Voice Acting in ToEE

Some of the voice acting in ToEE is excellent. Guys like Ostler in the Wench, and Calmert in the temple of Saint Cuthbert really have some top notch voice acting associated with them. It really helps me to believe these characters are real people.

Then there are guys like Turuko, Spungnoir, and to some extent, even Elmo, that have a hallow, mechanical, even amateurish quality to their voice acting. Its almost on the level of what I'd expect a DM who doesn't really do voices trying to do voices to sound like. Perhaps with all the nostalgia that Troika had around their P&P ToEE days, that's what they were going for.

But I've noticed that some of the voice acting added by Co8--Jade Empress, as an example-- seems to model this somewhat more hallow approach. It fits the game great, and the sound quality is excellent, so I'm not ripping on anyone here. But I am hoping that someone can help me understand what it is that Troika (and Co8 for that matter) is trying to achieve by having their characters sound like amateurs reading from a script... for the first time.

Or, am I just on crack here, and these are some examples of voice acting at its finest, and I'm just not able to realize it?

And while I'm on the topic of hallow, hard-to-believe characters, in P&P, does Elmo really give as his reason for wanting to go risk his life as an adventurer, a desire to purchase ale? That line has always kiled me.

Anyhow, I hope no one takes offense to my questioning here. This is not meant to be insulting in any way. It seems that this is a stylistic decision in this game, and it's one that I don't fully "get," so I'm just trying to understand it.

 

I don't think that Troika was purposely (in order to invoke nostalgic P&P DM making voices) having those voice actors sound "hollow." More of a budget thing I guess (can't always have Patrick Stewart voice lines )

When listening to some of Burne's lines, I can hear a change in actual recording quality...like some of them seemed to have been recorded over a telephone at the last minute.

 

I suppose that could be true, although I would have hoped that someone as popular as Elmo would have gotten some additional loving care. Also, thanks for realizing that by "hallow" I actually meant "hollow." There's nothing particularly "holy" about those voices, that was just a dumb typo on my part :doublethu. And I did it 3 times in the post. Sheesh.

 

Jade Empress...isn't she from "Voicing the Voiceless" thread? Lady Zorn did her, as I recall, not Troika at all. She was added on by efforts from this very community, as were a few others, thanks to Gaear's suggestion & dedication to improving the game. Actually, it's sort of a tribute to his talent that she sounds like a studio voice rather than a mod.

Look up "Voicing the Voiceless" to see who else has been done this way. You may be surprised; I don't think Burne was one of them.

Elmo's whole schtick is a put on. If you believe his cover story of being a soldier of fortune in search of beer money, then that's on you.

 

I'm aware that what you say is true when it comes to the P&P module, though I haven't encountered any evidence of this in the ToEE CRPG in the 2 or 3 times I've taken Elmo through the game (this would have been with my pre Co8 games, so if Co8 later added some content around this, I wouldn't know. I stopped using NPCs a long time ago).

But that really wasn't the point I was trying to make about Elmo. The point was that people who just want to get drunk are generally going to do the least amount necessary to achieve that goal. Going deep into evil infested dungeons is about as over the top a way to acquire the spare coins to "get some ale" as I can imagine. It makes my cheeks hurt in embarassment every time I hear him say that line.

If Elmo is a spy, then he's a poor one, because he can't even come up with a halfway believable reason for wanting to accompany the party. Anyone approaching average intelligence would know that something doesn't add up about Elmo just based on that comment alone. That was my point.

 

Don't get me wrong, I've very much enjoyed the additonal voicings added by VtV. It adds a lot to the game. And my primary intent was to discuss the voice acting of the original game, essentially asking why are some voices great, and others seemingly uninspired, comparitively speaking. I mean, I've played all of the Infinity Engine games as well as NWN and its expansions, and I'd generally say that the voice acting was consistently quite good. I'm sure that these games had their budget constraints as well. So I was just generally curious what Troika was going for. Didn't realize that they were pulling in their dev team to finish up the voices. I'd say that detail alone answers my question about as vividly as I could hope for.

 

The premise hasn't changed any. He's still an agent of the Viscount. The whole drunk thing is overblown, true. He's only supposed to have the reputation of being overfond of ale, not a staggering drunken bum. A youthful, hard partying mercenary, son of the Captain of the Militia; perhaps a bit immature, not yet acheiving his potential. That's the cover story. In truth, he's the trusted agent of Nobility, keeping tabs on those seeking the Temple. Troika blew it with him; drunken ne'er-do-well types would indeed beg, borrow & steal to stay in their cups & avoid exposing themselves to risks such as those found in adventuring.

 

I just wanted to add some about voicing stuff…Think of it as a side note.

It was done amateur all the way. But I do have some insights if not just excuses about the work done here (not Troika).

I made a couple hardware and audio upgrades through the recording process and one very serious software change that really paid off in some of the recordings and helped secure a more consistent recording level. There was also a learning curve that took place during the recordings too which contributed greatly to the inconsistencies. One could say the most current mod with the new voices was truly a test run.

I also had a familiarity problem. I did not record most dialogs with the expert knowledge of how, when and where the dialog was to occur. Often the scripts were sent to me without the accompaning scripts of the ACTIVE PLAYER DIALOG lead ins...So emotion and intensity seem to be a bit off and the flow mechanical. After playing the game with the new voices, I too believe the voices that "We" did could have been done better simply by knowing when and why they occur.

Also I had a heck of a time throwing accents and free will into the creative process. Black Jay was done too Jersey for some folks in the beginning and I will always regret we changed that. He was also too young and smooth sounding for a gristled and broken adventurer made farmer. I believe we need more character in some of the characters but I was very concerned about how the game was to be perceived. These characters are beloved by some folks and quite frankly…I was scared to direct them conceptually.

Once again I must reiterate the importance of playing and interacting in game with the characters for me to “get itâ€. It is quite unnerving to talk to characters in game and hear my own voice answer back…poorly. I really have an interest in making it better. I agree that Jade Empress was a near nightmare but what was done in this first voicing attempt is as bad as it will get. I really wanted to make that deadline. My wife was there so...She took a shot at an asian accent. I winced when I sent the recording in.

My equipment is good and the recording area is adequate. Talent? Eh… I have all these hopes that crumble before me every time I attempt to secure talent. Then there are complications with real life slowing things etc. I think things will improve.

 

Zorn,

I know I haven't been good at expressing my praise of your work, and criticized the Jersey in the first Black Jay. Let me remedy that now.

I love what you've done with the voices. And I really love the voice Lady Zorn did for Jade Empress. I think you work is superb, and in most cases surpassed the original voice acting in the game. Don't be down on yourself. You have far surpassed any expectations we had.

 

Jade Empress was one of those voices wich I *knew* had to come from the mods, but sounded VERY much like it came with the original game. Take that as a compliment or an insult, whichever way you look at it. (psst, tell your wifeit's a compliment. ) In fact, I didn't notice Black Jay at all until it was mentioned.

Compare that with Ronald's voice acting, and I could hear from the sound quality that it was from the mods.

I attributed Elmo's ridiculous cover story to bad writing. Agent of the Viscount? Aaaack. He's cute though, and really strong. (str 18, dex 16, con 16??? What the hell???)

Of course, I don't really believe in using NPCs much. Otherwise my party would have a dedicated rouge, which it lacks.

 

An good example of how a relatively crappy looking game can benefit massively from very well made voice acting is imho Return to Krondor. Without the voice acting I think I would've regretted buying it.

The TOEE voices are even in the German-language of the game still English. And in Beyond Divinity the German-language version of the game had no voices at all (only dialogues). That's why I bought the English-language version of the game.

My personal belief is that this is a point where I can see how much support a company (usually the publisher, because they often give the developing companies the money for developing) puts into a game. The more suppoort, the more the company rises in my very personal reputation list.

Infogrames/Atari had very little sopport for TOEE in general, so it has a very low level in that personal reputation list.
Troika, however, have a quite high level in that list, because they made a good work in general - minus the bugs (the bugs prevent Troika from rising into higher regions of my list).

 

Zorn's like the rest of us when it comes to things we care about. He's always thinking of ways to make it better or improve the quality of his work. In retrospect, it's taking on the aspect of "I only wish I'd done it this way...". It was kinda tough getting us voicers together then, and it'd be even tougher now...we all live 1.5 to 2 hours apart here in "Onnwal". So, it's going to have to be like this for a bit. Personally, my talent for this is veeery limited. Curufin's got a better voice than I do, but we both get into a sort of a rut with making things up; we just aren't real actors. My vote is to let Zorn find the talent whenever/wherever he's able, and drop a new one in the can at his convenience so some more of these characters will come to life. No deadlines, no pressure...just let Zorn do it if & when he's able. Even if that means tweaking the old ones a bit if he so chooses to improve the product. Gremag 2.0, if you will. I think we all agree he's the one to do it!