Taliyah was revealed yesterday morning, and while many players were excited about her abilities and the new landmark-centric synergies, others were concerned about some about her character portrayal. While her League of Legends complexion is bronzed and reminiscent of Middle Eastern heritage, her Legends of Runeterra complexion seemed much more fair-skinned and closer to European heritage.
Cropped portraits of Taliyah from her LoL splash screen (left) and LoR L1 full card art (right); click for full-sized originals
The other major change from LoL was her vocalization -- Riot both changed the Voice Actress and gave her a much different characterization. In LoL, Tayilah has a hard, mature voice and her lines are delivered with a very determined tone. The voice lines we've heard so far in LoR have a very juvenile voice are delivered in a giddy, "sing-sing" tone. Reddit user u/ranp34 created an excellent clip highlighting the differences in the voice lines.
Later that same day, Riot announced on their official Twitter channel that they recognized the seeming cultural appropriation and had begun the process of revising her artwork. They also spoke to their decision to change Taliyah's Voice Actress.
Quote From @PlayRuneterra Hey folks, thanks for the feedback on Taliyah’s visual design. Her current design isn’t representative of her character, and we’re making changes. Due to time constraints, her updated art won’t be in at the launch of Empires of the Ascended, but we’ve started on revisions.
We love working with @ericalindbeck - you’ll hear her voice all over LoR. However, we made the decision to recast Taliyah’s voice actor to the extremely talented @ZehraFazal to remain as authentic to her character and heritage as possible.
Community feedback has been a key pillar for LoR, and the entire team strives to ensure our champions and followers all authentically represent their core themes and respective cultures. We appreciate your passion and feedback to keep us on that course.
Erica Lindbeck is a Caucasian Voice Actress who voices several Riot characters, including Morgana (LoL 2019 release and LoL 2020 "Coven skin"), Zoe (LoL 2017 release and LoR 2020 release), and the original Taliyah in her 2016 LoL release. Ironically, it seems like Riot's attempt to "realign" Taliyah's voice lines with a Pakistani-American Voice Actress (Zehra Fazal) have called even more attention to their artwork oversights than if they had stayed with Erica. Zehra Fazal also voices LoL's Kayle.
What do you think of Riot's quick response? Was it warranted? Share your thoughts with us below!
Comments
who gives a fuck?
I like the LoR look more though.. Taliyah in league looks a lot more awkward, I prefer her with normal eyebrows.. the skin tone is too bright for desert borne person though that much is true but I wouldn't change the eyebrows in LoR... rather change those in league..
Hey some people appreciate a bushy brow.
when I see these controversies I am reminded that people in the internet are under the impression that middle eastern have just one skin color and belong all to the same ethnic group.
I guess so. Because if this article didn't mention it, I wouldn't even know we're talking about someone from the middle east.
While you're entirely correct in that it isn't as simple as people made it seem, it is still true that her voice was entirely a 360 from the LoL voice and the design was different as well. For me the annoyance wasn't the matter of her fitting her land of heritage so much as fitting the style which they had already established for the character.
If you didn't tell me she was supposed to look middle eastern in the left photo I would never have guessed tbh. She looks european in both.
Edit: That person lost a job because she didn't sound serious enough. I am glad I didn't choose VA to be my career.
To be clear (because I misinterpreted the first time I read Riot's tweet too): the juvenile delivery in the LoR reveal is by the Pakistani-American VA, and that is currently expected to remain unchanged. The serious delivery in LoL is by the Caucasian VA; Riot still uses her (she just did LoR Zoe and will presumably do LoR Morgana in the future), but they decided it would be more appropriate to have Taliyah voiced by someone of Middle Eastern heritage.
It is unclear why they also changed the characterization so drastically when they changed VAs. Zehra Fazal is an accomplished VA more than capable of delivering a "serious" tone -- besides LoL Kayle, she's also voiced the Batman villain Talia al Ghul, the fighter pilot Nadia Rizavi from Voltron: Legendary Defender, and She Ra's predecessor Mara in She Ra: Princess of Power.
I am agree about voice acting, it's something different not original Taliyah. But i don t know why lgbt or who else angry about her, she looks fine, yes, eyebrows thin now, but maybe she just want new make up:D
So people just making fuzz over nothing again. Got it.
Pretty much, yup. While I on *some* level understand that people who like her characterization in LoL are a little upset with the shift in LoR voicewise (luxifying her voice), it's nothing to get bent out of shape over.
On top of that, the two images above look the same to me. If I was an artist hired on and was told "here's the left picture, we want you to make card art", I would have probably assumed that the characters face was in shadows in the left, and made her face look exactly the same as it is on the right. The face on the right looks like typical euro heritage character but in the sunlight, while the one on the left looks like she has shadows cast on most of her face.
This has NOTHING to do with LGBTQ-whatever or sexism at all. But the sad thing is, the mercurial, vindictive, and frankly caustic gaming culture gets up in arms at literally everything. It's frankly speaking, a little sad.
To respond to the article's question. Was Riot's response warranted? Sure, Riot wants to be known as the "inclusive gaming company" so they tend to rectify community outcry in all matters psuedo political. Was it necessary? Depends. The artist misconstruing the origin? Maybe, then again these are fictional characters with *technically* fictional lands of origin, no=one should be getting offended at any of it. Voice? Not at all. I mean, yea the "lux-style" voice tends to get a little annoying after awhile, and new characters voices should be more reminiscent than "that sounds like it could be Lux's cousin", but at the same time, it's nothing to write home about.
"This has NOTHING to do with LGBTQ-whatever or sexism at all" You're right it has everything to do with marketing. Changing her nose, skin tone and eyebrows to look more European will have a wider appeal to worldwide audiences. I don't think Riot maliciously whitewashed the character but it was a pretty tone deaf move to change one of the few unconventionally attractive LoL girls into yet another samefaced design.
The voice is the bigger deal for me and I'm glad for the changes. We already have Lux, Zoe, Lulu and presumably every yordle character to come for the bubbly, cutesy, high pitched voice role, do they really need to make the serious 23 year old sound 16?
e: Just realized they shafted the original VA because she was white to be more politically correct but whitewashed the character in the art. They don't plan on changing the voice, Riot went full blown circus act on this one.
I'm not always perfect at interpreting things like this, but it says they are recasting the voice acting. Pretty sure that means they are changing both the voice and the art.
Read the last paragraph of the article again. It is a little confusing, I was fooled at first as well.