Random: Princess Zelda's Voice Actor Had To Pay For Breath Of The Wild Just Like Everyone Else

Nintendo employees also have to buy their Switch and games through retail..... I guess this is no different?

Of course she did.

I worked as a QA tester with a big video game publisher and always got free copies of main releases. Everyone there did. Kinda odd that Nintendo's voice actors don't.

Kinda expected. It's not like every VA for that game plays video games.

Wonder if the voice of Link has to pay?

Well excuuuuuuse me, princess!

Shame Nintendo couldn't find a British actress* to do a British accent!

*Or is it actor nowadays? (I have trouble keeping up with all the PC terms.)

Fortune favors the bold.
Just ask next time! 😁

@Julien

This always gets me. Bad British accents are only made worse how many available British actors there actually are. I'm from Ireland and I find it hard to stomach American media with terrible Irish accents.

Unless you ask for it in your contract, hired actors/musicians rarely get free copies of the things they've worked on.

She only JUST got it? I've been playing Zelda for nearly a month longer than Zelda herself? Hahaha

I've been playing this game on and off since launch, and I STILL haven't 'met' Zelda.

The blood moon rises once again... Ugh.

@Tsurii
Tired and out of breath

She was paid in cash to do a job, I don't expect free stuff for doing my job.

@HydroTendonMan Publishers generally aren't very friendly towards VAs (look at the SAG strike as a perfect example)

Oh yes, British accent... Has anyone noticed that despite day and night cycle and all the various weather in BotW it has so far not once been Reyn Time in Hyrule? At least not in my playthrough so far. Seriously, I'm not certain Zelda is really feeling it...

Zelda has a broad Yorkshire accent or the twang of a somerset strumpet can she not read script notes.

Crazy stuff and staff in Tesco have to pay for their groceries as well.

@HydroTendonMan

Remember that ep of Heroes that was apparently based in Cork
has to be one of the worst

She should also have to pay a fine for ruining Princess Zelda's lines.

I'm only kidding, but IMO she's not a very good VA. Not in this game anyway.

@HydroTendonMan

Yeah most Americans have no clue about the differences between Irish and Scottish accents either lol. Its pretty rare to find any voice actors on American shows that can voice any UK accent well tbh lol.

Remember when Masahiro Sakurai couldn't get ahold of certain Smash amiibo?

I wish Nintendo would have listened to the petition... They could at least have let Nintendo of Europe record voices for the European version of Breath of the Wild, like in Xenoblade Chronicles (that game's voice acting is epic)!

So many people complaining about the voice acting when that's not what this article is about. Also just play the game and don't get picky when it's not necessary because I have not seen a professional review where they complain about the voice acting.

Yeah, that Koizumi guy also said he had to go to the store to get his own, and he's a higher up at Nintendo Japan. Satoru Shibata did an unboxing before launch, saying it's a president's privilege, but for all we know, he may not have gotten to keep the unit.

I Just wanna finish the damn game. WHY SO MUCH RESPONSABILITIES?

It's always nice to see that VA's are interested in their games.

I wouldn't have given her a free copy either. She did a horrendous job. Her namby-pamby delivery & all the voices in fact we're really bad. Insert typical American voice in for a race of bird or fish people. Rubbish!

I don't think she cares about paying that much I mean, she is the voice of ZELDA!

It's pretty common for actors to put on a "non-regional dialect" no matter where they come from, which is what I'd blame any discomfort re her accent on. I didn't mind it tbh

@Julien : Males are known as actrons. Get with the times, gramps.

There's a joke in there somewhere.

As a software programmer I have always gotten the company products of whatever company I was/am working for at the time whether I had worked on it or not. I find it strange that they didn't offer her a free copy or at least a digital download. I can understand not getting the hardware but the software at least should have been a freebie for her despite her talent. But if I have to hear "The blood moon rises once again" one more time I may put my Switch through the wall.....kidding of course but they could have done without that.

I for one thought she did a phenomenal job. Zelda was such a complex and deeply sad character in BoTW and the voice they chose reflected that perfectly.

Nintendos marketing campaign for the Switch involved giving just about any low-subscriber unqualified YouTube channel a Switch and tons of accessories in favor of disgustingly biased reviews to increase the hype. But then didn't give the voice actors or employees free copies of the game?

So sad. Oh well. At least we got 900 identical Switch reviews that say the exact same press release lines about "Listen to that satisfying click" , "1-2 Switch is amazing" and "You can literally feel the marbles in the JoyCons".

@Fuz @Setery10 What a goofy position to take. It's video games - it is never "necessary" to be picky. And because there isn't a professional review that critiques the voice, that means no one else is able to? I'm not one to go around trashing the voice acting (And honestly, I'd blame whoever was in charge of the voice acting, not the actors themselves) but I must admit I wasn't the biggest fan of Zelda's voice acting either.

I will agree with you, that isn't what this article is about, so it is slightly off topic. But otherwise, I feel your points are a little off base. Different people find different aspects of a game important, be it story, voice acting, gameplay, or visuals. If they have an issue with something, then of course they should be able to critique it, even if it isn't "necessary", whatever that may mean to you.

@shaneoh work for Discover Card. They give free stuff just for doing your job all the time. Haha. They are the ones that bought my Switch and all my launch games/gear.

@Fuz That's fair. I certainly didn't expect a British voice actor - heck, I don't care what kind of accent Zelda has. But to me, there was just something that seemed off about her - both the voice, and her lines. Again, I don't blame the actress for that though. It just felt like we were kind of being force fed what a stereotypical princess in distress should sound like.

@Fuz
Well, to be fair, I believe the accent was not chosen to sound particularly "British" per se, but probably to sound aristocratic (and well-bred, so to speak), which of course makes sense, Zelda being a princess with aristocratic upbringing and all.

I also believe that the voice acting is okay, though I HAVE heard better voice acting that went more under my skin without even trying... But in some instances I believe Patricia has done a fine job, the resignation in her voice in the first memory cutscene comes to mind. Liked that. But then again, I'm not English (nor American) so who am I to really judge that...?! (I do have an ear for that sort of stuff though, and will always rejoice if the voice acting triggers genuine emotions within me, no matter which language).

In a similar outrage I used to work at pizza boy and didn't get free pizzas.

As I'm British myself I think she did an amazing job at voicing Zelda with the accent than I ever could. I hope she enjoys finally hearing how she sounds while playing!

I dont like her english voice for Zelda. Then again I played the game in german and I think our voiceactors did a great job.

On top of that why should she get the game for free? She gets payed for voiceacting for that game so basically she got the game for free anyway, since she got payed for being in the game and then used the money to buy the game

It's sad this voice actress can't just post 2 harmless tweets about buying Zelda, without it becoming a big deal.

@cfgk24 She's probably not a Nintendo employee, most actors are essentially contractors. They get paid to do a specific role as a freelancer.

Cheapo Nintendo, my workplace lets me take stuff (if I ask for it) when people donate things like NVIDIA Shield tablets that we won't need.

@Julien duh! It's a Hyrulian accent

@Sourcecode You can just skip the whole blood moon clip as soon as it starts you know... No need to sit through it if you don't want to. In fact this goes for most cutscenes, including the cooking one.

I wish voice actors like Deanna Mustard were more in the public eye...

@CB85 I know...still even that is quite annoying. They could just have the monsters and what not auto generate rather than making a big scene out of it...

She's good, but man, she fumbled her accent really badly in one of the memories...

Nothing against Ms Summersett, but I think Zelda's voice is the worst part of this game. It's just not what I ever imagined it as being.

Personally I think they should have just left voice acting out of the game all together. The other voices are ok, but the small cutscenes of voice just aren't a significant impact... except for Zelda's, which are a really bad impact.

Everyone here has no idea what they're talking about; the voice actor for Zelda did a great job.

@Guspaz Correct, she's not an employee - my point was that EVEN Ninty employees have to buy from retail !

lol. I kind of like all of the voices in BotW. I think it's a good step in the right direction. Although, I am perfectly fine with Link sticking to grunts and yelps.

Man, the voice acting is terrible in this game and Zelda's voice annoys me the most. So she should pay for it! Hahaha
I'm also pretty upset that Beedle doesn't say "ooooooooooohhhhhhhh" anymore.
The mixing is also atrocious. One line you can hear perfectly and the next line just disappears into the background.
I'd prefer they just went back to the noises. I think it gives them more personality that way.

I think it's funny that she had to buy it like everyone else. I also found her voice to be not at all how I thought Zelda should sound, but that's not her fault. It doesn't mean that she did a terrible job. It does mean that yes, hers is the only voice in the game that completely grates on me. But she did a good job recording the lines, I thought. I just can't stand the direction they took Zelda in now that she has a voice. I'm sure this woman has done fantastic, non-grating work in other games. And I'm sure she did exactly as she was directed to for this one. But gah!

@CB85 I recently learned that you can skip the cutscene, but until now I have not been able to- I think I saw the text "+ SKIP" only once. I just read today that you have to hit "X" then "+". Did they really have to make it more complicated than it should be? I'll try the X/+ combination next time I play- hopefully it will work.

This is kinda weird but oh well, she was a pretty good voice actor for Zelda in my opinion

@KittyKatta Oh nuts! Nobody sent me any free games to play for my channel.

@Tenacious-P so...Just because she didn't do (in your opinion) a great job that means she shouldn't get a copy? Wow. you sound like those fans that think everything should speak Japanese and any dub was bad. She provided a voice to Zelda and that was that. It wasnt fantastic but it wasn't awful. I really hope in the next game they dont speak any language so people can't complain but wait somebody will.

Oh god, she looks awesome! By the way: Please Patricia, don't lick it. It is said that the cartridge tastes awful!

@Tenacious-P I think Revali's voice is amazing, but Zelda's voice just sounds like a random American guy that tries to sound like a British girl.

@Qun_Mang Yes when you hit X a message appears saying 'press + to skip'. This works for most cutscenes and was done in order to prevent people from accidentally skipping them (which is actually a good thing). There are some cutscenes where you don't have to press X, then +, but just the X button (I think it's when entering shrines, which you do a lot since there are 120 of them), so anyone who's played the game should know very well that pressing the X button skips cutscenes... I don't see how people wouldn't know this honestly, unless they never read any on-screen text.

@HydroTendonMan That's kinda how I feel about the new Scrooge on the upcoming Ducktales cartoon reboot. Yeah, I know, Scottish and Irish are two completely different nationalities, but still, you can't beat authenticity.

So sad. Let's hope Nintendo at least paid her $59.99 for her voice acting.

Uhm, voice "actor"!? Wouldn't it be more fitting to call her a voice "actress"? o.O

It baffles me as to why anyone would want to watch a video of someone opening up a box : /

@PrincePeach92

Lol, I was just thinking this. I know it's a promotional thing, but youtubers whine and cry and get everything...meanwhile people with real jobs have to pay...like people with real jobs

I wouldn't lick the cartridge if I was her...then Nintendo gets a lawsuit for poisoning a reincarnated goddess.

@Setery10 "I have not seen one professional review where they complain about the voice actor"

Is Washington Post professional enough for you? https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/comic-riffs/wp/2017/03/06/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild-review-unusually-hauntingly-engrossing/

Yeah, well, I bet William Shatner would have to pay to go into space so...the world is full of little injustices.

Also, videos of attractive women licking video game paraphernalia is always okay with me.

@Fuz what sort of game development do you do?

@Valjean just saying I haven't seen one doesn't mean that out of the 60+ reviews there is one

@Fuz That's pretty awesome! Relevant or not - I am a NASCAR fan, and so I do enjoy racing games.

How did you get into the video game [developing] industry? It's definitely something that interests me - I have plenty of concepts and ideas in my head - but I don't know much of anything about coding or where to look or start.