Favorite VAs?

You'd be hard-pressed to find better voice-acting than in Xenosaga. (well, Episode 1 and 3...)

And so I can understand why it might be difficult to pick faves out of such an outstanding cast. Thus you can list your absolute #1 favorite, Top 5, Top 10 - whatever.

My favorites:

You gotta give it up for Lia Sargent as Shion. The loss of her is one of the many reasons I detest Episode II. She did a magnificent job in Episode 3. I consider Episode 1 to have an overall better dub but you gotta admit she has to put out a lot more effort in 3.

Speaking of Episode 1 being the best, I loved Sherry Lynn's MOMO. Ms. Lynn is THE voice for lolis. (MOMO, Sasami, Peppita, and probably many more)

EP1 being my favorite doesn't mean I disliked 3. In fact, while most people go fangirl for Freeman's Albedo, my favorite villain was Keith Szarabajka's Yuriev.

And let's give it up for the guy who was in all 3 Episodes - Dave Wittenberg. Allen's voice was perfect and it's even more amazing when you consider the same guy would also play Kakashi and kefka.

Finally, to give props to a voice that probably won't get so many props, Kim Mai Guest as Juli Mizrahi. Stone cold ice queen or distraught mother, it was always nice to listen to her.

^I very much agree with Lia Sargent as Shion.  She pulled off the emotional lines extremely well in Episode III, something Oliva Hack didn't do so well in Episode II.  However, the only thing I would complain about was her performance as her child self in Episode III;

it just didn't match the same quality as older Shion.

Out of all of her voices (including Mariko Suzuki's performance, imo), Bridget Hoffman's KOS-MOS was my favorite.  She pulled off the cold and detached android voice well, along with the emotional lines.  I also enjoyed her performance as T-Elos; her voice just oozed personality into her.

I really liked both of chaos's voices, but I kind of wish his original voice actor had returned.  Don't get me wrong, his second voice actually sounded closer to the original Japanese voice, but I liked his upbeat, caring voice in Episode I.  That and I thought chaos sounded awkward during battles in both Episode II and III.

Oh, I've got quite a few;



Lia Sargent as Shion, nice voice acting indeed.
Bridget Hoffman as KOS-MOS (and T-elos).
Richard Epcar as Ziggy.

But now, MOMO... I have to disagree on this;

I really dislike her XSI voice over (done by Sherry Lynn). It's so totally a forced, fake child's voice done by an adult. Her XSII & III voice actor at least sounds like a real child, for which I like Cristina Pucelli's voice acting for MOMO a lot better.

Now, back to the others;



Brianne Siddall as Jr. (awesome!).
Michael Gough as Jin.

Poor chaos is the only one of who I don't really like either of his English voices; I don't think either of his voice actors fit the character. I really like the tone of his voice as done by his Japanese voice actor in XSIII, that's how I imagine he would sound like.

Now, on to the villains;

Keith Szarabajka as Yuriev (AWESOME!). I can't spell the poor guy's last name, I always have to google it... my apologies. ^^;


Crispin Freeman as Albedo.
Michael McConnohie as Margulis.

While I generally dislike Kari Wahlgren's voice acting -imo she makes her characters sound bitchy at times- (XSIII Pellegri is a great example), her role as Febronia is an exception.

Christopher Corey Smith as Kevin in XSI & II. I'd like to add his XSIII voice actor, Yuri Lowenthal, is THE voice actor who I dislike the most out of all the well-known actors. He sounds so whiny and arrogant, and not just as Kevin (Yosuke in Persona 4, dear God). So yeah, not a fan of Lowenthal. >.>



On a closing note;

Jennifer Hale is a voice actor who I very much like and she happens to have a small role in XSII as (young) Nigredo.

[Also a bit of trivia; Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, who voiced Doctus, lost ALL her respect points from me after she publicly mocked one of the original Silent Hill 2 voice actors on a press conference for the Silent Hill HD collection. Shameful behavior, McGlynn.]

Pellegri IS kind of bitchy though. She's essentially a less annoying Dominia and Dominia was Queen Bitch of all Video Games.

Also I loved Ms. Wahlgren as Ashe in FFXII.

^ Well, I was gonna use Ashe as an example at first, but I figured Pellegri was more fitting as a Xenosaga character. She sounds nice when she has to be kind/caring, but when she has to say something more along the lines of being confident/tough, it just sounds more bitchy than tough to me. Pellegri, Ashe (FFXII), Karin (Shadow Hearts) are all examples of this. That's probably why I like her as Febronia, because Febronia never acts all "tough" or such, she always has the kind/caring behavior.
But of course, to each their own. =p

On a sidenote, I did not recognize Wahlgren in Pellegri's voice at all in XSI. She sounds so different in the first game. in XSII & III she sounds like her usual self, but in XSI... yeah, quite different.

<edit>

Shame on me, I forgot to mention a few villains whose voice overs I really liked;



D.C. Douglas as Voyager (fitting evil voice over).
Michael Bell as the Patriarch (his voice is what actually made me like him as a villain).

Uncredited voice actress as Orgulla;

because Orgulla's voice is awesome. I cannot believe they credited every character in XSII except her! There are 4 people credited for "additional voices", but they're all male. They even credited UMN & Vector Staff characters, but not Orgulla. That's just sad. :[

I honestly don't think that's her in Episode 1. It says it is on IMDB but IMDB can be wrong and I don't think Pellegri was credited in EP1.
Me, you, and many other people have commented on how EP1 Pellegri sounds absolutely nothing like the later performances. She doesn't sound like any other Walgren performance I've heard either.

Besides, why would she totally and completely change her voice for the next two games? Nobody else did that.

Unsurprisingly, all of my favorite voice actors are from XSI and continued their roles into the rest of the series where they could.

Paul St Peter - Andrew Cherenkov
Michael McConnohie - Margulis
Richard Epcar - Ziggy
Crispin Freeman - Albedo/Gaignun
Lia Sargent - Shion Uzuki
Bridget Hoffman - KOS-MOS
Michael Lindsay - Hammer
Derek Stephen Prince - chaos (Episode I chaos is best chaos.)

I don't know why I'm so hung up on XSI chaos, but I think the fact that he and Hammer are holdovers from the Digimon cast (along with many of the others on my list) made my interest in their VAs skyrocket. Oddly enough, I don't have a whole lot of opinions on Pellegri's VAs, despite how much I like her as a character (I tend to like characters that are terribly behaved).

katimus wrote:Derek Stephen Prince - chaos  (Episode I chaos is best chaos.)

I don't know why I'm so hung up on XSI chaos, but I think the fact that he and Hammer are holdovers from the Digimon cast (along with many of the others on my list) made my interest in their VAs skyrocket.

I was surprised to learn Derek Stephen Prince also voiced Takaya and Mitsuru's father in Persona 3. Especially the latter because of how deep his voice is. I don't quite get why they replaced him with Joshua Seth as chaos when he could have easily done a similar deep voice (and probably a better one too), if that's the change they wanted.

In any case, while I do like chaos' original voice slightly better, he just sounds too "high-on-sugar" happy for my liking and I don't think it fits his character very well (imo it's too childlike). Although going for the complete opposite with his 2nd voice actor didn't improve things any if you ask me.

PS: when I said chaos is the only one of who I don't really like either of his English voices, I meant that in regards to the playable cast, of course.

I just noticed Mary & Shelley share the same voice actress. I didn't know that. o_O Even more surprisingly it's Ali Hillis (same VA who voiced Lightning in FFXIII), didn't notice that either.

Oh, and I guess it would explain a lot if Pellegri indeed has a different VA in XSI. I saw her credited as Wahlgren for XSI on just about every site which has that kind of info, but I guess it could be they all borrowed it from an incorrect source.

I really like Lia Sargent's voice, I wish I heard her in more roles .Gotta give mad props to Crispy Freeman for Albedo. I think thats one of my favorite English dubbing performances ever.

ALSO GUYS the voice actor for Allen narrates the show I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant.

katimus wrote:
I don't know why I'm so hung up on XSI chaos, but I think the fact that he and Hammer are holdovers from the Digimon cast (along with many of the others on my list) made my interest in their VAs skyrocket.

Do you like Mona Marshall then? She apparently voiced someone named Izzy in Digimon.

Speaking of EP1 only VAs, what did people think of Richard Cansino's Wilhelm? He's Kenshin and legato ya know.

Favorite VA goes to Crispin Freeman for an absolutely amazing Albedo (at least in Eps. I and II.) No one can top his performance.

I much, MUCH prefer Ep. I Wilhelm. I was saddened when he wasn't one of the returning VAs for Ep. III. I also much prefer Derek Stephen Prince as chaos, since he didn't make chaos so freakin' boring, I could fall asleep. I give credit to Joshua Seth for upping his performance in Ep. III, but he still didn't work for me. Although I hate nothing worse than Ep. II MOMO (and thank the good Lord she got better in Ep. III because I would have broken the game disc.) Her voice made me want to take rusty forks to my eardrums just so I didn't have to hear her anymore.

Episode II "Mystic powers, grant me a miracle!" is the stuff of nightmares.

Well I saying that many times on godsibb, I don't like dubs, I like japanese VA the best always in games. I didn't mind so much ep1 english VA but later they made such much mess in next parts so I think of english VA as nightmare.

But I can agree that english VA for Albedo, Jr and Ziggy were really good.

Nikkolas wrote:Episode II "Mystic powers, grant me a miracle!" is the stuff of nightmares.

Episode II has some sound quality issues with battle quotes, though. I don't remember MOMO's battle quotes very well, but I remember some of the quotes for several characters had very poor quality during battles in XSII.

I don't know much about either of MOMO's voice actresses, but I checked on IMDB and they're both adult women. Again, props to Cristina Pucelli for sounding like a real child, something which -imo- Sherry Lynn failed to do.

And I just now noticed Pucelli also voiced Sunny in Metal Gear Solid 4. Huh, I knew that voice sounded familiar... I guess I didn't pay enough attention in MGS4 when Sunny first appears (because in MGS the VA's names are shown when a character first appears). ^^;



As for dubs, I'm the opposite; I very much prefer English voice overs, even if the original voices are better done, the Japanese language simply doesn't appeal to me (i.e. the sound of the words). I like the sound of English much, much more (heck, I like it more than my own language xD).
So even if XSII's voice acting wasn't as good as in XSI &

III, I still by far prefer the English version over the Japanese version myself.

I don't prefer one or the other myself. It just simply depends on which voice sounds better for a character. When it comes to Jr., I like Brianne Siddall a lot, but I tend to prefer Jr. in Japanese. On the flip side, it's Crispin Freeman all day, every day for Albedo.