So...when I said that Sephiroth doesn't speak in the new trailer, I was "mistaken", insomuch that "Sephiroth" spoke—but not Sephiroth as we know him, and that's why I thought he hadn't said anything at all.
It has been confirmed that they replaced Tyler, Sephiroth's English VA, with someone else, due to a "scheduling conflict".
Let me get this straight. This is a trilogy. Square always knew it would be a trilogy. I would think that everyone signed up for all 3 parts of it in their contracts, though I can't confirm that. They've used the same Japanese VA's for 20+ years, but they can't keep the same English VA's for 3 fucking games? Seriously? How little respect does Square have for their English fans, exactly?
Because I know that a lot of people, like myself, were very apprehensive when George was replaced with Tyler. It took at least half the game for him to grow on me. Sephiroth has so many fans, and they're going to disrespect him like this, by changing his voice AGAIN? Seriously?
I confess, this has killed half of the enthusiasm I had for the new game. I don't care if the new VA is fantastic, this is not okay. Square keeps doing this to us, and it's NOT okay. I'm incredibly disappointed that they care so little for their English speaking fans. Do they think that we simply won't mind? It feels like they're mocking us.
People like me are the kind that play the gacha cash grab Ever Crisis solely to find out more about Sephiroth and his history. He's my favorite character, and—no matter what anyone says—a MAIN character. In my mind, this is as egregious as if they had changed Cloud's VA. Seriously, Square, how dare you?
I may rethink if I want to preorder it now. As much as I want to know the rest of the story, the entire damn game will feel completely wrong. What a betrayal. No matter what they do next, I think FF7 part 3 will be my last Final Fantasy game. I'm not going to buy part 1 of a remake of 8 or 10 when they might swap VA's for the last fucking part.
Edit: To anyone crying "you can't blame Square when you don't know the whole story!" Yes, in fact, I can. I'm not here to simp for a wealthy company, I'm here for my love of FF. It is literally their ONE job to protect the integrity of their IPs. Let me ask this question...
If there was a "scheduling conflict" with Toshiyuki Morikawa, would Square have replaced him so casually?
No. No, they would not. I know they would not, because he is beloved by fans all over the world. They would not sell a single copy in Japan if they did that. Square cares about that, because in Japanese, Morikawa IS Sephiroth. But in English, I guess he can just be anyone.
My accusations are not "baseless" due to a "canned statement" by the director. All he has deigned to tell us is "there was a scheduling conflict". "Canned" or not, that is his statement, his ONLY statement. Yeah, and? You find a way to make it work, you delay a month or two, you don't recast a beloved main character. I wouldn't care if this came out in summer or fall instead of spring, for the right voice to be recorded.
My "proof" is simple: as I've already stated, and I can't say this enough, they have kept the same Japanese VA's for more than 20 years without issue. Morikawa has always been Sephiroth, back to Advent Children in 2005. He IS Sephiroth in Japanese, and we all adore him. As a casual student of Japanese, I don't mind playing the games that way, though I prefer to play them in English first(and most of the time, generally), to help me with context when I play in Japanese later, but that's neither here nor there. They scrapped our original English VA cast from AC and replaced them. That was hard enough to accept. And now, on the FINAL part of the game, they've replaced Sephiroth. It isn't right. Tyler seems to be perfectly healthy, I haven't heard that anything is wrong. A friend told me that at a recent convention, Tyler said he was excited for everyone to play part 3(meaning he read the script, most likely). If this was ultimately his decision to be completely replaced and not Square's, then that's an even bigger letdown, but I doubt that's the case.
Maybe they'll replace Riku from Kingdom Hearts next! Or maybe they'll remake AC and scrap all of the English VA's again. Are we really okay with this? I'm not. But no matter how much backlash there is, Square won't change their minds. Because, ultimately, they have shown that they don't care about the integrity of their games, at least in English. They'll still make the sales, because we want to know the ending, so they simply do not care.
I have been playing FF games and KH since 2002. I played the original FF7. I bought AC when it came out in 2005/2006. I was sad when CC only came out on the PSP and cried as I watched the cutscenes on youtube. My entire Tumblr and X accounts are dedicated to FF7, specifically Sephiroth, and I've written hundreds of pages of fan fiction for it. I am a dedicated fan. But Square is not dedicated to us, and that is the difference. It is valid to feel upset by that stark reality, and I am, indeed, upset. If you're not, if you don't care who plays Sephiroth as long as your favorites are untouched and just want the game to hurry and release, then good for you. Move along.
