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[Exaltation]

Maybe an option to mute protagonist?

[Dabrikishaw]

Bioware made it clear the were never going to drop voiced protagonists.

[RoboticWater]

Maybe an option to mute protagonist?

If you mean replace all the PC's dialog with a silent audio file, then that should be relatively easy, but removing the PC's whole speech animation might be prohibitively difficult. Given how heavily the scenes are choreographed, I wouldn't be surprised if it's not feasible to just get rid of our PC's actions within them, speech or otherwise. Not to mention that it's most likely not worth the opportunity cost.

 

Even just routing all PC dialog to silent might cause more trouble than its worth depending on how dialog is implemented. Cumulatively, it may be less of a hassle for all the people who want a mute protagonist to press the mute button manually.

[DeathScepter]

It's not about the NPC reaction. The NPC reaction is irrelevant.

What matters is what we can get our character to say, and how (with the silent protagonist we have full control over that), and why.

With the voice+paraphrase, we can't tell what we're choosing, we can't decide how it's delivered, and any mental state we think the character mught have can be undone by the resulting scene.

The voiced protagonist is a failure. I will accept it only when it allows exactly as much control over our characters as the silent protagonist did.

 

 

If the quality of the writing is on par of the Snarky Hawke, I will say yes to that. As much as I can see both points of view. As for Mass Effect, I do think it is out of place to have a silent protagonist. I like said before Bioware did both good silent and voiced protagonists. Yes within Mass Effect, Yes Shepard had his fair share of cringe worthy dialogue.

[Deebo305]

No.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Bioware made it clear the were never going to drop voiced protagonists.

They've changed their mind before.

If you mean replace all the PC's dialog with a silent audio file, then that should be relatively easy, but removing the PC's whole speech animation might be prohibitively difficult. Given how heavily the scenes are choreographed, I wouldn't be surprised if it's not feasible to just get rid of our PC's actions within them, speech or otherwise. Not to mention that it's most likely not worth the opportunity cost.

 

Even just routing all PC dialog to silent might cause more trouble than its worth depending on how dialog is implemented.

I'd be happy with just replacing the dialogue with a silent audio file.  I don't usually watch the scenes anyway.

Cumulatively, it may be less of a hassle for all the people who want a mute protagonist to press the mute button manually.

I'm confident this wouldn't be less hassle for those players.  I typically take my hands off the controls during conversations (particularly the mouse, which was a huge problem with the QTE interrupts).

[Arcian]

Stop with the horrible voice acting for main characters in RPGs.  I want to be able to role play in my role playing games.  I know Mass Effect never had a silent protagonist but its time to take the series in a bold new direction.  No matter what you did or what choices you made Sheperd was always the same old Sheperd due to the voice acting be it good or bad.  Have faith in us game developers.  Some of us can still use our imaginations from time to time.

Charging someone to use their own imagination seems like a pretty sh!tty deal.

[RoboticWater]

I'm confident this wouldn't be less hassle for those players.  I typically take my hands off the controls during conversations (particularly the mouse, which was a huge problem with the QTE interrupts).

No, no, no. It's not that is wouldn't be a hassle for you; it's that the collective hassle it would cause you and anyone else who wants a silent protagonist may be less than the hassle it would cause BioWare to route our PCs voice to silent. I've seen dialog systems freak out if the proper audio file hasn't been played. Combining the opportunity cost of constructing this optional feature rather than some other, more important feature with the technical issues it may create might be more trouble than its worth on BioWare's end.

 

I can't imagine it would be wise to waste time making an option to disable one of Mass Effect's signature features.

[Pasquale1234]

I think it is only an issue when the dialog is presented from an over the shoulder/close up camera. It puts the main character is an actor in a scene but it feels out of place when everyone can speak but not the main actor.
 
If it was fully voiced dialog in an isometric rpg, I do not find it weird or out of place at all. I played the beta for Tides of numenera and one scene had a companion that was fully voiced throughout this exchange. This did not feel weird to me at all because I maintained the isometric camera and I was not inserted into this cinematic.It was well done.

 
Another way is to make all dialogue scenes in first person.
 
That's kind of how I play DA:O, anyway.  I ignore the Warden's presence on-screen during dialogue scenes, and instead focus my attention on the NPC with whom the Warden is speaking.
 

If you can't role play with a voiced protagonist then you can't role play. The only thing a voiced protagonist does is limit your agency with how you imagine the voice. So what? Role playing isn't about agency, actors role play all the time that is in fact their JOB. They must give up most agency of the character in service of the job, yet one almost universal question actors get asked about their ROLE is "what did you bring to the role? what did you bring to the character?"

I don't think your argument says what you think it does.

Once a character has been fully animated and voiced, the role-playing is done.

ME1 provided enough agency for me to effectively role-play Shepard, but by ME3 I was simply selecting a path through a branching narrative that had already been fully realized by its creators.

Selecting a path through a branching narrative =/= role-play.

[AlanC9]

ME1? The game where sometimes making a choice on the dialogue wheel didn't change what Shepard said next?

[Sylvius the Mad]

You don't get that even with full text options and that control is an illusion.

Yes we do. I've been playing this way for many years.

We see the options in all their detail. We have the time to determine which option has a possible meaning and possible delivery that is compatible with the character we've designed. We can then choose that option and have it be exactly as it appeared to be.

That's all we need. We need perfect knowledge of the thing we're choosing before we choose it, and the full text options with the silent protagonist gave us that.

When the voiced protagonist gives us that, then it will be acceptable. But not before.

[Sylvius the Mad]

ME1? The game where sometimes making a choice on the dialogue wheel didn't change what Shepard said next?

If that's not discernable from inside a single playthrough, that doesn't matter.

[Sylvius the Mad]

No, no, no. It's not that is wouldn't be a hassle for you; it's that the collective hassle it would cause you and anyone else who wants a silent protagonist may be less than the hassle it would cause BioWare to route our PCs voice to silent. I've seen dialog systems freak out if the proper audio file hasn't been played. Combining the opportunity cost of constructing this optional feature rather than some other, more important feature with the technical issues it may create might be more trouble than its worth on BioWare's end.

I can't imagine it would be wise to waste time making an option to disable one of Mass Effect's signature features.

How about let us set the volume for protagonist dialogue separately from NPC dialogue?

They already break out different types of audio files for this. Making one more category would be a less significant change.

[Sylvius the Mad]

If you can't role play with a voiced protagonist then you can't role play. The only thing a voiced protagonist does is limit your agency with how you imagine the voice. So what? Role playing isn't about agency, actors role play all the time that is in fact their JOB. They must give up most agency of the character in service of the job, yet one almost universal question actors get asked about their ROLE is "what did you bring to the role? what did you bring to the character?"

Different in kind. The actor knows what line he's going to say.

The obfuscatory paraphrases are a much bigger problem than the voice, but we only have the paraphrase because of the voice.

[correctamundo]

 
Once a character has been fully animated and voiced, the role-playing is done.
 

 

No it isn't. It may be for you but that just means you have to work on your RP-skillz.

[AlanC9]

If that's not discernable from inside a single playthrough, that doesn't matter.

It matters when I realize it. I don't compartmentalize the way you do, which is why a lot of your interpretive strategies are unworkable for me.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Another way is to make all dialogue scenes in first person.

That's kind of how I play DA:O, anyway. I ignore the Warden's presence on-screen during dialogue scenes, and instead focus my attention on the NPC with whom the Warden is speaking.


I don't think your argument says what you think it does.

Once a character has been fully animated and voiced, the role-playing is done.

At the very least, all that extra action is distracting.

[Sylvius the Mad]

No it isn't. It may be for you but that just means you have to work on your RP-skillz.

You're just making player skill matter again.

[correctamundo]

You're just making player skill matter again.

 

Not in the way you usually mean. But if a player somehow gets the impression that role-playing is not possible because of a voiced protagonist I very much suspect that player should hone their RP-skills.

[Abraham_uk]

Stop with the horrible voice acting for main characters in RPGs.  I want to be able to role play in my role playing games.  I know Mass Effect never had a silent protagonist but its time to take the series in a bold new direction.  No matter what you did or what choices you made Sheperd was always the same old Sheperd due to the voice acting be it good or bad.  Have faith in us game developers.  Some of us can still use our imaginations from time to time.

I thought Mark Meer and Jennifer Hale were awesome.

 

That said, your idea would work well combined with race selection.

This could pave the way for playing:

 

Volus

Turian

Drell

Salarain

Asari

Krogan

Vorcha

Baterian

Geth

Quarian

etc...

[Battlebloodmage]

Silent Protagonist is a thing of the past. Voiced protagonist allows more immersive interaction with the NPCs, most of the time, it's like the NPCs just talk to themselves. We're just passively react to it instead of actually engage in the conversation. 

[Sylvius the Mad]

Not in the way you usually mean. But if a player somehow gets the impression that role-playing is not possible because of a voiced protagonist I very much suspect that player should hone their RP-skills.

The problem I find is that the writers try to impart information within those lines, so if we don't read them (or listen, I suppose - I typically just read the subtitles) we risk missing out on necessary information.

We could avoid this problem with full-text dialogue options, of course. Then I probably could just ignore the voice.

That said, the first Shepard I designed was supposed to be flamboyant and playful, and the first time he spoke I knew that wasn't going to work with Mark Meer's VO.

[KaiserShep]

Silent Protagonist is a thing of the past. Voiced protagonist allows more immersive interaction with the NPCs, most of the time, it's like the NPCs just talk to themselves. We're just passively react to it instead of actually engage in the conversation.

Not to mention that banter participation will just never be effective with a silent protagonist. I loved how Inquisition finally gave us the ability to actually chime in while selecting dialogue.

[Seraphim24]

Stop with the horrible voice acting for main characters in RPGs.  I want to be able to role play in my role playing games.  I know Mass Effect never had a silent protagonist but its time to take the series in a bold new direction.  No matter what you did or what choices you made Sheperd was always the same old Sheperd due to the voice acting be it good or bad.  Have faith in us game developers.  Some of us can still use our imaginations from time to time.

 

I think actually one of the reasons Shattered Steel is one of, if not the best Bioware game is because of the kind of creepy aesthetic established with just being a lone person and nothing but your mech AI to converse with it. It's like this weird feeling where you really get immersed into it personally since no one is speaking for you, and yet you also have choices as to which AI to talk to in different mechs and stuff like that, so the experience is much more intense in that fashion. 

 

The D&D based games like Baldur's Gate 1 is similar of course although there you start to have a backstory naturally. 

[Gothfather]

 
Another way is to make all dialogue scenes in first person.
 
That's kind of how I play DA:O, anyway.  I ignore the Warden's presence on-screen during dialogue scenes, and instead focus my attention on the NPC with whom the Warden is speaking.
 

I don't think your argument says what you think it does.

Once a character has been fully animated and voiced, the role-playing is done.

ME1 provided enough agency for me to effectively role-play Shepard, but by ME3 I was simply selecting a path through a branching narrative that had already been fully realized by its creators.

Selecting a path through a branching narrative =/= role-play.

 

Imagining who a character is and making decisions based on what they know and what they believe is the essence acting out a role or role playing. Yes the action choice of what button to press or icon to click isn't role playing but basing a decision on what a character would do is role playing and that is true if the character is set in appearance and has a set voice. When you engage is sexy role playing your appearance is set, you can only change is superficially and so is your voice your voice is your voice. Most of us can't really change our voice effectively without is sounding bad. Yet magically people are able to role play in the bedroom successfully. How? using your logic is is impossible. How do people do it?

 

The fact is any role playing game can be played without role-playing i see this all the time with Pen and paper games. So yes you can choose NOT to role play in a cRPG there is actually no requirement to do so but there is nothing prohibiting you from role playing in Bioware games.

 

Why do players insist on p!ssing into the wind and complaigning of getting wet on so many issues? No one is right or wrong for liking or disliking a voice protagonist it is nothing more than a SUBJECTIVE taste as much as so many gamers like to cage this as an objective issue. If you don't like it BUY a game that doesn't have one. Bioware has stated they WANT to make games like this these are the type of games THEY like to play. So if you don't like it don't play it. Why is this concept so hard for gamers to grasp? What you think you are so damn awesome that your subjective tastes must be conformed to? There are hundreds of games i don't like even by companies i like, I feel zero need to tell these companies to drop a signature feature of their style of game design for a given genre just because I don't like it. Why? because I don't think games being made that i don't like is a sign of a problem. I in fact think that games that i don't like but others do like being made is a sign of a HEALTHY industry as this gives players choice. But that requires me to not think that my opinion on taste is superior to everyone else's.