Just had this topic in the Lounge, about Anime.

http://forums.eyesonff.com/lounge/10...-bastards.html

Copy/Pasting part of my response here:

In many cases, the Japanese version 'feels' better. Aside from the elitism and the language barrier, the stuff is Made In Japan. The voice actors are directly influenced by the Director of the show who moulds their performances to fit with his vision. Sometimes a character is designed to perfectly fit with a particular actor. Anime is serious business in Japan.
There's a lot of inbreeding with anime and videogames these days, so oftentimes the voice actors often do both games and anime (in both Japan and the US).