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Voice acting in RPGs - yes or no?

C

Chrono

Banned
Do you turn off VA while playing an RPG? I'm not talking about adventure games like MGS or Resident Evil.




I really don't know where I stand on this issue. I don't like the voice acting in Tales of Symphonia, from what little I played. I'll definitely have it turned off when I continue. I got Radiata Stories and going from the trailers I'd rather go deaf than listen to it.

It's not just that the acting is bad, like the characters are being voiced by whiny amateurs with modern accents (completely ruins the FANTASY setting), it's also just slow. If I had to listen to every single line of text voiced I'd fall asleep 10 minutes in the game - I'd rather read it and move faster through the game.

Despite all that I can't imagine myself playing games like FFX or (soon) Digital Devil Saga w/o voice acting. I don't know it just fits better. And what sucks is that I still end up reading the entire text before the actors finish and either wait and get bored, or skip it. Skipping the voiced text also affects immersion in a game. here's a character telling you an important story or whatever and suddenly he cuts through to the next part or stops. I know, it's a videogames but still... there's a certain level of immersion and skipping through voices like sound files sort of kicks that in your face.

This will be a bigger problem next-gen. Imagine a square RPG with the same quality as the FFVII tech demo. Maybe in 50 years when a game system can simulate all human senses in virtual reality you'll listen to every word and it would be awesome but now...


I don't know what to make of this. My plan is to just judge each game individually. Good VA = on. Bad VA = off.

I don't want to see all RPGs with VA though, but I guess that's just not happening unless it's a low budget game. Games like FFIX for example just have a certain charm to them. I don't think I'd enjoy a remake with voice acting. But maybe that's because hearing their voices will conflict with how I imagine them. Even if robin williams does steiner it would be robin williams, not steiner.


I feel like I don't want to games to turn into movies, but there's no other way.


[/rambling off]
 
I turn it off if I can, because I prefer the hidden nuances of text to third-rate voice actors. Metal Gear Solid is the sole exception.
 
Depends on whether the VA grates on my nerves or not. I left it on in Radiata Stories, only because it was cheesy and added to the humor of the game, but in Baten Kaitos, it was so utterly horrible that I absolutely had to turn it off. I may do the same with DQ VIII, though the voice acting wasn't that bad. I'll have to see when I get the final game.
 
no.jpg
 
Some voice acting especially from Bioware RPGs have pretty damn good voice acting but yeah, after playing Tales of Symphonia on my friend's GC, yuck :(

But yeah, judging voice acting in games is totally on an individual basis
 
Voice acting in console RPGs has only been succesful twice. First with Panzer Dragoon Saga and secondly with KOTOR. Everything else has pretty much sucked. If the voice acting in RPGs could all be at the same level as those two games then I'd be all for it, but until then.....
 
If it's good voice acting (aka. most Japanese tracks and the occasional English dub) then it adds an incredible amount of believability to the characters and can really bring them to life. A line of dialogue might be "I want ice cream" but depending on the tone of the voice actor the line may take on a whole different meaning and give you more info about the character besides them wanting ice cream.

IMO, the standardization of voice acting has been the greatest accomplishment of this generation. But then I play 99.9% of my games in Japanese where people have to go to acting school before they can voice a game character...
 
Hitler Stole My Potato said:
Voice acting in console RPGs has only been succesful twice. First with Panzer Dragoon Saga and secondly with KOTOR. Everything else has pretty much sucked. If the voice acting in RPGs could all be at the same level as those two games then I'd be all for it, but until then.....
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Too bad KOTOR sucked ass nails and Shadow Hearts Covenant had great voice acting.
 
RevenantKioku said:
Too bad KOTOR sucked ass nails and Shadow Hearts Covenant had great voice acting.
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Too bad KOTOR is the highest rated RPG this generation and you have personal tastes that don't match mine.
 
I hate voice acting :/ I just try to press X through it anyways (and just read the dialog onscreen), so if there is an 'off' option I use it.
 
Speevy said:
Too bad KOTOR is the highest rated RPG this generation and you have personal tastes that don't match mine.
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I know, it's a shame.
Bah, fuck it. I'm not gonna argue this now. KOTOR was easily the biggest disappointment to me this gen, though.
 
Peasants should have a Cockney accent, peerage should have an Elizabethan accent, male villains should have a German accent, female villains should have a (sexy) Russian accent, and all shopkeepers should have either a thick Indian or Jewish accent.

Video game plots tend to run towards the deep end so they deserve thoughtful and skilled voice acting.
 
One thing I hope about Blu-Ray PS3 games is that there'll be enough space on the disc to bundle the original Japanese voice tracks on the NA release, like Konami did with Ys: The Ark of Napishtim this gen.
 
SaucerEyedMurder said:
Video game plots tend to run towards the deep end so they deserve thoughtful and skilled voice acting.
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Video game plots tend to be embarrassingly ridiculous. Good to decent voice acting just makes the experience less painful.
 
Bebpo said:
If it's good voice acting (aka. most Japanese tracks and the occasional English dub) then it adds an incredible amount of believability to the characters and can really bring them to life. A line of dialogue might be "I want ice cream" but depending on the tone of the voice actor the line may take on a whole different meaning and give you more info about the character besides them wanting ice cream.

IMO, the standardization of voice acting has been the greatest accomplishment of this generation. But then I play 99.9% of my games in Japanese where people have to go to acting school before they can voice a game character...
Click to expand...

Yeah I totally agree with everything here, but most people on this forum play games in English and except for FFX, there isn't a single game I like in English, or maybe more accurately there isn't a single RPG dubbed into English that I think is even passible as quality. The problem with English voice acting is that 1. they talk to slow and 2. they're afraid to scream. Seriously Japanese voice acting is so much better than English because the voice actors actually yell at each other.
 
I perfer to use the original voice in any game....so if its a English made RPG sure, but otherwise i try to turn it to what it was designed as, and just turn on subtitles ( they usualy have subs anyway though ).
 
I turn it off when I get the chance. There have only been a couple instances where I felt voice acting (in games, generally) has worked. MGS and Half-Life 2 come to mind ... although neither of those are RPG's.
 
antipode said:
One thing I hope about Blu-Ray PS3 games is that there'll be enough space on the disc to bundle the original Japanese voice tracks on the NA release, like Konami did with Ys: The Ark of Napishtim this gen.
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I don't think they will. It's cultural. I honestly don't think Japanese developers want English speaking people playing games in Japanese. Why? Because Japanese culture is very self-protective.
 
Hitler Stole My Potato said:
Video game plots tend to be embarrassingly ridiculous. Good to decent voice acting just makes the experience less painful.
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Although it's one of my favorite games of this generation, I think Phantom Dust has one of the most absurd plots. (of course, secondary to games like Katamari which are just trying to be weird)
 
I let it on if it's english or japanese/subbed but I turn it off as soon as it's french. Even a bad english VA is fine enough for me, it helps me work my comprehension skill.
 
In Digital Devil Saga, the voice acting REALLY set the characterization for all. You really could connect with them more because of the emotion. Heat's rage, Argilla's despair and compassion.....it all leaked through and really expanded the game:)
 
I've found that voice-acting in the industry has never pushed past that 'saturday-morning cartoon' quality of VA....

So, I find VA best on games that are light-hearted, cheezy, and - well - "saturday-morningish"
Games that take themselves too seriously tend to have drab or over-dramatized VA --- Professional voice-actors still don't know what to make of games yet.....

But games that are good swashbuckling fun like Sly Cooper - the VA comes out awesome, like all the actors had some drinks, let lose, and put all their effort in.

Metal-Gear's a great example, it's the epitome of everything that testosterone rich 'saturday-morning' stands for ---- so voice comes out totally fun.
 
rod said:
huh


it was abysmal
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I know, I was just mimicking the laugh scene. I made sure that the :lols didn't show up as the animated smilies and instead, the cold empty grammar marks. I failed, JUST LIKE THAT SCENE DID.
 
Tales of Symphonia was passable, everyone except Colette grew on me as the game went on.

Of all of the rpgs this generation, I think Radiata Stories has some of the best VA, whereas Star Ocean 3 and Baten Kaitos have some of the worst.
 
I don't think I've played any where there was an option to turn them off or not. DQ8 US will be the first..I'll probably leave it on just to hear what they have to say.

Falling back on ratings to 'invalidate' someone else's opinion is pretty weak.
 
I don't think they will. It's cultural. I honestly don't think Japanese developers want English speaking people playing games in Japanese. Why? Because Japanese culture is very self-protective.
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What? If original dubs are not in Blue-Ray disk will be for any reason, but not that. In fact, you can find some games like Disgaea that includes the original japanese dub in its english version.

Some of you have odd ideas about Japan.

I never quit the voices, usually they are very good for japanese RPGs and really good as well for west RPGs. The problem comes with localization (and I think it happens at booth sides, I´m not an expert, but I have seen some english spoken films in japanese version and... well, they didn´t feel fine saying it in a kind way, japanese and english are very different languages, it must be really hard. ).
 
Bataman said:
I know, I was just mimicking the laugh scene. I made sure that the :lols didn't show up as the animated smilies and instead, the cold empty grammar marks. I failed, JUST LIKE THAT SCENE DID.
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haha, i totally get it now. that part of the game was an all time low in videogames for me
 
Whether or not the voice acting is good is one factor, the other is whether or not the script is something you want to hear spoken out loud.

So many games this gen have made me cringe due to awful writing.
 
The only bad voice acting is the kind you can't skip. I'm not so cynical to expect A level voice acting in a B level game. I don't understand why anyone would.
 
Last JRPG I delved into was Baten Kaitos. I turned the VA off in that game, but for many Western RPG's I leave it on, because you can tell they put a bit of work into the VA. Morrowind and Fable come to mind.
 
WRPG's - yes
JRPG's - no. where do they hire their voice actors, walmart? almost always turn on the subtitles and turn off the voices.

for the most part
 
Voice acting isn't really that bad, If I had turn off the voice in Disgaea, I wouldn't have found it so funny and enjoy it as much. I guess everyone is still hatin on the Star Ocean 3( till the end of time) voices :lol :lol
 
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