Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback [Request] More voice sets (warrior brute/evil)

I cant stand that the only two male voice sets available in bg3 are so sissyish, effeminate - no offense (at very best they sound like elvish boy scouts). I cant find them working with my idea of a tough, vengeful human warrior, or evil, mad warlock characters (which are the only options that would let me enjoy roleplaying in this game, as it worked for me in previous baldurs gate releases). Cant imagine playing a dwarf character with currently available voice sets aswell.
I have no doubt larian is planning to implement more voice sets in the game, but please guys, dont make us wait for it untill full game release! Proper dwarfs and alley thugs are waiting for their voice!

I would be very grateful for any effort made in that direction
Best wishes to you all, stay healthy!

Not going to happen. seems like way too much extra voice acting.

Surely an unexpected money injection from selling nice amount of early access is pushing the limits further and opening new possibilities (?) I mean come on, voice set 1 and 3 sound almost the same...
Otherwise modders are our last hope.

The question is if they're going for full voice acting for custom characters. It seems to be the case and therefore it's... a stupid amount of work to voice, say, 5 options per gender. One of the reasons I'm not a huge fan of full voice acting. Greatly limits the possibilities.

What imo they should do, however, is introduce "voicebark only" voices, and make a ton of them. Would be less work than making one full voice, I think.

While not the main character, they do use the same voices for the Dream Person. (Fun fact the "Who are you?" at the beginning of character creation is all 4 voices on top of each other)

So adding more voices will mean a lot more work. But I sort of agree, it would be nice to have some more choices. The 2+2 we have to chose from are sort of very similar.

great so my brutal bulky berserker is going to speak like every moment is a tea o'clock

I'm a little confused by the constant refrain that such and such is too much work or too expensive. No its not! This is work that needs doing, if we want the game to be successful. They shouldn't cheap out on this stuff. It was like the first thing I noticed during char creation... 4 voices? 2 for each gender? So pitiful.

Also this has to be the cheapest "content" they could produce. I mean seriously. It doesn't need motion capture or animation or 3d models to do voice barks. Hire a couple dozen actors to read a script of voice barks. It could be done in a weekend at a recording studio.

If they don't have the resources to fully voice the protagonist, then they shouldn't even attempt it.

BG1/2 didn't have a fully voiced protagonist, but it at least had some variety for the voice barks, and if you really didn't find what you needed you could import a custom sound set.

lets not forget that its 4 voices but in multiple languages

That's what subtitles are for

But if they really need to dub every line like we're making movies in Berlin or Rome or something, then start with a more realistic goal.

A dozen voice barks in multiple Voices (translated into multiple languages) is a lot more manageable than recording a couple of hours of dialog for each. Its just silly, we don't need all that

I agree... I appreciate that they're trying to make a cRPG that takes all the advantage of modern tech, but there ARE going to be drawbacks, no matter how much they say they're not cutting corners or making compromises. Their resources may be vast, but they are finite. What's worse with full voice acting is that it cripples dialogue, and I've already seen people complain that there's no personality in the responses to choose from, nor that many of them. But that's a whole other topic.

Still, I think that adding a dozen or more "voicebark only" voices on top of the four fully acted voices is the way to go. Then most of your players are covered. Want full voice acting? You can have that. Want a good variety to choose from? It's there. Not a 100% perfect solution (if you want a fully voice acted gruff dwarf, there'll be a problem), but I think the best realistic one.

Edit: I'm pretty sure only subtitles are planned for other languages, but I can't find the source right now. I think they've said it shortly before EA launch or around that time.

Exactly

Going fully voiced for Charname means that they have fewer options to revise their script, or add to it later when they need to. If everything requires a re-recording of dialog that's more money and another phone call each time, instead of the writer just loading up their word processor and getting it handled on the fly.

I mean what's the best we're likely to get if they go fully voiced? maybe SWTOR levels of variety if we're crazy lucky and rich, with like a single male and female voice for each major storyline? I'm certain they're not pulling down enough loot to compete at that level of video game "movie making." But we don't really need it for the BG feel. A couple dozen different barks in a couple dozen different voices is all we really need, and text for the rest.

Having the spotlight on some companions moreso than others, with more robust interjections and cutscenes for some is totally fine. They did that in BG2, and not all the companions had equal weight. The romanceable ones obviously had more going on, so Viconia, Jaheira and Aeire maybe had more to say over the course of the game. Certain show-stealers like Edwin and Minsc had some extra theatrics and more lines going on, as returning Fan Favs... but for the most part, unless you were performing a Companion quest, it wasn't like everyone had to read everyone else's lines for the basic script to still work.

This is what we had to work with in BG1/2 for sound sets... Each of the companion NPCs had a unique bark for each .wav slot, and there were half a dozen male/female barks to choose beyond those specifically for the Charname Protagonist.

Battle Cry
Becoming Leader
Tired
Bored
Badly Wounded
Selected 1
Selected 2
Selected 3
Action Acknowledgement 1
Action Acknowledgement 2
Action Acknowledgement 3
Being Hit
Dying
In Forest
In City
In Dungeon
Daytime
Nighttime
Rare Selected 1
Rare Selected 2
Rare Selected 3
Rare Selected 4
Reaction to Party Member Death

That's what we need, a couple dozen barks like those. A few dialogue highlights beyond that for initial introductions or when the story beats demand a more epic interjection, but text for most of the rest. They shouldn't be setting the expectations so high, where every Companion or NPC needs to be fully acted in a conversation scene for everything. At that point you might as well just watch a film. I'd rather they built it out in a way that lets their writers do the heavy lifting rather than the actors, so that it is more flexible and adaptive and easier to edit or expand later on.

Put another way, I hope they have some Companions in this game that aren't just totally developed Origin characters with elaborate voice acting scenes in every convo. I want some random mercs on a B-team roster, who won't make my largely voiceless protagonist seem so out of place by comparison. Hopefully with enough variety in their barks that the Protagonist might use them too at character creation if it fits with their idea for the character.

Right now we have 2 voice sets for each gender. I was hoping for something more like 12, and that was being conservative.

I'd like to see one Posh, one Gruff, one Nervous, Cocksure and Arrogant, Dumber than a bag of hammers etc... all the standard voice tropes. Then done up in various accents, some British, some American, some Australian, South African or Caribbean... some further afield or Euro fusion second language style for flare, whatever it takes to make Baldur's Gate feel a bit more cosmopolitan. Everyone liked Minsc for doing basically an Arnold impersonation, more like that.

"The stone's less worn here"

Right, sure it is
heheh


ps. of the 4 barks that play when selecting your voice during character creation, I don't think I've heard any of them sound off while actually playing. No "hells" or "tidy slots" that I've come across. They should just follow the list above for the main BG barks. Returning fans will find them instantly familiar, and if players don't like barks just let them mute it in the game options.

pps. Cackling Laugh

"No one is more worthy"

"We should not waist time like this"

Lol

I mean, I think they should have more barks than what BG1/2 had, it still wouldn't be THAT much work and would make the character more lively. But yes - just voicebarks are really needed. Once you are familiar with your character's voice, you "hear" it when selecting the dialogue options.

It would be great if you could have different voices AND for each voice (actor) several options for personality/way of speaking. I'll once more point to Solasta - there your characters can have slang, casual or formal speech. With this implemented in BG3, you could have a "typical" dwarf voice that would be appropriate for a crude criminal, a respected soldier or an exalted paladin.

Im a little surprised there hasnt been thread like this here so far. Characters voice is a major thing considering classic roleplaying game. It all makes me wonder and worry if larian will even notice our concerns here..

I think that saying that they're '' sissyish and effeminate '' is a pretty huge exaggeration, sorta like saying that women who have short hair or don't wear heavy makeup are masculine and butch.
Not being a typical brute doesn't make you a '' sissy '' or effeminate.

I don't mind more voices tho, but I'd also like to see a more seductress type voice then just like how I want seduction to be a part of persuasion.
Lemme bang my way through the game lol, male characters could get a voice like Astarion too.
I do find it a bit funny and annoying at the same time tho how people can ask for these things and say such things but when I ask for more feminine options people tend to have really negative reactions and jump to the worst conclusions and often mock.
It's like '' can I get more feminine attire? '' and people get super rude and assume that I am literally talking about bikinis.

I dunno if it's actually planned to add more tho, but the voices they have currently do make some sense as '' neutral '' voices.
It's just kinda what happens when you need to try and serve a multitude of different fantasies all at once.
I am not entirely sure if Barbarian has actually been confirmed yet tho but maybe they'll add more voices along with the rest of the classes altho I doubt it.

At the moment, you can find 2.5 hours of recordings for the main character, and it's only for the males.
There will be a lot more of this in the full game so adding extra voices is hardly an option.

Whats the point of barbarian class then when all of the male voices available in character creation are just gentle and sophisticated

Considering the variety of voices that were available for your character in DOS2, I really hope the voice selection gets expanded. I honestly haven't been able to tell much of a difference between the two female voice options so far.
One thing I do like is the fact that voice selection isn't locked to gender.

You can select a beard for human female character yet even male elf character cant select one unles half-elf,

What happend here pc principle(pal)

You really think the intent is to just have 4 voices in total? A lot of the drow/gith/dwarf specific voice lines aren't even done yet. I'm just assuming they have more recording to do yet.

Yeah, we NEED more voices for the different races