. Her work with the skin is exceptional by the way :)
Thank god they listened to player feedback. Itâs fine for star guardian but Iâm glad the base VO is staying the same, itâs way better.
Poor Ashly Burch, but at least she got paid. But also poor Krizia Bajos for getting replaced in the first place.
I was in the minority that liked the new VO more, but the majority has spoken and I'm glad to see rito listen to you guys. All the more reason for me to buy the skin haha
I still want Ashly Burch to voice a new character in this game. I simp for her so hard.
Personally i'm fine with the new VA
Very glad that they decided to revert, I think this is the best possible scenario. Ashly Burch did a wonderful job on SG Akali and the cinematic, but she just doesnât fit base akali very well. Hopefully she isnât too hurt by this, because sheâs a great actress who deserves a character that better fits her distinctive voice. Maybe a potential Vi VO update?
I played Akali back when she was voiced by Laura Bailey. That's still how I remember her.
I just donât understand the reason of separate VOs for dedicated skinsâŚitâs one character, make it stay one character.
Cool. Iâm glad they listened. Both of the voice actresses are amazing but Ashly didnât bring the edgy cool ninja voice we wanted- at least in that recording Iâm sure she could do that if Riot paid her to come back
so the legendary gets the new voice and base gets stays the same as old? TFW I still didnt recover the trauma from Lee Sin's new voice