Does Pikachu need a voice actor anymore?

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PokeDot517

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Is there really a reason for Pikachu to have a voice actor/actress anymore? There's over 800 episodes of the anime and Pikachu sounds pretty much the same since the Original Series. Can't they just reuse voice clips from previous episodes? Won't that save them money? Or am I just not understanding why they won't or can't do it?

Also, I don't dislike the VA for Pikachu or anything I'd just figure that since Pikachu doesn't really say anything other than his own name and has consistently sounded the same over the years there's no reason to keep paying a VA to continue providing the voice when we have hundreds of recorded voice clips already.

=)
 
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It actaully sounded quite different in the earliest days, but I get what you mean. I think it's ideal for the actress to be present and provide it live specifically performed for every scene. Of course, if she's ever unable to continue her role anymore, whether temporarily or for good, they could ask her to approve them using existing recordings (actually they might not even have to ask her or pay for that, depending on how their agreements are)
I'm pretty sure they actually did that and used existing recordings for a while during AG when the VA wasn't able to work, so it even happened before already.
 
We need Pikachu to be able to emote. They can't do that as well with just sounds clips (even though they likely have some for EVERY occasion)
 
I think it's a respect thing more than anything else. Getting rid of her *now* would be a pretty shitty thing for them to do.

Piplup said:
I'm pretty sure they actually did that and used existing recordings for a while during AG when the VA wasn't able to work, so it even happened before already.
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Yeah, it happened when she went on maternity leave back in 2006.
 
Does Ikue Ohtani make major dough for doing Pikachu? She has other roles of course like Chopper, and Gash Bell back in the day, but I wonder if she's basically set for life.

Yeah, it happened when she went on maternity leave back in 2006.
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I thought in that case, didn't they get someone else to voice Pikachu? I remember some of the other Pokemon she voiced (Mime Jr.?), I think someone took over for her. Or maybe I'm thinking of the time the girl who did Mimirol's voice left?
 
Iirc, the mechanisms they used to recording is play the anime on a background and records the voices for the scenes when all the seiyuu is present.

Most seiyuu that play pokemon have multiples roles isn't it? And they need to record the voices for the human character.

I think record it live is more effective than edit the record latter just to add pikachu's voice.

If they use recorder at live record, they need to set timing to add the right recorded voice. One mistake and they need to record the scene from begining. Or edit them later. From what I heard, Japanese seiyuu is really professional and it's really possible to record lot of scenes without error.

So I think it's more efficient to use seiyuu. Maybe this is the reason..
 
Garren said:
Does Ikue Ohtani make major dough for doing Pikachu? She has other roles of course like Chopper, and Gash Bell back in the day, but I wonder if she's basically set for life.

Yeah, it happened when she went on maternity leave back in 2006.
Click to expand...
I thought in that case, didn't they get someone else to voice Pikachu? I remember some of the other Pokemon she voiced (Mime Jr.?), I think someone took over for her. Or maybe I'm thinking of the time the girl who did Mimirol's voice left?
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They used archive audio for Pikachu while Tomoe Hanba played Mime Jr.
 
They could probably get away with using archival audio at this point, but as Dogasu said it'd be disrespectful to Ohtani to boot her now.

And really it just makes for a better show.
 
Like others who have posted on this thread mentioned, Pikachu is put into a wide variety of situations in each episode, and he will react slightly differently to those events. Interacting with different characters could also bring out more of Pikachu's emotions. Those emotions can't be expressed as vividly through prerecorded sound clips.

For example, some Japanese anime (and this may include Pokemon) are recorded by having the voices interact with each other at the same time, as opposed to the "Western" practice of bringing the actors and actresses in to play their roles at different times.

This practice supposedly increases the voice quality because the actors are able to interact in real time, so all of their emotions from interacting with one another become the characters' emotions. Consequently, the conversation becomes more real and personable. Human actors aren't able to express these emotions as well if they voice a character in isolation.

But if this series continues indefinitely, there will be a point when Pikachu will be "voiced" by sound clips. Ikue Ohtani can't voice the character forever.
 
I never even thought of that.

If they needed to cut costs that's actually something they could do.

Just bring her in if they need specific emotions or something.

They could end up spending more time searching for the right sound than just getting her to do it xD
 
On top of all those possible reasons; there are so many of them, it'd be way harder to find appropiate voice clips for Pikachu than just have the actress do the voice.
 
Instead of using sound clips, they could just evolve Pikachu with a Thunder Stone.

That would be an even cheaper method.

No royalties for Ikue's sound clips that way, since all Raichu have practically the same voice.
 
Maybe because they don't need to cut cost for seiyuu... In anime industry, seiyuu are 'the actress', but they are not as expensive as actress for drama..

And pokemon are huge franchises *a.k.a they are rich*.. and Japan is Asian, as Asian people too I know how inefficient our method sometimes and we keep do this because we used to it and it's fine how it is..

^^;
 
SammyW27 said:
We need Pikachu to be able to emote. They can't do that as well with just sounds clips (even though they likely have some for EVERY occasion)
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Pikachu has to emote. Not only does it have to do that, but the actress has to respond to all the new situations. This isn't just Pikachu and a bunch of Pokémon screaming nonsense, this is Pokémon using their own language to emote their reactions to whatever is happening at the time!
Yes! Pokémon have their own language! We have even translated parts of it! Ash's Pikachu - Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia (Scroll down to Pikachu's language)
 
I could see why financially it wouldn't be a bad idea but just using stock recording isn't the same as fresh voice over done just for that scene
 
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