The sort of discussions tend to descend into some argument about how deluded the people are who insist to have this option, or how much of a purist wannabe wapanese one must be to ask for it.

However gaming is about the last bastion for that sort of thing. Not only anime but also regular films made having the option pretty much the norm with DVDs. Digital TV often offers multiple soundtracks as well.

If for FFXIII they don't want to expand to one more dvds and only decide to release English - sucks for those who want the option and only have the 360. Ideally there would be DLC original voices, but that's not a given.
I'll be very disappointed if they don't include it on the ps3 version, which is not a given either. Just recently SE released Disgaea 3 in Europe with just English and French voiceovers.

i could care less about having japanese voices not being on the disk. not a loss at all for me. i have over 400 animes right now and 85% or more are english dubbed. its a nice option but wont affect sales on the 360 version at all, also the ps3 version wont be the definitive version at all, thats just wishfull thinking .

I totally agree with this. I guess ignorance is bliss.

You can tell the ignorant people. They will give you every excuses for why original language isn't needed, when in fact that's them who are the problem.

English dubs are a problem for every single country of Europe where English just is not the main language. So that's far more than just 100,000 people.

And people wonder why JRPG don't sell well in Europe...

The english dubs are always crap, any European that has heard both japanese and english dubs can tell right away the crappy one, and it's always the english dubs (sometimes it makes people laugh for it being so bad), be it in Anime or games. Valkyria Chronicles is a perfect example: everything is butchered right through the subtitles. It's a pain to read sometimes when you understand japanese, and it's even more painful to listen to the english voice track. Some of the american adaptations are just stupid and cringe worthy, while the same scene is just perfect in japanese. And then you will hear people say the story is badly written, when in fact that's only the english adaptation that is very bad.

It's undeniably good to have your mother language in the game, so I can understand the preference for the English dub in NA, but the SE comment shows pretty well that they still don't understand and don't care about Europe. We would be far better with Japanese tracks and subtitles than the crappy English dub and subtitles.

As most NA people are unable to understand, as they most often don't understand more than their mother language, try to imagine a foreign movie you liked, but dubbed in Japanese (when you don't understand Japanese, and it's not the movie's original language).

Now you're FORCED to read the subtitles, and you better know how to read.

I'm sure all those clamoring for the English dubs only couldn't even play the game, be it FF.

Dubs are very important, and can change entirely a movie. It's very easy to turn any good movie to a bad one just with bad subs and translations. There is no point for non english people to get the english dub, when the original language is japanese, and it's counter productive.

I understand perfectly why people want the original language, even if they don't understand it. The story is always better conveyed, there's no contest. As long as you have subtitles in your language.

The only thing I don't understand, are people that play JRPG in Japanese only, when they don't understand a word of japanese. That makes no sense as they lose at least half of the game's interest.

Japanese voice tracks are pretty important to me in JRPGs and anime. English Dubs just aren't at a high enough quality level most of the time and really ruin the experience. For example, I had to stop playing Star Ocean 3 because it got to a point where the cut scenes were so long and the voices were so cringe worthy that the game wasn't worth it to me. FFX's laughing scene is another example of why I can't stand English dubs most of the time. Even if I don't completely understand Japanese I want to see the characters in their original form because that is generally the best way to see and hear them.

I tend to like understanding what the plot is about in my games, so hence I feel more in a game when I can understand the characters and they don't sound like Martians to me.

When terrible VOs in games occur, I would like the option for them to start speaking Animale Crossing style gibberish though, so if FFXIII has horrific voice acting, of course I'd want an alternative to prepubescent teens screaming in my ear in an understandable language; I'd rather prepubescent teens scream into my ear in a language I can't understand.. Otherwise, I see no reason why I'd care for Japanese subs. They don't make it feel any more weaboo to me, really.

Final Fantasy always had good English VO IMO. Besides I prefer playing my games in my own native tongue and not have to pay attention to reading.

japanese voiceover for me please!!

I would have preferred JA voice acting over the English in SO4 any day of the week.

The FF series always have exceptional English voice actors so I highly doubt this will be much of an issue for the targeted audiences in NA and Europe.

There will still be some who prefer the JA voice actors, but it is not a "deciding" factor for me, and probably the majority for FF.

Well, it would be a nice feature and it would suck if they put it down because of the 360 version, but FF games actually have very good VA, FF12 had great voiceacting.

japanese its always better, thats a rule for anything that comes from japan.

cars, technology, anime, movies.

and for almost all jrpg from this gen.