Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback A barber shop?

It should be allowed to like to change hairstyles and beards during gameplay.

Preferably in the camp, I would suggest giving haircutting skill to Volo... make him useful?

Let's go crazier, make a quest : Volo asks you to find one of the Faerun's most valuable artifact : a set of scissors and combs that can make hair to grow.

At the end of the quest, Volo gets ability to change hair style and colors.

*why not similar stuff for tatoo, or even face changing...

Interesting ...
But i still like more the idea of having interactive mirror that will send us to player customisation screen. :-/

Too easy, too simple...

I have had more thought about the quest idea. It would begin in the camp.

Volo approaches PC, commenting how his/her haircut needs an improving. (*different dialogue tree needed if PC is bold from beginning)

If PC accepts to let Volo fix the haircut, Volo will of course make a little mistake

He cut a little too much on one side, so to fix, he cuts the other side, again a little too much.

At the end, the PC becomes bold.

Under the threat of death by PC, Volo remembers the existence of an artifact which can mend boldiness problem: the "Scissors of Unboldiness" (better name needed)

PC goes on the epic quest. (to be elaborated)

At the end, Volo will claim the artifact and thereafter, PC can change freely (or with small fees) his/her haircut and beards.

Easy, simple ... and most importantly cheap.
You know voiceacting is the most expensive thing in game development, that is why most studios prefer non-verbal solutions.

That's an interesting statement, that I doubt to be even remotely true. If that would be true, than VO would definitely be detrimental. If VO is the most expensive part of BG3, imagine intricate game it could be, if you got rid of it.

Feel free to google more.

Well....to consider it detrimental or not is a subjective opinion I guess. Voice acting done good, can substantially enhance the experience of a game. And considering that Larian ain't an indie developer, voice actors expect to get paid.

So, a professional voice actor can cost around 200-400$/h. Unless your sound designer already has an recording studio, that needs to be booked too. Plus a recording engineer. And a talent director to find the actors you want if it's a big project. And catering etc.

Because of needed retakes etc a company would be wise to allocate one minute recording time per line of dialogue, plus time for editing etc. And BG3 has A LOT of dialogue.


Compare all that to a programmer that needs a computer, a chair and some encouragement from his boss :P well yeah, voice acting is expensive. But the most expensive part...nah. That is without doubt marketing.

Of course. Merely meant to riddicule an idea that in the budget of a game made by 250 people, the biggest money sink is VO. It is a big money sink no doubt. But if more was spent on VO then on any other aspect of the game then.... I suppose we would get 12 minutes? That was the game, in which that could have been true.

There is one detrimental effect to Larians decision to include full voice acting to even custom mc's, the low selection of voices. But, given how expensive every new optional voice would be I understand why they keep it low.

I'd definitely want a chance to redo hair and makeup once I see how it actually looks ingame. I often over apply make-up in the character creator.

But please don't put this behind a quest