Cognition Dissemination: Another Eye Opens for the Bayonetta Voice Actor Story

The video game news cycle over the weekend was dominated by the story regarding Bayonetta 3’s voicework, in which the recast of the title character from Hellena Taylor to Jennifer Hale came to a head. Taylor created a video series which specified how, according to her, negotiations broke down, feeling that PlatinumGames’ offer of $4,000 was insufficient. She also, more abrasively, requested that fans boycott the game and donate the money they planned to spend on it to charity. This news spread far and fast, even beyond video game websites — on a Saturday, at that.

There was always a story regarding why Taylor didn’t reprise the role in the third game after being the voice of the character for more than a decade. But not every story should be believed in its entirety at first, even when they’re told through a veil of truth. This is one of them.

Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier reported more about this story, his first job back after maternity leave. It was noted in his semi-lengthy story (notably paywalled) that Taylor was initially provided a much different offer than she indicated, with $3,000 to $4,000 per session for at least five sessions, a normal amount for a unionized voice job in the video game industry. This would have been at least a $15,000-$20,000 job, more if they needed her for further sessions.

Taylor believed this to be inadequate and wanted a six-figure salary for the job, very much not the normal amount for a unionized job for a video game on this financial level. There’s nothing wrong with Taylor believing that she should have been paid better to reprise the role of the lead character in a semi-long-running series, but this report makes it clear that she, well, misstated the amount she was initially offered. Perhaps she even lied about it.

Bloomberg’s story continued by saying that “Platinum later offered Taylor a cameo in the game for the fee of one session,” likely to at least return as the Bayonetta with the original design shown to be killed off in front of new character Viola in the newest trailer. This was where the $4,000 offer came in, something she neglected to mention.

This is very much not a “he said, she said” situation, as some who didn’t or couldn’t read the full story interpreted it as. (It’s a real shame that so much of the truth is paywalled these days). Given his sterling reputation, Schreier wouldn’t report this unless his sources are good, and he indeed mentioned on Twitter that he saw the paperwork. He has a lot to lose by getting his story wrong, and as a journalist who’s utilized plenty of sources for previous stories, it’s clear he verified them here. There was no shortage of social media and message board users who wanted Schreier to share his sources so they could verify them on their own, the worst decision he could make. I hope certain people will come to understand how sourcing and protecting sources work in journalism, especially with how essential the practice has been in the political sphere. But I know better.

Portions about the pay offered to Taylor were corroborated by VideoGamesChronicle’s Andy Robinson, also proven to be a reliable source. Axios’ Stephen Totilo heard about the pay offered from one source but declined to report on it without further corroboration, as Schreier and Robinson obtained.

Let’s be honest here. It’s always tempting to believe wholesale the testimonies of workers who were wronged, and Taylor suggested that she was among them in the video series. But there were reasons to question parts of this one, though it seemed disgusting to do at first. I made a passing mention at her claim that Bayonetta was a half a billion-dollar franchise in the previous post, which couldn’t possibly be true. Sega, who remains the IP holder, would have funded the next installment themselves if that was the case. Not to mention that Taylor didn’t provide any sources of her claims herself.

She also slightly threw Hale under the bus, and sent an inevitable harassment campaign that she didn’t deserve her way. I hoped that this wasn’t malicious on her part over the weekend, but now I’m not sure.

Taylor’s likely — and I’ll say this nicely — misrepresentation of the facts could have grave consequences for the movement to get voice actors better pay. The next situation that arises like this, and there will be another one, will be viewed with hesitance from an audience that will remember this story upon seeing how this one started and continued. Hopefully more actors like Kyle McCarley and Sean Chiplock will continue to be as forthcoming as they were about their time and pay in voice acting.

As Schreier acknowledged in a follow-up tweet: Taylor’s version (not sorry) of the story got immense reach, with some videos being viewed more than any Bayonetta 3 trailer. Meanwhile, the extended story has yet to be reported by outlets beyond the gaming press like TMZ and Variety. This topic was also a top trend for most Saturday when the videos first surfaced on Twitter, yet this fuller story never cracked the top 20 trends yesterday.

Nintendo’s social media networks have gone largely silent on this game following the mess that arose over the weekend, but with this info, they’ll perhaps resume it soon. A new game in a franchise that has undoubtedly not made around half a billion dollars could use it, which is due for release a week from Friday.