Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Fully voiced protagonist DLC?

Hi.

This is just a small idea/suggestion, because for me having talking main protagonist (in cut-scenes and not just gameplay) is quite important for the immersion. But...

a) I understand it is expensive to do even for just one male and one female voice (what would be however more than enough for me).
b) I realize some people dislike it (this I don't really understand but everyone has his/her own preferences and mine are no better than the others).

So..., to make it economically viable for Larian, what about making it a (paid) DLC? Those who care (like me), would happily buy it. Those who don't (or don't like it) can ignore it.

It might sound like good idea from player perspective ...
But im a little affraid that this attitude will give Larian tag of assholes who split Base Game in DLC(s) to get more money. :-/
(Just like some other companies do)

Assuming it isn't in the game at launch (which I hope it is), I wouldn't see it as a paid DLC, but more in line with what Disco Elysium did, i.e. simply add it down the line in a definitive edition (free update for those who had the original), a good reason to re-sell the game at full value rather than discounted.

That said, I really hope we have voiced protagonist for Custom Characters AT LAUNCH (with the option to turn that off for those who don't like it).

Also waiting for the day a game like this gives you the tools to pre-record and add your own voice (he he).

To perhaps help the understanding aspect:

What should this voice sound like? The way you imagine your character to sound? The way I imagine mine to?

... Like some vaguely urban British woman trying to make a career for herself as a budget price VA for an up and coming game studio?

Should they sound gruff and serious? Should they sound suave and smooth? Should they sound innocent and uncertain? Maybe sinister and cruel?

If a player creates a character, they will usually have some idea of the character they're making in mind - this is the heart and soul of D&D; creating your own character. For most that will include an idea of how they talk, the way they sound, and what their mode of speech might be like... and every character that is created, each different one by one player, and by the multitude of others as well, will have a potentially different answer to that question.

So... IF you create a fully voiced character, that has recording for every dialogue line... that voice is going to sound *Wrong* for the extreme vast majority of people who create characters to play. Having your character speak in away that is completely wrong for them, that doesn't even remotely match up with how you imagine they might sound, is by far more immersion-breaking and disruptive for players who play characters, than having their character silent in game and their actual manner and mode of speech left in the grey player-filled imagination space.

Now, this doesn't affect players who don't create actual characters - who either just focus on the mechanics of the game, race and class etc., and don't think of their character as a person - the kind of player who names all of their MMO characters BoBTanks, BoBHeals, BoBPews, BoBSneaks etc., and refers to them all as 'toons' (No slight on that - different people have different focuses). It also doesn't affect players who don't ever engage creatively with their character and just adopt a 'take what's given' mentality, and wait for the game to define the character they're playing for them (again, no slight on that - it's just a different way of playing). However, in a D&D-based game, players who create and play characters are the extreme, overwhelming majority group in this sense, because creating your own character is what playing a game like dungeons and dragons is all about.

It would be nice if we had a fully voiced protagonist... IF, and only if, we also, as aprt of that, had at least a dozen or so voice sets to choose from, so that we have a reliably good chance of finding a voice set that is at least passably acceptable for out imaging of our character... and fully voicing every possible voice line literally dozens and dozens of times over is far too ridiculously expensive an endeavour to demand.

This is why, in other game,s voice sets are mainly in control of short phrases and action barks, which create a consistent sense of how the character sounds throughout the game... but leaves the actual selected dialogue lines silent and to the player imagination. It's far more preferable than having to accept and deal with a grossly unfitting voice.

Totally agree with everything you said ... BUT!
You get me thinking Niara ... and we both know that means i have to ask:

What about Origin characters? O_o
I mean, they could be fully voiced bcs all those things we create and imagine for our custom avatars is allready set for them.
Maybe that could be the way to satisfy everyone, what do you think?

Well, the orign characters ARE already getting the full voice treatment regardless - precisely because who they are is already strongly defined and well determined. This is why they are perfect as companions... but not as playable characters directly.

Now we don't know how many Origin characters there will be at release, but what IF, and assuming they all receive voice lines for everything the player could pick, we could also have the option to select their voice bank (possibly removing said Origin character from the game in the process to avoid weird overlap)?

They do? O_o
My misstake then ... i would swear that last time i answered someone with Shadowheart, she was exactly as silent as Tav.

It is not impossible that both Origins and Tav will be fully voiced when the game is complete, and some answers from QA could have hinted at it, but it is definitely not confirmed. Ther eis a bit I run into in my last playthrough of Tav having his lines voiced during a cutscene when you run into dying true soul. Is it an odd exception, or an example of things to come?

Not something I support to begin with, but then again it applies to many decisions made for BG3.

I sure like the Option of downloading one or several DLC's,

in which the Player, male or female Gender, could have at least like Three to Five different Voices each.

From sexy and alluring,
to powerful and wild,
to charming and wicked,

etc. etc.

Sounds cool to me. Something i am definitely willing to pay for.

As humans we are able to distinguishes between what, about 200-300 different facial appearances? (e.g. "you look just like <insert famous actor X>!") before everything starts to blur.

And around 30 different voice "appearances" (like what the Fach scheme tries to differentiate in opera) before everything starts to blur. This is beyond what we typically get in games, which is more like "you sound just like <insert regional dialect or national accent X>!" I mean like distinct voices/cadences within a given regional dialect or accent.

Usually I see like 4 regional dialects or national accents, across 4 basic tenors, in both genders for games like these. The games that use the barks concept I mean. For the tenors its typically not like the big 4 in Opera, but divided more into generic emotions. So maybe like Caustic, Reserved, Exuberant, Seductive maybe. This just going off what I've seen in various RPGs that included voice barks.

There's sort of a standard for it now that I think BG helped create, but baseline you're going to need like at least a dozen or more voices in each gender to really do it justice. To make it fully convincing you probably need a set closer to two or three dozen.

That's different voices, not just the same actors doing different performances. Unless they are very good voice actors they will still have the same telltale registers, even if attempting a different "accent" for their next trick. Good voice actors who can do more than 1 voice convincingly are very talented and rare to find. Same thing with a good radio voice. I think they could easily achieve something that most players would find satisfying though, they just need to cast a much wider net.

A fully developed bark scheme would probably be easiest to achieve if it was crowdsourced with amateurs, like out of a beta or ea opt in to record custom barks. BG1 actually had that capability in 1998 which was another thing that made it novel. The key there is just to pick like 24-36 basic barks with riffs on each and then farm it out until you find exemplars with enough variety to really carry it. Pick one or two sets for each gender that is fully voiced if you like (probably many people would be happy with 1 British and 1 Not British set for each gender), but then have the rest be Bark oriented. That way people who like a fully voiced protagonist can have one, or to experience on the first play through, but that doesn't suck up all the zots, which would be better spent recording more voices than more lines in the same voice, if that makes sense.

How do you account for different races? Do you think half-orcs and halflings sound the same? Dwarves and elves? Humans and gnomes?

And doing full voice over becomes even more difficult once you consider that all dialogue in any expansion has to be voiced also or it will stand out rather badly. Now imagine any attempt by modders to add new quests and such.

Good point ...
Step 1. create proper voices for allready existing system ...
Step 2. find a way to expand it.

So far Larian didnt make even half of Step 1. (there is no proper Dwarf voice for PC) lets not be greedy. :-/

This is why I think a recording suite DLC for custom sounds (e.g voice barks) as a follow on would be cool. It was the first thing I checked for (after custom portraits, which also aren't here) in the hopes that BG3 would keep up the tradition of custom assets that BG1 inaugurated way back when.

I think they are focusing on many of the wrong things sadly, and the fact that there are still only 2 voice sets after a year indicates a big problem to me. Put another way, I don't think its the kind of player necessarily, but more the way the game is set up, that encourages players to think of their PCs as 'Toons' rather than Characters.

Like is this going to be the kind of game where I can even create a character in the first place, one that wouldn't get you laughed under the table immediately in PnP? or is it going to be the kind of game that promotes stat pushing with like +20 attributes or triple 18s as monstrous races for bonuses, because we know the characterization is just going to be meh regardless, even if you really get into it. I have D&D characters that I've been playing for years, but which probably won't be making an appearance in BG3, cause it just doesn't seem to be that kind of game. Not right now at least. Maybe it will launch with more bells than we're getting now, which would be cool, but I totally judge it based on the character creator and the limitations there.

If there is only 1 voice or 1 head that you actually like, and then only 1 outfit or class progression that fits, its kinda hard to get all into the idea of making a unique character. Just aesthetically, if everyone looks and sounds the same, then that sort of restricts where one can go with it, more than a bounded point buy scheme ever could hehe. Then on top of that you get a world where all the characters are railroaded into the first act, party size is restricted to 4, and there are only a couple paths to navigate the available world/plot, its kind of no wonder we see the video game characters treated more like throw-away cartoons than the real deal.

I wish they'd do something for character sheets/avatars, more like what they've been doing with dungeon mapping, like putting out editors via 3rd party design suites. A standalone character creator, that can then work either in a PnP setting or within the computer/videogame setting. They've done stuff like this a few different times in the past, but its never integrated with a flagship game, such that the same application might work for both. The last time it was tried 3d modelling was still pretty wonky too, compared to the unreal level its achieved now.

I mean how cool would it be if you could "Create and Dress" a character in a 3d modeler similar to what we have here in BG3, just with way more options, but then also stage a portrait with lighting and facial expressions! A pose-able mannequin that could do 'gesture' the way it works in animation on the most basic level? Then either hit "print" to create a physical copy of a legit character sheet, or export the same into the digital game with equal ease!

You know, a Character sheet portrait/avatar with official looking D&D letterhead, and FR themed fonts for the Mini bio, stats, skills, feats, all the good stuff, but which could also be used in the digital game.

Like having your own Frazetta card basically, with your very own character. One that you actually built, which you could then use either at the table or on your PC. Not some dumb MMO exclusive, but designed to be functional and look rad in both contexts, Analog or Digital.

Like that would just be the best. I don't understand why they can never pull it off to my satisfaction. Clearly we've reached a point in 3d modelling where its possible to do something like that, it just hasn't been done yet. Let alone as like the base starter set for whole centralized analog to digital inter-play. I think its what they wanted to do before 4e got sort of derailed by tragedy and missteps, but the basic concept or ideal still seems like one worth pursuing. If they really want to capture the heart and soul of what makes D&D D&D, which is the 'custom' player character.

If they got such a thing working for the PHB, then the next progression would be to do the same with the DMG and MM. Like where the gamemaster could do similar things with non player characters and monsters, defining their looks and such and then exporting either onto pamphlet printouts or directly into a digital framework for the game. The main idea would be to indulge people's creative side and delight when given tools like that to play with. Recording a custom bark, and then playing it back for yourself, maybe with some kind of Fantasy themed voice modulation?

That would be particularly cool. Like say you launch the app, and it has you read the barks to create a character voice set! That's still a little ways off, but not too far off. Voice deep fakes are fast pulling ahead of the curve, and everyone has mics and cameras on their phones now too, so one imagines that an opt-in thing might be possible in the near future. Like using the player's own voice to create barks, and the player's own face to create a 3d "headscan" that can then be modified or embellished in the design suite. Build out a whole library that way that can be shared. I think that's the next iteration, as it moves into a more VR/AR type space. I'd like to see a more simplified or abstract version of that done as a dry run for a game like BG3. I feel certain a D&D product like that would be pretty popular and profitable, if done tactfully, with some real spirit and artistry in the presentation.

If the dialogue selected is gruff and serious, they should sound gruff and serious. If the dialogue is suave and smooth, they should sound suave and smooth.

Unless they have a system where you can type in your own words for each reply, then you won't have complete control over who your character is anyway.

If they are going to make it an interactive cinematic experience, they should at least have one male and one female voice, along with a button to mute them for those who just can't stand it.

For Oghma's sake though, at the very least don't cut to a closeup of Tav not saying anything with that thrice-cursed neutral expression during his/her response. Cut to B-roll. Show the crackling fire. A closeup of the glowing lichen on the walls. Anything else.

No, too much dialogue. And I want Larian to make different Dialogue when the character has low intelligence.

Funny ... this is right on top of things i hope they never do.

I like fully voiced dialogue, BUT I would like the option to shut it off if none of the voices remotely fit my character. DLC with more voices might be something I'd buy, but Niara's right. If I can't find the right voice, just no voice would be preferred.

And I want Larian to make different dialogue when the character has medium-high intelligence.