Voice vs. Choice

[aaaaaDisregard]

Maybe it's not just storyline, but increase in complexity of game scripting, animations and overall technology. In fallout you can script NPC to go at point (x; y) and then initiate a dialog, while in modern RPGs like Mass Effect 2 designers have to take care of camera, different animations, facial expressions, lighting etc. And then debug it all.
Just remember how messy and full of bugs were Troika's choice-rich games like Arcanum and Vampire: Masquerade - Bloodlines.

So it's not just voice acting, but tech complexity and players' expectations of production values. I'm more than ready to play Fallout: New Vegas with 2D 1998-level tech if it had as much freedom as original Fallouts, but most gamers aren't so forgiving, sadly=(.
A friend of mine said he won't play Alpha Protocol 'cause its graphics sucks. I'm, afraid he's not alone.

But if you look at it from different perspective, something as cool as Mass Effect 2 just couldn't be achieved without those expensive profuction values. It's not better than Fallout 2 as an RPG, but it's not pure RPG either. Times change, game design changes, but it's still great fun to play all these new games with different ideas in mind than 10 years ago. Embrace the future!

 

[AngryMongoose]

Yes. It is. I hate silent protagonists.

In the two examples, the protagonists themselves speak only in text...

Personally, I think most games could chuck away voice acting. It annoys me alot even without the limitations in choice and scope in games, the voices are stupid and wrong, tend to not sync with the characters properly, seem out of place when you look at the characters, and mean I can't make up my own voices based on the character themselves. It also means that RPG protagonists lose their ability to speak full sentences, or have to speak only in text when everyone else can speak normally, and means you have to choose between not being able to name your character, having noone say their name, or only getting to choose their first name and have it not be refered to at all.

 

[GothmogII]

Yes. It is. I hate silent protagonists. I understand your reasoning, but I honestly think voice acting in games is absolutely essential to sell it as the next step in media that the industry seems to be trying desperately to do. If it comes down to reading multiple dozen option there are a lot of people, myself included, that'll read until something interesting comes up and click on that because they don't want to spend half an hour deciding on these things.

So I respectfully disagree.

Umm, the protagnists at least in the games mentioned in the article (Torment and Fallout) -weren't- silent. They 'spoke' through dialogue like everyone else, I do get what you're talking about, but that really only applies to a certain RPGs, mostly JRPGs I've noticed where, you simply have others talk at you and occasionally get to press yes or no.

So no, I don't agree that voice acting is essential, as written text can do just as good a job, if not better than vo work. Although for preference, I rather enjoy a mixed bag of talking heads and dialogue, which is what Planescape Torment and Fallout had incidentally. Mainly dialogue but with key characters voice acted at certain points in the game.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

No voice acting is just an unnecessary expense. And even the best voice actors can't do anything with the crap that passes for most video game dialog.

Anyone old enough to remember what happened during the transition from Floppy based games to CD based games? A ton of great older games were put on CD with decent voice acting instead of written text. System Shock 1 was notable for that period because of the goodness of the newly voiced audio logs. A good idea would be to release a game with text first, then if it looks like the game is a hit re-release it later with voice and an expansion. Almost no additional development cost but you get nearly a full sales cycle.

And games don't need full voice for it to be useful. The great Planescape didn't have full voice but you read the text in the characters voices in your head throughout the whole game. It made the parts that did use voice even more meaningful because if the character was talking you knew it was special.

 

[ben---neb]

Another excellent example of what Shamus suggests is Borderlands. All quests are given via text as are major plot points. But the characters still say a one line greeting and you get audio logs as well. It works well although it does mean I do some quests without really caring for the reasons why.

 

[FloodOne]

I would love to see deep RPG's have like the first line of dialog voiced while the rest is text, while more linear games be fully voiced.

I came here to post this exact thought.

I was much more connected to the story in Final Fantasy X than I ever was to VIII or IX.

I also think that more linear RPG's should use Mass Effect's conversation whell, minus the choice. It will make a quest description move much more fluidly if your next question is fired off right after the first answer you receive.

That is assuming of course, that future linear RPG's aren't like FF XIII, and more like Suikoden or the older FF titles. Plenty of diversions and interaction with the world you're observing, even if you can't change how the story unfolds.

 

[dochmbi]

When you were talking about the knick-knack quest, I thought were referring to Fallout 3, because in my experience there are many ways to do most of the quests in that game, not just the standard good and evil versions. If you go to the fallout wiki and look for information on quests you might be surprised to see that there are many choices which you overlooked.

 

[bjj hero]

I think a big issue is in that literacy levels are not as high as they should be, some people are dyslexic, others have poor eyesight and text is becoming harder to read if you have a none HD TV for your console. Voice acting makes the game accessable to more people which can increase sales. Add to this that developers feel the need to prove games are "art" and voice acting is here to stay.

Personally I don't need all NPCs to have a voice, this is doubley true when you are making the one voice actor voice 15 charecters. I also don't need my games to be art, just make it enjoyable and engaging.

 

[Crystalgate]

Yes. It is. I hate silent protagonists. I understand your reasoning, but I honestly think voice acting in games is absolutely essential to sell it as the next step in media that the industry seems to be trying desperately to do. If it comes down to reading multiple dozen option there are a lot of people, myself included, that'll read until something interesting comes up and click on that because they don't want to spend half an hour deciding on these things.

So I respectfully disagree.

You do realize that you won't actually get all those nine choices listed like that.

1) Sneak or scam your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the knickknack.
2) Murder your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the knickknack.

Those two for example, are both done by telling the king you accept his mission. The difference between those two is how you actually proceeds with the mission, not what dialog choice you pick. You don't have to tell the king you will murder the guards, you just have to do it.

Some of the other options also aren't dialog choices at all. To find and free Nancy without even having gotten the mission from the king in the first is obviously just something you do. The "get Nancy killed" option also sounds like something you don't tell the king in advance.

Despite those nine option, when you talk to the king you only need four dialog choices (accept the mission, don't accept it, attack the king, bribe the king).

 

[asinann]

And here I thought it was going to be about voice chat in MMO's, you know, that thing that if it's in the game and you don't use it you get tossed from groups and raids.

 

[kementari]

I dunno. I seem to be in the minority here, but I'd far prefer a game with no voice acting. With the exception of cutscenes and the like, I've (almost) never listened to the full text of voice-acted speech. Usually I'm just irritated by the voice acting in games, often to the point where certain (sometimes oft-repeated) phrases become the subject of mockery.

I feel as though there's an undercurrent of thought in games that says that if a line isn't delivered with a voice, nobody will be able to tell what the speaker's attitude is. This is not only false, it's a sad road to see ourselves going down. Everything can be derived from context, if it's written well. If we spent more on writers and less on big-name voice actors, we'd probably have better games.

 

[Unrulyhandbag]

some text was here.

You, sir, are spot on. Bad voice acting is the single most annoying feature of oblivion. worst example is when a beggar steps out of character voice to spout nonsense about the courier in an upper class style voice.

I personally can't wait until voice synthesis reaches a point that you can ignore actors. Even if it can't do emotion it'll be as good as oblivion with a lot more variety and some solid dialogue.


second: Star control 2. Possibly the best space based game ever (Master of Orion holds it's corner well.) The only thing I dislike about that game is the Spathi music but it does get the point across just as well as any voice acting.

I double take every time I see SC2 on these boards until I remember that peeps are on about Starcraft 2 these days.

Right now I'm going to download Ur-Quan masters for some free SC2 replaying.

 

[0HP]

I think Shamus is right. I'm so incredibly fed up with voice acting that doesn't make sense and quest-lines that get truncated into "either-or" scenarios.

Take Fallout 3, for instance, in "The Replicated Man" quest (assuming you can get past the idea that the whole idea of this quest doesn't make sense and has nothing to do with the fallout setting to being with), the cyborg AA-23 was voice acted by a competent, but overused voice actor. I only actually listened to his lines on the first playthrough and, even then, you've got to struggle through the immersion because the SAME actor is used for a bunch of other guards and random townsfolk throughout the game. After that first playthrough, I didn't even give a crap anymore and was just skipping his dialog wholesale.

And what about Three-Dog? I can't NOT accept his quest to go get the new radio dish? WTF is that about!? No matter how much you insult or try to bribe him, nothing works. It all comes back to the same one or two dialog choices that will actually move the quest forward. Again, whoever did Three-Dog is a pretty good voice actor. He was given some poorly written lines and maybe some bad coaching, but he does alright as far as faces with names go in video games.

What happened here? I liked Fallout 1 and 2's "talking heads" idea. Most of the mooks just spout one-liner floats over their heads. You can read these quickly and get a feel for the atmosphere of the game. They're not worth full dialog interaction. So, there's no need to voice them and, thus, no need to hear the same actor do 20 different characters. But for a few of the really interesting characters, we get fully-animated faces and some really good voice acting like Michael Dorn. Yeah, Michael Dorn! Who doesn't love his characters? And even the lesser known actors like Jeffrey Jones did very well. I will forever associate him with President Richardson. Having that one actor do just that one character really puts the cherry on it, you know.

*Apology: Sorry. I should have known there would be another thread up about this. :/

 

[LTK_70]

You know what I liked? The voice acting in Pirates!! (Yes, that is an exclamation mark of my own in addition to the one in the title.) Everything was spoken in gibberish. There were only two possible variations on gibberish, one for the person, who was either French, Dutch, or English, and one for his mood, which could be delighted, disapproving, or scalding. That makes nine soundbits, which are adequate for every governor in every town in the entire game in every language. It's so easy, why don't more games do that? You just give the impression that everyone is speaking a foreign language, and put everything in written text. All you need to do is set the mood, and you can endlessly tweak the exact words if you want.

 

[Hurr Durr Derp]

Deus Ex did both full voice-acting and multiple choice.

Deus Ex' voice acting was also hilariously bad. I mean, it's probably one of the best games ever, but it had some of the worst voice acting ever as well.

On topic: I really don't care about voice acting in videogames. It certainly helps immersion, but especially in menu-based conversations like most videogame RPGs it's completely unnecessary IMO.

 

[Pinstar]

Yet another reason why modern graphics (and in this case) are a curse, rather than a blessing, for good game design.

 

[Avaholic03]

Well as long as games like Uncharted 2 get praise for their voice acting, then other developers will see that as a point to compete with. It's not necessarily a good or a bad thing, it just is what it is. I don't see that voice and choice are mutually exclusive, especially with how much data can be stored on BluRay discs, there could be an extensive web of choice.

 

[omicron1]

Someone needs to work more on text-to-speech synthesis. Our current levels thereof date back to Windows 98 or thereabouts; yet if someone was able to develop a quality voice engine - that sounded natural - it would fix so many problems with budget and open-ended design.

 

[Wolfram23]

I like your thinking. I sometimes just listen to the voice acting and pretend it's a movie but often, I skip if possible. I never played that Planescape game but it sounds like they did a really good job with it. Text is great, and a little bit of voice acting maybe also add full on voice acting if there's any important cinematics or w/e. Could be fun!

 

[Not-here-anymore]

Yep, I end up skipping almost all the voice acting (in story driven RPG's, anyway). And then frequently end up skipping the next cutscene or going with the default option, as I press skip at exactly the moment the choice appears (damned mass effect, with the dialogue wheel appearing whilst the subtitles are still on screen.

Maybe the lines just before cutscenes/choices should be unskippable to prevent that from happening?

And I suspect it's more expensive than just voice actor costs to have that many choices - the programmers have to make each choice viable, new graphics may be needed for a different route, different sound effects might have to be used, this new route has to be tested for glitching... and all this for a series of choices that most players may well not take. And then this has to be done for every quest with variable methods of completion!