355 réponses à ce sujet

[jadefishes]

I'd love to have a few choices of the voice, but I do enjoy voiced PCs. However, why would it be so difficult to have a toggle to turn the voiced PC off for people who prefer not to hear it?

[Jerrybnsn]

I believe the topic of this thread was basically "no one wants to go back to a silent protanginist anymore and that's in the past".

That's why I  brought up Fallout 3 which came out the same year as ME 1.  In the recent past, people had a choice of what to spend their limited dollars on and Fallout 3 was a more popular game that gamers wanted, even though Mass Effect had a voice character and better graphics.

And that's why I brought up Elder Scrolls Skyrim vs DA2 this year.  It should be no surprised at which game will be more popular.  Again, a silent protanginist game vs a voiced over game and that's in the immediate future of gaming today.

So the sentence up above is not accurate.  I rest my case.

[MyKingdomCold]

Jerrybnsn wrote...

I believe the topic of this thread was basically "no one wants to go back to a silent protanginist anymore and that's in the past".

That's why I  brought up Fallout 3 which came out the same year as ME 1.  In the recent past, people had a choice of what to spend their limited dollars on and Fallout 3 was a more popular game that gamers wanted, even though Mass Effect had a voice character and better graphics.

And that's why I brought up Elder Scrolls Skyrim vs DA2 this year.  It should be no surprised at which game will be more popular.  Again, a silent protanginist game vs a voiced over game and that's in the immediate future of gaming today.

So the sentence up above is not accurate.  I rest my case.

you're making it sound like the only  or primary reason why Fallout 3 sold more than ME was because of the silent protagonist. 

[byzantine horse]

Don't mind the silent protagonist, but having a voice on Hawke was one of the major positives with DA2 imo, having grown up with Nintendo it always seemed odd that my character never said anything (mind you, this isn't even textboxes in most cases) even if npcs just let out muffled sounds - at least it was something.

But sure, I can do without the voice acting on the main character if it means...
... that several races are available.
... the money otherwise spent on voice acting is thoroughly spent on other things that I would otherwise count as "fluff" in the game (combat and story is exempt from the "fluff"-cathegory) such as scenery, cinematics and npc voice acting. You know, those integral things that might not be necesary when you first sit down and create the game (which you really need story and mechanics for).

Modifié par byzantine horse, 12 avril 2011 - 06:50 .

[Einherjar420]

MyKingdomCold wrote...

Jerrybnsn wrote...

I believe the topic of this thread was basically "no one wants to go back to a silent protanginist anymore and that's in the past".

That's why I  brought up Fallout 3 which came out the same year as ME 1.  In the recent past, people had a choice of what to spend their limited dollars on and Fallout 3 was a more popular game that gamers wanted, even though Mass Effect had a voice character and better graphics.

And that's why I brought up Elder Scrolls Skyrim vs DA2 this year.  It should be no surprised at which game will be more popular.  Again, a silent protanginist game vs a voiced over game and that's in the immediate future of gaming today.

So the sentence up above is not accurate.  I rest my case.

you're making it sound like the only  or primary reason why Fallout 3 sold more than ME was because of the silent protagonist. 

My favourite thing about Fallout 3 was V.A.T.S. Nothing else. No vehicle or mount to ride around in made travel a little tedious, but that's ok. No game breaker. Character customization wasn't all that great in Fallout 3 either, compared to Oblivion. My personal belief is that Mass Effect wouldn't have sold as well simply because it is Science Fiction. That doesn't appeal to many people. Mass Effect seem to have a stronger story than Fallout 3. But that is a discussion for another thread.

[Jerrybnsn]

No. I'm saying that it's not true that silent protaginst are a thing of the past. Games with silent protaginst have been and will be some of the highest selling games ever. And the fact that they go head to head with the highly praised games that have voiced characters and still sell overwhelmingly over them, proves that they are not going away.

[Einherjar420]

Jerrybnsn wrote...

No. I'm saying that it's not true that silent protaginst are a thing of the past. Games with silent protaginst have been and will be some of the highest selling games ever. And the fact that they go head to head with the highly praised games that have voiced characters and still sell overwhelmingly over them, proves that they are not going away.

I can see that being true, although I'd have to look at the statistics before agreeing with you. As long as franchises like Legend of Zelda and Mario exist, the silent protaganist will always be in games. I have a suspicion that silent protaganists will be used less and less over time though. Companies just seem to like that route better.

[DoctorCuddles]

I'm not bothered either way, both options have their pros and cons.

[TMZuk]

If Obsidian/Bethesda had made the decision to voice Fallout: New Vegas, I cannot imagine how much space it would have taken up. New Vegas has four major routes through the game... support NRC, the Legion, Mr. House or your own character. That aside it has a multitude of sidequests, subquests and random people you bump into. It has ten times the amount of content DA:O has and twenty times what DA2 has.

And that's what a silent protagonist offers: The ability to have hugely varied playthroughs, where you travel different places, speak to different people, and discover new locations in each playthrough.

I simply cannot fathom why any role-player will choose less content simply in order to have a voice added to their character. To each their own, I guess.

Modifié par TMZuk, 12 avril 2011 - 08:37 .

[DanaScu]

Einherjar420 wrote...

I see people telling others to go watch a movie if they want to hear a character with voice. In that case, why don't those who want to read text, pick up a book?

Straying off-topic: I also see people claim Dragon Age 2 is not a Role Playing Game. I don't understand this. You're playing the role of Hawke. Is that not role playing?

Of course, there is also those people who feel the need to insult people who choose to play on consoles, and call them idiots without even using proper spelling or grammar. Good show.

I choose to play on a console because I started playing games on them. From NES all the way to current generation. I also prefer the ease of use of a controller over the keyboard and mouse. This somewhow makes me an idiot?

Back on-topic: I'm a casual gamer, because I have to work so I can continue playing video games and such. That being said, I like Voiced characters. In all forms. I've stated in other posts that I enjoyed Dragon Age II far more than Dragon Age: Origins. Hawke having a voice is only 1 reason for that. I found Dragon Age: Orgins' story to be too cliche, and the only memorable parts of it for me were the side quests. After my first playthrough of Dragon Age: Origins, I could not play again. Around 60+ hours and I had finished almost everything, save for some side quests that didn't seem important at all.

I'm on my second playthrough of Dragon Age II, and my first playthrough was 72+ hours. I plan on playing a third time as well, to fix the story of my Mage Hawke. In my oppinion, Dragon Age: Origins was superior in 1 way: less glitches. Dragon Age II's glitches didn't bother me much. A certain one in Act 3 confused me a bit, but nothing more.

I fear I have strayed too far from the topic. Perhaps this rant was better served in another thread, oh well.

Everyone I know would prefer voiced protaganists over silent ones, but they would also read if they had to. It's a 50/50 thing. Some prefer one over the other, some like both. I read books, so I appreciate that protaganists have a voice. I like reading, but I only ever read for an hour at best. I play video games for at least 3.
There is really no need to insult people's intelligence or lay claims to one game being inferior to another just because your oppinion dictates it. Everyone will enjoy game A, while disliking game B, and vice versa. Others will like both. It's just the way things work.

The unfortunate reality for those who prefer to read text in a video game is that voiced protaganists are going to appear more and more. I wouldn't doubt if Bethesda begins to use voice over for Elder Scrolls and Fallout eventually too.

I was playing Bioware's version of Hawke. Unlike my Warden, I couldn't use the weapons I wanted to use, pick the party members I wanted to use, or if I did, I couldn't pick the class I wanted to use, or the dialogue I wanted to say. Hawke was never "my character".  Starting off from the beginning playing a predetermined character is fine, if that is what you want to do. I have no problem playing as Shepard [although forever grateful to the deities of chance that they found a voice actor I liked for at least one Shepard; Meer's Shep annoyed and aggravated me to the point the poor guy never made it off the Normandy to Eden Prime. I have no male Shepard characters because I can't stand the voice.]  If the only two choices for a voice irritated me, I'd just skip the game. Playing "my" character shouldn't make me cringe every time they speak. The sort of almost not quite a paraphrase guess at a vague implication of a hint of what the dialogue might possibly be wheel o'hints really doesn't help the "roleplaying" aspect much either. I want to be able to tell what "my" character is going to say, instead of picking a hint, and sitting there going "Wth was *that* supposed to be?"  I have multiple characters and more than a dozen complete beginning to end playthroughs of Origins. I borrowed my brother's copy of DA2 that he lost interest in and quit playing, forced myself to finish the game once, and can't really remember all that much about it.

If they had not hyped DA2 as DA2 sequel to Origins, they might not have had as much of a reaction. DA2 is much more like JE than DA. As a spin-off it wouldn't be that bad.
 
And you should take a look at Bethesda's Skyrim forum; threads about voiced characters do show up there, and the results are in favor of the silent character.  A few random quotes:

A voice set for battle shouts/wound alerts etc would be nice to see. A mass effect type voiced character? I'd rather every Bethesda employee each took a turn to punch me in the groin then see that happen.

Voices for your character takes heavily away from that character being yours. Text only dialogue options are restricting enough in that regard. With voices you lose control of the attitude and mannerisms and half the time what you pick to say isn't even what comes out.

I'll deal with the grunts and such that you got in Oblivion, though choice would be nice. That said, doing full blown voice overs for my character would be them dictating my character in ways that I do not want. It might be ok or fit with a game that chooses your character for you, like Mass Effect, but the TES series doesn't do that. So it doesn't fit and I would be rather unhappy if they forced it on me.

Different games, different opinions.

Modifié par DanaScu, 12 avril 2011 - 07:35 .

[Tirigon]

The evolution of BioWare RPG.

[Bathead]

Wow. Yet ANOTHER awesome button joke.
*yawn*

[Gatt9]

Faust1979 wrote...

 It was good for the past but really reading text boxes and having no voice is like taking a step back to the past. Are there gamers that want to go back to having to draw your own maps and lots of time sinks just to pad the game out and make it feel like it is longer than it really is? these are the types of cinematic RPGs Bioware has been building to since Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. These are the types of games I dreamed about as a kid hearing the voices making the game feel more life like. It would suck going back to the past.  I don't really think I could sit through anymore where the game is vague at best so you don't know exactly what you need to do just so the game makers can make you feel like the game is longer than it is. 

You didn't really just try to compare a necessary skill for life,  Reading,  to the lack of an auto-map did you?  Really?

You didn't really just try to claim that a necessary skill for life,  Reading,  is a time sink did you?  Really?

Is there anyone left on this forum that wonders why I keep saying Bioware is making games for people who hate RPGs? 

Btw,  that word,  Cinematic,  doesn't mean what you think it does.  It means "Movie" as in,  watching and not participating.

[Dark83]

Cinematic refers to "motion pictures, collectively, as an art".
?

[Ross42899]

Not talking player character is boring and takes a lot of atmosphere. That was the thing I hated most in KotoR, Jade Empire and DAO, that your character didn't talk.

[Alex Kershaw]

There are two possibilities:

1) Like me, you prefer the immersion of not having a voiced character.

2) You prefer a voiced character, but as you are obviously an intelligent life form, you realise that it takes an insane amount of resources to have 3 different personalities PER GENDER PER RACE, leading a much worse game as a result. Dragon Age 2 was limited to just one race but even that was 6 different combinations for every single line of dialogue in the game from the main character, and there's thousands of them! Multiple races will never come back as long as the PC is voiced - they just don't have enough resources for that. Even if I did like the voiced PC, I'd much rather have a larger game than the 6, 12, 18, etc different combinations slogging away at resources.

[Turran]

I can see both good and bad points to having a voiced character, but until the level of customisation is:
You can have 6 different personality voices per race and gender, then sure! Go for it.. (Along with the option to play a voiceless character).
But until then it does break game immersion, I mean my Fem-Hawke sounds bored and dull with everything she says, I want to rip her head off sometimes.

It is not taking a step back at all, it is just the genre of game, it is more immersive and creative for a LOT of people in RPGs to have a silent character. Hell in Origins I was able to change the tone and voice of anyone while reading a text by my character, it is a lot more 'your own game' kinda feel.

[Jerrybnsn]

some games just shouldn't do the voiced character. I enjoyed Sheppard but never felt I was role playing him because of his words he chosed and his mannerism. I was in the military and let me tell you, Sheppard has no military bearing! You can't give orders to your people and cross your arms, uncross them, scratch your head, **** (move your head to one side, a letter that begins with C, that also can be a dirty word, hence the stars, are you serious moderaters?)your head to one side, then the other...but that's another topic.

But Dragon Age was different. It was one of those games that you could fall back into the immersive role playing. I think that's why Bethesda keeps the silent charactersfor that immersive feel. Where DA had one up on Bethesda games was that your character was not flying solo. The interaction with the party members was very rewarding.

Modifié par Jerrybnsn, 12 avril 2011 - 11:52 .

[A Crusty Knight Of Colour]

TMZuk wrote...

If Obsidian/Bethesda had made the decision to voice Fallout: New Vegas, I cannot imagine how much space it would have taken up. New Vegas has four major routes through the game... support NRC, the Legion, Mr. House or your own character. That aside it has a multitude of sidequests, subquests and random people you bump into. It has ten times the amount of content DA:O has and twenty times what DA2 has.

And that's what a silent protagonist offers: The ability to have hugely varied playthroughs, where you travel different places, speak to different people, and discover new locations in each playthrough.

I simply cannot fathom why any role-player will choose less content simply in order to have a voice added to their character. To each their own, I guess.

This is exactly how I feel, the bolded is the important part.

Consider Morrowind and Oblivion. Oblivion decided to go with fully voiced NPCs all round. How shallow were the characters of Oblivion compared to the ones in Morrowind? How shallow the quests? Does Oblivion have anyone on the level of Vivec or Almalexia? Fully voicing NPCs have a role in that.

Not that I'm suggesting we go back to silent NPCs. We are probably at the point where fully voicing NPCs doesn't affect gameplay or depth nearly as much. But it's the same principle.

I'm not opposed to a voiced protagonist per se, but I feel like a voiced protagonist both:

a) takes away choice from the player to define their character and;

limits the amount of content, dialogue and depth a game can have because of what is devoted to voice acting.

When both these issues become less prominent, I'd be fine with voiced characters.

So, full text responses, 5-6 voices per gender per race, and much better dialogue trees than we saw in DA 2.

Other games, like Mass Effect don't suffer from this problem. This is speaking from a purely roleplaying and traditional RPG perspective.

Modifié par mrcrusty, 13 avril 2011 - 12:01 .

[Dragoonlordz]

Faust1979 wrote...

xkg wrote...

What gaming genre are you talking about now
In CRPG i want silent char and i want to read much
In Action-RPG i can skip reading and VA/Cinematics are ok

I'm talking CRPGs, they need to grow up with in the present. I had fun playing some of them on the Amiga 1200 in the past but I don't really want to go back there. Things need to grow, like I said playing these types of games as a kid I always dreamed and wondered about how awesome it would be to have full voice in the game and wondered if it would ever be possible 

Unless the voice is my own or there is such a large amount of choices I can pick one simular to how I wish my character to sound, the whole thing is immersion breaking for me. By locking in a voice your putting the character as someone else right from the start imho. My warden was me placing myself in the world of DA and appropriately he had my voice in my head while I read what to say. That is what I want in my RPGs. I also prefer knowing the exact choices in what my character is going to say instead of random guess work based on emoticons and agree, disagree, don't care sort of statement structure in DA2. On top of that in a fantasy world the UI and font's have to reflect such and DA2 failed on both those counts for me too, it was a sci-fi ME bubble placed in a fantasy style world, it just did not fit.

Modifié par Dragoonlordz, 13 avril 2011 - 12:52 .

[Embargoed]

As a roleplayer, I prefer the voiced protagonist. It's a character, and a character without a voice is more akin to a statue than anything important. At the end of DA:O, I didn't give a rat's *** about the Warden. I cared more about the other characters. The Warden was cool for about the first 30 minutes of the game. After that, I stopped caring. Morrigan, Shale, Sten, and even Alistair had better personalities than Mr. Cardboard-Cutout.

In DA2, Hawke was much more memorable than the Warden. I can't remember a single dialogue option that the Warden made that made me care about him as a character. Hawke left numerous marks on me during his time in Kirkwall.

Now, to speak a little about Fallout 3. I bought Fallout 3 at the same time as DA2 and played each one after the other. Playing Fallout was like pulling teeth. The quests were terrible, the characters didn't even look like they were talking half the time, the animation was ugly and cringe-worthy, and the combat was a lesson in masochism (****ing Super Mutants carrying missle launchers!). Half of the time I spent playing that game was spent ****ing around the wasteland, looking for things to do other than the horribly boring Main Quest or trying to find a vehicle so I could skip the sudden, lame encounters in the wasteland, or better yet skip travelling across the wasteland entirely. The environments were repeatedly recycled in that game too, much like DA2, to the point where I begged the game to end my suffering.

Not only that, I couldn't stand all of the useless crap that littered the world. Who cares about dirty dishes and iguana bits anyway? God, make it stop!

All of this, piled on top of the main character who could either:
A. Act like a tool.
B. Act like a douche.

That was it. That was the entirety of Fallout's character depth for "the Lone Wanderer". You either acted like a white knight, or you acted like a douche. That was about it. You could imagine your way to hell and back, but the intent in the writing was clear that you were going to be shoe-horned into being either good or bad. There was no moral gray area except for that ****ty corner of the room that some people ventured into for the sake of "choices and roleplaying". The game even validated it considering you had the whole karma system which hardly mattered, except if you wanted certain companions.

I couldn't finish Fallout 3. I tried to, but just thinking about the terrible combat, the bland protagonist, the absence of an interesting story- I couldn't do it. DA2, while having some faults, admittedly a few that it shares with Fallout 3, was far better in terms of plot, environment, characters, and overall fun. There was emotion in DA2. There was no emotion in Fallout 3.

Oh and, this is all subjective. None of this is "Word of God", so keep that in mind.

[A Crusty Knight Of Colour]

Fallout 3 had terrible writing, mediocre quests and a boring main narrative that's as shoe horned as the one in DA 2. It's a different type of game with a focus on gameplay and exploration. Bioware > Bethesda when it comes to writing and narrative.

Now, moving away from the irrelevant parts and to the important part.

Embargoed wrote...

As a roleplayer, I prefer the voiced
protagonist. It's a character, and a character without a voice is more
akin to a statue than anything important. At the end of DA:O, I didn't
give a rat's *** about the Warden. I cared more about the other
characters. The Warden was cool for about the first 30 minutes of the
game. After that, I stopped caring. Morrigan, Shale, Sten, and even
Alistair had better personalities than Mr. Cardboard-Cutout.

I think this is why you disagree. You expect the Warden to have personality to be an engaging character. This is what makes voiced protagonists better for you, they provide that personality.

Unfortunately, the point for people who want silent protagonists is that it's your job to provide personality for your character, not the game's. The people who want silent protagonists don't like the idea that the personality you want to have for your character is being overriden by whatever Bioware wants for the protagonist. Taking the role creating out of the roleplaying.

For people like me, who can live with voiced protagonists if done right, but prefers silent protagonists right now, if your character is a cardboard cut-out, then that's your fault.

Not meaning to be offensive and I apologise if it comes out that way, but that is how I feel.

Modifié par mrcrusty, 13 avril 2011 - 02:20 .

[Lord Atlia]

I think people are drawing causality where there is none. Just because Fallout:NV sold well and has no voice over does not mean one causes the other. Good exploration games tend to have high sells, just look at GTA: 4 or Red Dead Redemption. Plus Fallout NV can be played as a FPS. In fact if ME2s data shows anything its that some people don't like talking to people or listening to them, they just like killing things, and in sandbox games you can go everywhere and kill everything.

[SteelRaptor]

@OP

As I've said elsewhere many times, I'm an old school player. However, personally, I do not see having a voice actor for my PC is a hill to necessarily die on.

If we think back a bit, even our PCs in BG/BG2 had a voice to them. Granted, they only said a few things like a standard attack phrase, a lost a spell phrase, etc. but they had some form of voices (of which there were only around 7 of them) and you had to pick the one closest to your liking.

Now as to voice-acting itself, let's take ME2 for example. The game's voice acting is great, from recognizable NPCs (The 'Chuck' cast, Seth Green, Warf, etc.), to a veteran voice actor in FemShep (who's been in every good Bioware game). Even Male Shep is tolerable. I didn't mind them at all, even if I had the captioning on so I can still read the text (out of habit, and partially out of need).

DA2 was alright at best, but nothing beyond Flemeth jumped out at me as really good. Some were just plain annoying (I'm looking at you, demon-possessed boy, I spare Aveline for a few good flashes of talent). However, the story behind the VA was horribly sub-par which seemed to make the acting worse. However, that can be hashed out elsewhere.

I won't throw the baby out with the bathwater. VA is going to happen in any games, like it or not. Just do it "right" and give it some depth and quality.

[Jerrybnsn]

I only played the demo, but here is my example of problems in voice acting for DAII.

Your sister is being threaten by a Templer, whom you just saved, the ungrateful bastard. I want to lop his head off. I'm presented with choices and immediately disregard the first two because I know they are nice and funny and I don't want to be nice or funny. I select confrontational that is paraphrased "Stay away from my sister!" But I get in a calm, English gentleman voice:

"Just so you know, I'm with Bethany."

Talk about breaking immersion, in my mind Hawk already held his seven foot long broad sword out in front of theTempler and said with a meanacing growl "Stay away from my sister!"

No if you'll excuse me, I'm off to play more Fallout 3. I'm looking for my Dad, Liam Neeson. He's out there somewhere in the Wastelands and I'll kill every mutant rat or human that gets in my way.