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Voice Actor Reveal: Hikaru Hamato!


I am thrilled to announce that for the role of the youngest Hamato brother, Sami Chen shall be lending their talents! Casting this Kappa like the others wasn't all that difficult of a process. I had an idea of how I wanted him to sound, but unlike the others I was definitely less married to it. I kind of always felt while Hikaru probably most closely resembles his inspiration personality wise. Voice wise this was the area I really felt he would differ. For Hikaru, really what helped me in determining who to cast for the role was just the first line, "'sup my name's Hikaru." If the actor couldn't properly pronounce the character's name I sort of ruled that as a failure. Part of this was just to cut down on the massive number of auditions for the role, and another part was because Hikaru was going to have pronounce his brother's names as well as a few other Japanese words. And yes I could absolutely just teach a VA how to pronounce things, but I'm my opinion it's better to cast someone who can already do it on their own. And I believe Sami was one of the few if not the only VA who auditioned for the role who properly pronounced Hikaru's name. Which when you're deciding between like 49 other candidates a lot of which all took sort of the same approach when it came to the sound of his voice, really helps to separate them (Sami) from the pack.

Pronunciation aside, I just felt really drawn to Sami's performance. Obviously at this juncture you just gotta take my word for it. I think maybe the other VA who auditioned just leaned too much into the wacky side of him or the lazy side of him (Hikaru)? Sami just seemed to have understood Hikaru's vibe. Which is kind of all you have to go off of as Hikaru really isn't a particularly complex character. Sami even went so far as to ask me, "so should he have a Japanese accent? Or American?" To which I really just told Sami, "you decide." So when you hear Hikaru, that's all Sami, outside a handful of guidance on a delivery of like maybe 7 lines? It's all their interpretation and how they believe Hikaru should be reacting, or speaking. There's a real charm and believability they bring that I really don't know if the other VAs would have captured quite as effectively as they have. And that's not to poo-poo anyone who auditioned, that's never my intention with these announcements to crap on others to raise another. But to illustrate that sometimes it's not about how talented you are, but just if you're right for the role. I could have hired an equally talented VA and gotten fantastic results just fine, but that's just not how I do this. I'm not a casting director I'm not even really a developer so I don't view these performances solely as "who has the best audio uh- acoustics or whatever and the best performances." It's just "does this quality sound like someone who knows what their doing and sounds of quality?" and "do they make sense for this role?" And Sami just made sense by a large margin when compared to the others that after I heard their take that was really it. While Sami isn't Japanese they are the only Asian person to have auditioned for the role. And Hikaru is of course Asian, so again it's deeper than "is this a good performance?"

Again, not a casting director. But once you remove the barrier of entry being "is this a good performance" and "is this good quality audio" you have to start thinking about okay what are you parameters then? So that's why I asked people to tell me why they wanted a specific role because that sometimes really is the deciding factor. Anyways, I'm rambling. Sami was such a delight to work with and they seem like such a genuine person with a real love for the craft, you can just look at their Twitter to see the light they radiate out in the world. And that in itself makes them the perfect choice for Hikaru who just wants to have fun, be positive, let's the bad roll off his back. Smiles in the bad times, makes people joke in their darker moment to help alleviate the fear. Hikaru is a character that helps make the sad stuff easier, helps lighten the pressure on your shoulders, and Sami really appears to do that themselves in their real life. And so I think innately that adds to their performance. It's interesting because when you do seem to find that perfect actor for a role when you ask yourself, "why are they perfect?" it's just kind of like, "uh- well- duh, hmm." And you can't actually really quantify it because you don't decide these things just based on "they do acting good." So it's just sort of this feeling or other factors that may or may not seem superfluous to others. And that's sort of the case here, like it's apparent Sami is talented, you can listen to their demo and hear that. But without really experiencing what they bring to this role first hand and sort of within context I don't know that I can ever truly make you grasp why it is exactly, or what it is I saw/heard. For now you really just have to trust me that when the time comes and you can experience these events and moments with the Hamato, Sami is really going to shine as Hikaru. And that dialogue with the other actors playing the Hamato is just really going to show why they were the perfect choice. Because that itself is a whole other facet to consider too. But I've rambled enough, for now just take my word for it. Sami Chen really is the best person for the job, they nailed this role. They talked with me took time to understand how Hikaru differs from his inspiration, why he might talk a certain way compared to his brothers. So without any further delay, Sami Chen, welcome to Pleasant Sparkle Academy, may your time here be righteous!

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