Dialog, best seen and not heard?

[Starglider]

After I'd heard a characters voice a few times, I could pretty much imagine what they sounded like for the remainder of the dialogue. I'd love to see that used again.

 

Very much agree. Having key lines voice acted makes the characters much more real - the player can fill in the rest from that baseline much more easily than making up a voice from scratch. However having every line recorded is not an efficient use of funds unless you have Grand Theft Auto level budgets to spray around.

 

Note that realistically, leaving out voice acting entirely is not an option. The game just won't sell to a wide audience if it completely lacks such a basic modern feature.

Edited September 25, 2012 by Starglider

[Tale]

Also, with text, the NPCs can now refer to the PC by name.

I'm playing Neverwinter Nights 2 and I chuckle everytime the subtitles say my character's name. Because they are lying.

[JediMB]

Note that realistically, leaving out voice acting entirely is not an option. The game just won't sell to a wide audience if it completely lacks such a basic modern feature.

 

If this was a game for a "wide audience", it wouldn't be needing Kickstarter.

Edited September 25, 2012 by JediMB

[Metabot]

I like ambient chatter and stuff like that in Morrowind and BG2 and maybe voiced greetings, but I think reading is much more interactive anyways.

[zlarm]

I'm against both full VO and no VO. Full VO takes up too much resource (and well its already been confirmed that PE is not full VO). That said I would like the limited VO seen in the BG games. Think of how much a little VO added to some of the characters in BG (particularily Saerovok, Edwin, Minsc, Irenicus etc..)

[themanclaw]

I can't stand poor voice acting in RPG's. Skyrim's dialogue was painful to sit through, even though I loved the rest of the game. It is essential to character development and narrative immersion and I would sacrifice gameplay features if it meant having quality acting.

[metiman]

Yes. Someday we may develop a technology to synthesize realistic voices but till then, voice acting is expensive and games like RPG where you are trying to create a living world with deep stories, its not practical to voice all written dialog. So for the time being, we have to settle for just the texts.

 

Note that I'm not saying we should have majority text only for the sake of it. I'm just saying we have to make do with what technology allows us at the moment.

 

Voice certainly increases immersion, and should be implemented where and when its practical.

 

http://www.cereproc....pport/live_demo

 

Speech synthesis has gotten suffciently good that I purchased the cereproc Stuart voice for converting ebooks to audio books. It's not perfect, but it's not half bad. Better than many bad voice actors that you sometimes find narrating audio books, particularly in science fiction. After listening for a while it starts to seem close to a real person to me. I think Stuart, Sarah, and William are the best voices. The area at the top of the screen is where you can type in text and hear it read by the various voices. It would be nice if Eternity were speech synthesis engine friendly. Although the voices aren't quite good enough for me to actually request for them to spend any time on a speech engine hook.

[Tale]

If the software can't emote, it's no replacement for an actor. People aren't going to be satisfied having the lines read to them. They can do that part themselves.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Also, with text, the NPCs can now refer to the PC by name.

I'm playing Neverwinter Nights 2 and I chuckle everytime the subtitles say my character's name. Because they are lying.

NWN did this, as well, and I think it was a pretty elegant solution.

 

It seems no one else liked it.

[Wolfenbarg]

I think the Infinity Engine games got it right. Almost all of the dialogue was presented through text, but most of the conversation starters, pivotal lines, and lines that would start a battle were spoken. I love that. It makes lines very iconic and memorable without requiring an ungodly expense to voice 3 novels worth of text.

[Sistergoldring]

I'm with Wolfenbarg. I think that the partial voicing of NPCs is probably optimum, we get the sense of character and emotion that a good voice actor brings to the work and the additional dialogue options that are possible with a text based system.

[Bos_hybrid]

There is no point in full VO for this project and I'm glad the devs have made it clear it's not happening. I still feel for AAA RPG the NWN2 way was best, give quite a bit of VO, with lot's of text in other places. I just don't understand how there is a downside to that.

 

For PE, just the bare minimum, even then if Obs said there was no VO, I wouldn't lose any sleep over it.

[themanclaw]

For PE, just the bare minimum, even then if Obs said there was no VO, I wouldn't lose any sleep over it.

Well, since narrative has been emphasized as an key element in PE, I feel that without at least some VO, one would be deprived of crucial character aspects that denote their general mindset and subtitles of their statement.

[Guts]

Like Fallout and Baldur's Gate did it. Voices for the main characters in important situations, mostly just text though. A few different, short voiced greetings for not-so-important NPCs like in Baldur's Gate too.

Edited September 25, 2012 by Guts

[Flying Magician]

They can make it even without any voice acting and it won't concern me. At least if they make the rest of the game right. Behold how fcuking oldschool and hardcore I am.

[Jancarius]

One of the great benefits of DA1 over DA2 was it's choice not to voice the main character. You could generate quite nuanced 'this is WHY I'm burning down the orphanage' responses.

[dlux]

I like to hear the voices of characters, but it can become extremely annoying to hear all of the crap that they have to say. I can read like 5 times faster than these guys can talk. And sometimes they talk so slooooow, which makes the problem even worse.

 

I normally turn on the undertitles because of this, but I have to mute the game, because I can't read very well when the NPC is talking. But sometimes I am just lazy and click straight through and resort to only reading the quest description my journal.

 

If it is a very important NPC or a companion, then they can (and probably should) be fully voiced... but that is about it imo.

Edited September 26, 2012 by dlux

[rjshae]

I'm not sure how well it would work, but possibly they could do an inverse of the voice acting in Mass Effect 2: a short voice over insert combined with a longer text explanation. A set of brief voice overs could be used to express the emotive state while the text gives the full information. Maybe they could use an animated graphic to show a facial expression. Shrug.

[Tauron]

There was similar thread about this i belive. I am for voice, not full, but like we had in BG2. Start of dialogue maybe, to give us the feeling of the character.

[Scootaloo]

I think the Infinity Engine games got it right. Almost all of the dialogue was presented through text, but most of the conversation starters, pivotal lines, and lines that would start a battle were spoken. I love that. It makes lines very iconic and memorable without requiring an ungodly expense to voice 3 novels worth of text.

 

Can't agree more. In fact, I think games that are fully voiced have console player specifically in mind, all show no substance.

[Shardbearer]

All I want is one kick-ass VA for the main villain, it's all I need, and it's usually the most memorable (when done well) voice in a game anyways. It doesn't need to be very line, either, but enough to just establish the voice.

[LokiHades]

BG1 approach personally. Sarevok wouldn't have been the same without his deep booming voice for the few lines he did speak. At the same time, most lines should be text only.

[licketysplit]

Voicework = waste of resources.

 

I don't agree. I think having an introductory line spoken and then the rest largely written helps establish character and wouldn't be prohibitively expensive.

[Boof]

BG and other IE games style. Voice act small parts of dialogue and major encounters.

[Hmm-Hmm.]

Good voiceover work is rather expensive. Not to mention that as an rpg, Eternity would need a LOT of it (even in a trimmed dialogue version). So it's probably best not to voice dialogue at all but possibly have some good voiceover work. And even then it can be hit-and-miss, especially if the PC has a voice in an rpg with character customisation.

 

So what I'd choose is: Voices for NPCs outside of dialogue only. ("Go for the eyes, Boo!") No voices for the main character.