Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Trans-inclusive voice acting

I know that what I'm about to suggest/request would be incredibly expensive to implement, but it would represent an incredible gesture of good will and inclusion in the community towards trans/non-binary players.

Hire at least one trans/non-binary voice actor whose tone diverges from a stereotypical masculine and feminine delivery.

I can understand if it's difficult to understand exactly what I'm asking for because there is no such thing as a stereotypical 'trans voice.' I mean, there sort of is. But it's more like trans/non-binary folks share a common experience of dysphoria around the sound of their voice. If you listen to a lot of different trans/non-binary people speak, you can appreciate subtle differences in the sound of people's speech. These subtle differences tend to manifest, although not always, when folks seek out gender-affirming voice care. These services aim to alleviate the stress and discomfort of dysphoria via vocal cord surgeries, hormone therapy and/or vocal training with a specialized coach. These experiences may explain some of what I'm talking about, but I don't think they are necessary prerequisites for the subtlety I'm trying to describe.

At the end of the day, I wish my characters could sound like Jesse James Keitel, Ian Alexander, or Mason Alexander Park. For now, I'm feel like I'm stuck with options that are more or less irritating because I'm constantly reminding myself that a voice line I just heard is supposed to be what my character said. It just doesn't sound like what I've decided the character should sound like in my own head.

You mean for the Tav or dark urge origin? I think you’re right that each of the voice options are clearly feminine or masculine. I would definitely support a more ambiguous voice for Tav. (Is that what you mean or am I totally off here? Like a voice that walks a line between masculine and feminine?) I think the closest thing there is may be a female voice that is on the low/deep side of things. Thanks for pitching it, who knows, maybe they’ll see it!

I’m afraid I don’t understand how the game could be more inclusive. It already caters to the transgender community by including genital options and pronoun / gender identity. Yeah, the voices can be a bit meh for the MC, but I don’t think any developer will be able to pull off what you’re asking without there being more demand for it.

Even then, they have to decide on the criteria and, as you’ve said, it would be an expensive undertaking in time and money just for people to decide they don’t like that interpretation.

I don’t disagree with you on the whole, but the criteria would need to be more than the MC not sounding like the way you think they should. (I have a similar issue with the voices, so I’m substituting the DA:I British male voice in my head whenever my MC speaks).

Just curious. Is the voice of the ringmaster of the "circus of the last days" the kind that you refer to ?

I don't think there's really any need to bring the politics of trans inclusivity into the equation, to be honest. There is no way to answer the leading question "What does a trans person sound like?" that is not, itself, reinforcing a stereotype unnecessarily, or needlessly doing a disservice to portions of the community. Let me put it to you this way: how do you know that none of the already presented voice sets are not, in fact, presented by trans or non-binary individuals? Short of looking up exactly who they are and checking, you don't, and you can't. I've known tans people whom I would never have known were trans unless they told me, voices included, and I've known numerous extremely gender normative people with voices on a broad spectrum that could really go either way.

I dislike that we have such a minuscule selection of voice sets to pick from - none of them sound like I feel like any of my characters sound, and it's discomfiting. This is an experience that will be shared by a broad spectrum of people who play the game regardless of any other factors, and more voice sets across the full spectrum of voice sets would be good - as well as the option for a silent protagonist or no voice set at all, because at the end of the day it will never be possible to cater to everyone's individual character and the option to not have a voice overlay, if you cannot find one that is close enough for you to be satisfied with it, is important as well.

Niara, your comment is thoughtful and well written. I agree no politics here and this issue seems to always lead to politics.

I also agree we need more voice options. I hate that I cannot have a Dwarf with the deeper rumble you would expect.

Yep! Thanks for that clarification. Honestly sometimes I forget that playing as Origin exists because I have so much fun with the character creator.

Hi Niara: I understand where you're coming from, and I agree that this is a situation in which all sorts of people are affected by a limited selection of choices. I mention identity not to presuppose that a subgroup of players are exceptionally harmed by the current state of things, but that they would uniquely benefit from a change in the status quo. Yes, everyone would benefit from more voice choices, but as a member of the aforementioned community, I'm trying to express why a change to the status quo is a higher priority for me. I'm just one person, but I hope my anecdotal experience serves a developer who doesn't belong to my community and who tries to work as an ally, specifically.

We definitely need a cat voice. I can't continue playing the game without Tav meowing...

To be fair, the voice options are pretty limited even without this taken into account. Make a half-orc barbarian and try to pick any of the existing voice options...yeah, none of them work. Not even close. Where's the deep, gruff voice? Where's the more mature scholarly voice? Where's the cocky young hothead? Of any gender? Seems to me Larian cheaped out a bit on the Tav voices, which is odd considering the custom character doesn't have many voice lines at all. Wouldn't have been (be...?) a monumental undertaking to make a few more voice sets, and then a more neutral voice set would certainly be a nice option too.

That is more than fair, and to my mind sharing a personal perspective like that shouldn’t be treated as political.

I also agree that the voice selection is limited all round and we could really do with voices that could suit a wider range of characters. There are at least some in the current set that I find way too samey (despite being English myself, and therefore probably having more of an ear for distinctions in accent for English voices than those who hear them less). I’d be all for dumping a couple of those and replacing them with ones that are more distinctive. And given that Tav doesn’t have a huge number of lines (unfortunately, given I’d have preferred more protagonist voice acting), and no additional cinematics would be required, hopefully it wouldn’t be a silly amount of work to add more.

Everything is political.

Isn't voice 6 exactly that?

How about no?

Yes but it's also much more noticable now, back it the day it was still there but you wouldn't care about it since it was subtle, nowadays it's different, thanks to the obnoxiously loud "activists", the Reactionaries are looking even harder at it than ever before, I personally don't consider activists to part of the LGBT community, their so called "ally ship" is Hypocritical at Worse, at Best they mean Well but tend to do more Harm than Good,

The next part might be Extremely Political, so forgive me,
TDLR: just do political stuff under the radar, think of it as smuggling alcohol during the prohibition period, do it while being smart about it.

Also follow through with it rather than half-assing it.

I'm afraid it leaves the unfortunate impression that only certain politics are allowed, as opposed to no politics.

We need more voice in general tbh.

i Kinda agree i would like to have more options at least in terms of Voice..(i know this cost a lot..)
but even the Narrator she is Great.. but imagine that guy from game of thrones narrating the game..
crazy shit. haha
maybe i went to faar.
but ok just some more voices would be great..
would like More Hairstyles too at least some of the NPCS that we cant use.
(Orin Hair its F. Cool a lot..haha)

I agree with all of this, if we add more voices in general, Steve Blum would be perfect for Half Orc PCs, since it has that grittiness to it that Half Orcs are known for.

I would like a bit more gruff to the voice. For Dwarves, you almost need a thick accent with the DEEP voice for the male. For the female do the same accent and just a deep female voice. Truth is you only need one voice actor for this. Find the perfect voice actor, male or female and then use AI to create the other gender of that voice.