[Music] My name is Cloud my name is Cloud
soldier first class
Cloud Strife is arguably the most iconic Final Fantasy character from its spiky blonde hair
to his oversized weapons in asymmetric outfits it's easy to see why his design is so memorable
but something has always confused me about Cloud since his vocal debut on the PlayStation
2 Cloud's adult voice has remained the same to this day in Japanese if you ignore these
games in English Cloud has had two different voice actors but all three of them give quite
a different performance when reading Cloud's lines leading to very different interpretations
of who he is based solely on who's voicing him and this isn't just limited to dialogue
so today we'll be analyzing the nuances history and vocal
evolution of the consistently confusing character Cloud Strife [Music] Jayniac
since his inception Cloud was intended to be a sort of deviation from your standard
JRPG protagonist rather than genuinely having a boisterous or arrogant personality any and all
traces of being a battle-hardened soldier with insurmountable confidence was a farce Cloud's
not a soldier he's a guy playing soldier a guy who looked up to soldiers as a child who's now
convinced himself that this is how soldiers behave and as the game progresses his real personality
slips through the cracks in reality Cloud's insecure and a bit of a dork and anytime this
side of himself was unwittingly put on display he'd be very quick to backpedal all of this was
presented to the player through text and on-screen animation because of this it can be a bit
challenging to interpret some of Cloud's dialogue and the intention behind it you'd think the advent
of technology capable of using voices in the games would remedy this but this is where we
run into our first problem after the mind-numbing success of Final Fantasy VII it only made sense to
capitalize on that success by featuring everyone's favorite spiky blonde soldier in a plethora of
sequels spin-offs and other series the first of which being 2002's Kingdom Hearts where right away
you might notice something's a little strange a red cape a metal claw extra pairs of belts none of
these features were synonymous with the previous rendition of Cloud Strife but rather Vincent
Valentine a completely different Final Fantasy VII character this is a problem because now Cloud
who is once depicted as a guy pretending to be the edgy action hero is playing it completely straight
you see Vincent is the dark and brooding bad boy he's the undead loner that wishes to atone for
his past failures but for some strange reason all of those attributes are now given to Cloud
in his first voiced role which means the voice actors were likely directed to play Cloud this
way instead of how he was originally portrayed because of this so many of Cloud's lines sound
like this I'm looking for someone Hades promise to help I tried to exploit the power of darkness
but it backfired I fell into darkness and I couldn't find the light dry stoic monotone
nothing at all like Cloud in the original game now in order to thoroughly analyze each voice
we need to pay close attention to how lines are being delivered what words are being held what
phrases are being strained and most importantly the tone in which they are being presented
unfortunately I skipped all my Japanese classes to play Dissidia in the back of my car which
is to say it'd be hard for me to intricately analyze a vocal performance in a language I'm
unfamiliar with but I'd be remiss if I didn't at the very least mention Cloud's tone in Japanese
Takahiro Sakurai who's been voicing Cloud for over 20 years lends a greater deal
of confidence to Cloud's personality this is especially noticeable when contrasted with Steve
Burton's voice in English how about a rematch sometime fair and square no dark powers involved
I think I'll pass
but hey Kingdom Hearts is just a side series so what if they fuse two characters it's not like
they do that for an actual Final Fantasy VII sequel right come on there's no way
2005 gave us the first direct sequel to Final Fantasy VII the animated feature film Final
Fantasy VII: Advent Children in 2006 we got it in English and uh well take a listen do I
feel sorry for you I pity you I want to be forgiven more than anything yeah the vocal
direction didn't get any better to be fair though the movie's plot centers around Cloud
fighting off a disease called geostigma one of the symptoms is fatigue so like maybe he's just tired
though there are a few scenes where Cloud's voice is pushed to demonstrate his distress
Tifa
Tifa for the most part he sounds pretty docile take this scene for example here
Tifa is scolding Cloud for being so moody there's no cure yeah but that's
not stopping Denzel is it I'm not fit to help anyone nobody now let's hear it in Japanese
from the cadence of his words to the change of his volume it sounds almost like poetry Cloud
who had been living behind a false identity for years prior to this only recently learned
to genuinely open up to people now being infected with geostigma he not only puts up his barriers
again the façade he once championed is in full effect Cloud's reverting back to his fake self
as a coping mechanism but deep down the traces of him putting on a show are still there hence
the poetic tone or hey maybe I'm just reading into it too much let's move on the same year this movie
was released Japan got Last Order Final Fantasy VII a 25-minute OVA recreating an iconic moment
from the original game unfortunately it was only ever officially released in Japanese though there
does exist an English fan dub on YouTube it's pretty good check it out shortly thereafter
Cloud would play a supporting role in Kingdom Hearts II and Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII
not much changes in terms of Cloud's presentation that is except for one particular instance
we lost contact about 15 minutes ago I don't think we have to worry though
those two should be fine yeah and what about you what do you think right
and as for you don't worry leave Deep Ground in me can you hold on a second Tifa
don't get yourself killed now for the first time ever we hear a more jovial side to cloud
in English fitting seeing as how Dirge of Cerberus takes place after Advent Children that must have
gotten out of his angsty phase then 2007 gave us a prequel to the original game Crisis Core:
Final Fantasy VII which would later be remastered and redubbed in 2022
currently this is the first instance where Takahiro Sakurai, Steve Burton,
and Final Fantasy VII Remake's English dub newcomer Cody Christian all do the
exact same lines so what better way to compare them than with one iconic battle cry Sephiroth
Sephiroth [Music]
Where do we begin in all fairness Cody Christian does a wonderful job portraying Cloud both here
and in Remake even going so far as to make him sound significantly younger in Crisis
Core much like Steve Burton it's this line that really stood out to me while playing
through Crisis Core Reunion it sounds like Cloud's living in a basement apartment and
doesn't want to wake up his landlord upstairs [Music] Sephiroth last time we discussed how
drastically different Zack's new voice is but I'm happy to say that Cloud's new English
voice is almost identical to his original one with a few nuances sprinkled here and there
hey Zack you know I've never seen you use that hey Zack I really like that sword
it's impressive side comment I had initially thought that changing this line made sense seeing
as how Cloud definitely would have seen Zack use the buster sword at some point in time but as many
have pointed out the original line was a callback to Zack telling Angeal he'd never seen him use his
sword so now Zack having a flashback makes little sense though we could chalk it up as Zack just
remembering Angeal because Cloud acknowledges the sword at all because seriously how could he
not have seen Zack use it he he must have right personally I think Crisis Core is Burton's best
performance as Cloud the only other instance of him voicing Cloud that really stood out to me was
in Dissidia Final Fantasy NT that is now in the original Dissidia and its sequel Duodecim Cloud
demonstrates a lot of his usual stoicism an answer I'm tired of taking part in pointless battles
we're enemies no matter how you look at it we have to fight but in NT for the first
time ever Burden is allowed to play Cloud the way he was originally portrayed confidently
looks like I finally found my way sarcastically
such a warm welcome he's got a bit of a southern twang and get this he even laughs
but then you get the rest of his dialogue and don't get in my way or else just do what you
can you're bigger than the reactor now look I'm not here to criticize anyone's performance I'm
just analyzing what we got and what we got was a very strange direction for Cloud's English voice
which fortunately was remedied once the Remake released in 2020 here adult Cloud's English voice
was played solely by Cody Christian who has given numerous opportunities to demonstrate
things other than indifference that wasn't the deal you mean you want more even though you've
got a priceless reward coming your way do you know what I promised him I'll do it
that went pretty well sure did
huh wait a minute did you did you nope let's get down to business shall we most every home
in the area has one folks love them because they practically eliminate the rotten egg
smell honestly they make us more money than this place and it's easy money too we give me a break
I'm not a salesman I'm a soldier it took over 20
years but now Cloud finally sounds the way he's supposed to in English
so there you have it of the 950 people that voted in my community poll 50 percent wanted
an analysis on Cloud's voice I hope you enjoyed it if we're going to keep talking about character
voices I'd love to go over Tifa's next she's a very unique character and I've always had
a soft spot for Rachel Leigh Cook's portrayal of the character in a way it's kind of meta you
see Rachel came to prominence in the mid to late 90s 1997 was when Final Fantasy VII released and
gave us Tifa Lockhart my favorite woman in video gaming the series spanned across various mediums
like novels CDs and film but never found its way to television 1998 one year later
Buffy the Vampire Slayer is redefining standard television programming in its third season the
season that introduces Faith a character played by my favorite actress Eliza Dushku fast forward
to 1999 a year after that and Final Fantasy VIII hit the shelves starring a cast of youngsters at
attending a military academy not unlike a high school and it was in the year 2000 that
Eliza Dushku played Missy in the high school comedy Bring It On and if you start the film
at 21 minutes and 34 seconds you'll notice on Missy's dashboard a statue of Tifa Lockhart
be sure to follow my social medias but especially Twitch if you want to see me live stream if you
like hearing my voice be sure to follow the Jr. & Marcus Talk Podcast available on anywhere you
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finally be sure to check out the merchandise hopefully there will be new stuff at the end
of this month or I don't know sometime this year I'm genuinely surprised that 17 percent
of people voted for River City Girls how many of you are playing that game what'd you think of the
second one and to all the Final Fantasy fans how do you feel about Rebirth I'm hoping to stream
it at the end of this year but until then I'll leave you with this come on you're gonna call
your guards on us in case you haven't noticed they're all beat up yeah we did that for love