Guild Wars 2

Personally, my biggest concern with the voice acting in this game is the lack of variety of accents. EVERYONE in the game sounds american, and they all speak in AMERCIAN english rather than British english, or just pronounce words how people would pronounce them if they had come from the same part of america. Prime examples are “CenTAR instead of CenTOUR” (thats the main one I can think of off the top of my head because it is said so much) but I have noticed many, many others that could have more diversity to them in order to add to the immersion. (Imagine if every english speaking person in the world said things exactly the same)

It’s always a little bit awkward when you’re about to write a post criticizing the writing and voice acting of the game only to see that the game’s lead writer is watching the thread. Even so, I’m going to agree with everyone else- ambient dialogue is great (if a bit repetitious in LA) and story writing and voice acting is generally quite terrible. I stopped playing my personal story at around level 66 (I think that’s what it says on the right hand side of my screen forever) because the actual missions aren’t fun on the gameplay side and the story stopped being worthwhile right around the time Tybalt threw his life away in the most awkward and needless way possible. I think there’s a moment that perfectly shows the dichotomy between the awkward, stilted dialogue scenes and the excellent ambient dialogue: the mission where you meet Destiny’s Edge (I know it’s a fantasy game, but please say that combination of words out loud and try to do so with a straight face. It’s kind of absurd.)

Your character sees a group of children playing around and in about 30 seconds to a minute, you’ve pretty much learned the entire backstory for their group in a really enjoyable, charming way. The conversation flows naturally and the kid VO is excellent. I really enjoyed standing there and watching them (a bit creepy, I guess) and liked that the game didn’t take away control of my character. It trusted me to pay attention if I was interested and move on if I wasn’t. Great. Then you meet Destiny’s Edge and it all goes to hell. The characters awkwardly deliver poorly-written lines while the game engine frantically tries to switch out their models. It doesn’t flow like a conversation, it doesn’t sound natural because of the huge pauses, and it gives the player way too long to actually consider the ridiculous things that these characters are saying. Please, please stop using the cut-away cutscene thing. Trust us as players that we’re going to be willing to pay attention to your story, although, frankly, there are large parts that simply aren’t worth paying any attention to. The whole “Destiny’s Edge acts like spoiled children” subplot that runs through every dungeon rapidly became the subject of many bets amongst my friends, namely, which member was going to act unreasonable and storm off in a huff this time. If I start playing the story again (probably just to get the weapon skin at the end, hooray for skinner boxes) I’ll try to screenshot the most egregious examples of poor writing, because I know there were multiple times where I actually laughed out loud at the fact that a character was actually saying something and expecting the player to take it seriously.

But this thread is theoretically about voice acting, so back on topic: the norn voice acting is the worst, with the asura as the best. Norns sound completely stiff and disinterested (try listening to the way the norn female voice says “new lands? new lands!” First off that’s kind of a dumb line for her to be saying to herself, and second she sounds like she’s reading off of a cue card right before she leaves for lunch.) and there isn’t enough variety in the voices (I’m pretty sure Eir has the same voice actress as my norn female, so there are a lot of times where they sounded identical). The asura actors pretty much sound like they’re having fun and actually putting something into the character. The charr are pretty good too, while the humans and sylvari are a bit stiff but generally fine. I don’t know how many of the sylvari voice actors are actually British, so I hope I’m not being a complete idiot here, but I gotta say a lot of them sound like they’re doing a fake accent (you can really hear it slip during some of the male sylvari’s lines) and it’s kind of distracting. Nolan North delivers his Nolan North-iest performance yet, pretty clearly making no effort to do any voice but, well, the Nolan North likeable hero voice that he does in 90% of his games (not to say he isn’t a great voice actor, since he’s done some amazing stuff [Spec Ops] but a lot of directors seem to just tell him to do the one voice and nothing else). That said, he is still doing a competent job as compared to the borderline atrocious performance by Trahearne’s VA and most of the norns.

Conclusions: ambient dialogue is great, the cutaway conversation scenes highlight the worst parts of the game’s voice acting and writing. Norns are bad, Asuras are great, and Nolan North is playing Nathan Drake with a codpiece.

Bourbz.8712:

Personally, my biggest concern with the voice acting in this game is the lack of variety of accents. EVERYONE in the game sounds american, and they all speak in AMERCIAN english rather than British english, or just pronounce words how people would pronounce them if they had come from the same part of america. Prime examples are “CenTAR instead of CenTOUR” (thats the main one I can think of off the top of my head because it is said so much) but I have noticed many, many others that could have more diversity to them in order to add to the immersion. (Imagine if every english speaking person in the world said things exactly the same)

I watched some voice over scene where the character had a fake English accent but it was so laughable as the pronunciation was all wrong. Particularly with the word “can’t” which sounds almost identical to “can” in an American accent but the vowel is elongated with an English accent.

Very few Americans can pull of an English accent. Better to just get a native to do the voice over otherwise you will sound as painfully false as Canadian actress Amanda Tapping in Sanctuary.

BobbyStein.2315:

Are your criticisms mostly being leveled at the personal story and cinematic conversations, or also with the ambient scenes and events?

Honestly I wish I could stop my character from telling me she’s feeling good, or silence those cheesy mantras recited during, well… mantras.

Sometimes the spoken dialog gets a bit much/repetitive all around.

I don’t mind the quality of the story dialog, it gets the job done and I don’t take the story too seriously anyway.

Ambient dialog is great. Sometimes timing is a little off, but it actually impacts how I view Tyria and makes me more engaged in the game.

Storyline – Honestly, if the lines were better I wouldn’t mind the VA. Particularly if the PC didn’t have the lines of a super-cheerful dumb cluck.

But right now most characters aren’t differentiated enough in their dialogue, they’re all stuck in the same flowery, bog-standard fantasy stereotypes and most of them are the same stereotype. So the voice-acting becomes more important, and most of it’s mediocre, which is fine, but when there’s a few really brilliant ones and then everyone else is blah it points out just how blah some voices can get.

I think the real problem with Trahearne is more related to his role in the story (especially for Sylvari) and how much time we spend with him. Less time, better decisions = not so irritating. Magister Sieran from the Priory is also an annoying stereotype, but people miss her because she dies before we get tired of her.

Trahearne’s voice is kind of grating and monotonous, which doesn’t help. I think making it clearer that Trahearne has the bureaucrat /diplomat role would help since then it would look less like he was stealing the PC’s thunder. Or maybe give players a chance to choose diplomat vs combatant to get PCs more invested in their role.

BobbyStein.2315:

Are your criticisms mostly being leveled at the personal story and cinematic conversations, or also with the ambient scenes and events?

For me it’s the personal story cut scenes. I took my ranger to assist the Ogres. The “ogre in charge” was horribly voiced. The voice sounded like a woman – trying to sound like a man trying to sound like an ogre. It was horrible!

There are no accents, no oddities in speech, no… nothing. It amazes me that all races and species in Tyria have perfect English language skills.

It seems like it was the last thought and no one wanted to review how it flowed with the animation on screen. And if all these voice overs were reviewed by a group, well… you need some new ears in your office!

I would say
Ambient – usually good – thow as for “getting it out right” – top would be Asura and Charr – i can spend an entire day running around in BC; listening to the charr… its great, and u really FELL – like “ure in charr land…” – great writing, great lines.. good voice acting. I just LOVE the charr soldiers sing.. Asura also very good… Agent Zrii, and others – NPC lines like "Vacaaaate this premises (sorry for spelling) – cracks me up..

For both – i would say, that wandering around in theyre cities/places – gives u a “great feel” bout charr and Asura….. u can litterly "learn how charr/asura – and somehwat Sylvari is – from just listening to the NPCs…

Some/much of the Sylvari ambient is okish – but – i still feel somewhat disconnected from sylvari.. i LOVE the grove.. favorite place.. but.. when i walk around, i dont really get a “feel”, there.. there is no “atmosphere” of sylvari… most times u hear some mock about a dream – and thats pretty much that…. exceptions would be in The Grove is the 3 Sylvari standing near the bank – theyre actually very good – they bring life.. sparring with eachother.. there is a few other spots – the 2 sylvari talking to the charr bout war.. and the absolut best “scene” – my favorite – big +10 to both voice actors – The asura and sylvari gate keepers standing talking… “You.. weirded out my golem” “Are you the father or the mother ?” – GREAT stuff… but thats the execptions… better writing, voicing sorta ok – can be better

Norn – its like.. any human town.. i dont get any feel of norn listening around in theyre city, or listening to them… soundish – its like listening to humans, just lower voices.. writing definetly needs work – there is nooo feel bout them what so ever.. humans exactly the same… and if they really wanted to put some work into it – make LA be somewhat more “piratish” – DR some more “we are the main city” – and ebonhawk more… “we fought hard to get this far, and we keep doing it”… (im sure that can be said with a simple word)… and still Norn.. do something.. anything.. Norn just sound.. human….

As for story.. a few NPCs really has good voice actors, and are great – Tybalt… the only NPC i will go as far as “elevate” to a nearly Gwen status… best NPC in the game so far… Rytlock, and generally Charr Story NPCs good – however, the Charr character voice actor.. she needs to work more – sometimes she sounds like.. i dont know.. she is.. knitting, watching TV, making dinner.. i dont know, but whatever she speaking bout, dont really seem related to the situation… Eurtayle is another nice Voice Actress.. love her bantering.. Traherne – bad – it seems like he keeps his voice the same no matter if we just won the war, or lost 5000 men to the dragon.. wake up dude.. ure a necromancer that just got put in charge of the pact… show it, act it..

Basicly – ambient/generic NPCs Okish → Great (depending where u are)
PS NPCs – from crap → great (very much depending which u talk too)

TSW had great voice acting even though your own character didn’t have his/her voice. NPCs felt very natural compared to this monotone, inflectionless, crap we’ve seen from both GW2 and SWTOR.

The one voice worth mentioning in this game (for story-mode) that I felt came across the most successful was Tybalt Leftpaw from the Order of Whispers arc. This game could definitely use, even benefit from a better VO tech team, albeit a bit late in the process now to go back and correct.

The basic point to all this is: If you’re going to shell out the dime to get a team of well known voice actors for all the major roles in the game, might as well take advantage. Right now it sounds like you guys had a running joke were you’d use all the worst VOs before launch, then plug in the right ones at launch, but lost the good sound recordings, basically shooting yourself in the foot. It would still be tragic, but hey, at least you got a good story out of it.

The Norn voice acting in story cinematic is terrible. Sounds like people trying to speak with a lower tone than they can pull off.

Hint: don’t do that. Record normally, then use a VST that can do a formant shift to deepen the voice.

Trahearne.

Since release I have wanted to play a Norn female. Their model is great. I like the cultural differences that make them unique from the humans. Yesterday for the third time I attempted to make a Norn female alt. I managed to finish the starting area and one heart reaching a whooping level two and a half before the voice acting became so unbearable that I had to call it quits again. Its a real disappointment to say the very least. I could really care less about Trahearne. I figured he’s been hanging out in Orr by himself for so long he has no social skills and that’s why he sounds that way. But to be unable to play a Norn female because she sounds just so awful? That’s unfortunate.

Pasha.2367:

Since release I have wanted to play a Norn female. Their model is great. I like the cultural differences that make them unique from the humans. Yesterday for the third time I attempted to make a Norn female alt. I managed to finish the starting area and one heart reaching a whooping level two and a half before the voice acting became so unbearable that I had to call it quits again. Its a real disappointment to say the very least. I could really care less about Trahearne. I figured he’s been hanging out in Orr by himself for so long he has no social skills and that’s why he sounds that way. But to be unable to play a Norn female because she sounds just so awful? That’s unfortunate.

Hmm… I like the norn female voice.

Healu.2586:

Hmm… I like the norn female voice.

Well, to each their own I guess. To me she has either no inflection at all or the wrong inflection for the dialogue. To me it sounds very much like she is reading from a script with no idea of the context to the lines. To me it sounds stilted and awkward and very unappealing. And that’s just in reference to the cut-scenes. I won’t even get into how annoying I find the noises she makes when getting hit or jumping what have you.

The Norn male voice acting is SOOO disappointing. So much potential… yet so bland..

Doesn’t bother me too much I enjoyed it. Zojja is by far the best one imo (rememeber the quest where you walk with trahearne into the tree’s vision?)

Trahearne is a bit meh.. but like I said I’m not too bothered by it.

I was less than four hours into the game when I found the sliders for music, ambient sound, and voice. They all went straight to zero and things have been fine ever since. I may give the music a second chance but the voices, both cut scene and open world, were intollerable. It’s a shame they spent development money on that.

Parthis.2091:

BobbyStein.2315:

Are your criticisms mostly being leveled at the personal story and cinematic conversations, or also with the ambient scenes and events?

The Voice acting in the personal story events is pretty uncomfortable, but when combined with the relatively generic backdrops that take you away from the scene, that’s when it’s at its worst; there is nothing to focus on other than the delivery. It’s not terrible, but it’s pretty jarring, particularly when the NPCs are talking about the slow death of their race, the world, and everything you, as the player, are supposed to hold dear; they’re delivering lines like they’re reading a shopping list.

The voice acting would’ve felt a little more natural if it was taking place in the world, with NPCs milling around, or the serious stuff in a war room, or while the Vigil fort is being sieged; the setup dialog could be taking place overlooking the oncoming armies, dodging catapult fire and shouting to be heard over the noise. Everything that makes for great conversations in popular drama, classic war films and great fantasy was missing from the personal story.

I also can’t escape the feeling that the VO was recorded separately, at different times, like each actor was handed a sheet of paper that was “say this in a sad voice:”, so the emotional context was lost. It felt like the nature of the conversation was different to all of the NPCs taking part. It just didn’t gel well.

Finally my real problem with the personal story is two fold; I wasn’t the hero, I was a lap-dog… and secondly at no point did any of the story moments make me feel like this did back in the day; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQc7o2rm7po (SPOILER: the closest was the death of “apples”, but it was nowhere near the emotional impact of Aeris).

[…]
I’d just like to get a little more “world” into the RPG part, and a little more emotion into the journey.

Well, can’t expect Guild Wars 2 to have Celes Chere or Aerith Gainsborough. (well, I do know another popular MMO that does >.> but I digress).

I quite agree with everything that’s been said here. If at least the lines were delivered in world, maybe I’d enjoy them more. Either way, there is a skip button for most cinematics. I guess the one bad aspect of GW2 really lies in the voice acting – the soundtrack, the ambiance, and the NPC voicing outside the cinematic is excellent.

You’re not alone! They are pretty lousy. Listening to my manly Norn guardian have a higher voice than myself in real life was disappointing to say the least.

And the dialogue. Oh my.. the dialogue.

I have a female Norn, and the Norn voice acting seems to be the worst. The male VO work in general seems at least more lively, whereas the female Norn and Charr are very robotic.

The biggest disappointment is that you didn’t have any input on the voice. For all the visual customization and the scope of VO work in the game overall, it’s just odd that the option wasn’t included.

BobbyStein.2315:

Are your criticisms mostly being leveled at the personal story and cinematic conversations, or also with the ambient scenes and events?

I’m late to this thread, and many of the comments I’d like to make have already been delivered by people more capable than myself. But seeing how it was brought up, I want to point out how much my feelings about the lore and environment shift between the story and ambient moments.

Listening to the story voice acting very often (not always, but most often) drags my heart to my ankles. You’ve heard the reasons, I don’t need to repeat them. Sufficed to say, I felt more than happy to put Apatia out of her misery.

But for every moment I drudge through an awkward, stuttered story cinematic, I find five little moments in the ambient world which get me positively goofy with happiness. A little girl who recreates a large dog’s “Woof”; a sylvari who baffles an asura over whether his golem has a mother; an asura who argues with a golem about whether his corner market is actually loitering. These liness have done more to enhance the game than all the overbearing drama in the cinematic dialogues together.

Exceptions exist: the norn, for one. It’s been said many times in this thread, but I feel it’s important to reiterate just how nauseatingly preposterous the norn female sounds.

Another exception: the human ambient lines hit and miss. On one hand you have, “Met an asura the other day… called me a ‘bookah’… I think she likes me.” And it sounds self indulgent and prim and very, very natural. On the other hand you have the guard who sits on the door of Shaemoor Garrison, constantly blabbing about how he needs vengeance on all Centaurs, and he sounds like someone who wants to act really melodramatic about a wet sock. It sounds so fake that my hackles raise. I mean, if I had hackles.

But this example very often defines the difference between the game’s good and bad voice acting. Flippant moments, funny quips, and oddball banter are almost always delivered well. Primary reason, I believe, that so many people enjoy the Asura— and to a lesser extent, the Charr— backdrops (personally, the Skritt do it for me every time). They always have bizarre, outlandish things to say, and you can hear voice actors get into the fun of it. Bear Shaman Marga is an awesome example. Despite all the problems of norn female voices, I loved hers from the moment I heard, “You found the bear’s den, lets celebrate with FIGHTING!” She’s campy, and over the top, and outright fun. She gets into it.

Those actors who get saddled with all the gravity and seriousness, that’s where the acting falls apart. I have trouble recalling ambient examples, as most often the voices are forgettable, rather than painful. But the storyline actors get hoards of seriousness pushed on them. And, no surprise, they’re the ones who have the most trouble getting the lines across. Gravitas is difficult. I blame no one for missing the mark. But when it consistently fails, something is definitely wrong.

It’s funny how I came to the GW2 forum for the first time with a thought of posting about poor voice acting, and this thread was at the top!
But let’s get to the point, voice acting is indeed out of place. There’s no dynamics in a conversation, no life. Where are emotions, how about interruptions, stuttering, back chanelling? I mean, that’s what they teach at school about spoken discourse, and dialogues in the game feel like script reading.
I would like to add that it would be nice reviewing the possibility of removing the cinematic dialogues as such. Art-work behind them is nice, but two turn-taking plastic figures on the screen take it all. Why not make this conversations on the game drive, in that same place, so you can see all characters, as well as how they interact? Or, on the other hand, go extreme and make the whole conversation an art work – stationary pictures of those who speak with some appropriate emotion on their face!
I guess I should post elsewhere about character content and his/her involvement in the story? Because, huh, please, it’s just ridiculous…

I just want to add a little example from the game that drove me laughing out loud under my table: if you were completing the human storyline and got to the point where you go to the pirate camp and fight the undead by their side, I think the captain there says “yaaaar”…Put this word into google translate and press sound option, it sounds the same. It’s very sad, you know.
On the lighter note, spontaneous dialogues on the streets, ot written information is just amazing, I really can feel that NPC world is living, very greatful for that!

Personally I think the biggest problems are the cut scenes. They pull you out of your environment and present to you a static, dull backdrop that only serve to amplify the sometimes overly emotional, other times not emotional enough conversations. It just highlights the whole “actors on a stage” impression.

The reason SWTOR’s work better is because they are shot from varying angles while you are still in the environment, and more than two people can be on screen at a time. Sure they are only fun the first time around, but with GW2’s format they are terrible even the first round.

Personally I would like it if they just trashed the cut scenes altogether. I think it would actually be better if the conversations just occurred in chat bubble format (freezing your character in place for the duration of the conversation, unless you hit skip or esc of course). It would be far less of a jarring transition.

Pinder.5261

Exceptions exist: the norn, for one. It’s been said many times in this thread, but I feel it’s important to reiterate just how nauseatingly preposterous the norn female sounds.

Yah that is the worst “girl trying to do a deep voice” I have ever heard. Maybe they should try employing a really small guy to do the female Norn, you know, work it from the opposite angle.

The ony voices I do not care for are female norn and female sylvari.

Holy balls. I haven’t checked this thread in a while… look at how many replies!

I’m glad to see I wasn’t alone in this.

Storyline:
Trahearne, I played the game for the story and found myself reading it once I got past the Order. Past that I will had the best VO to the Asuran and the worst to the Norn. Humans are bleh but at least you know they sound human just a bit detached but human. Charr are okay are good, I just would much rather of been able to choose the voice. Sylvari is the wishy washy, sometimes they do good and others bad, but your always trying to figure out why the accent sounds off.

So yeah the storyline needs some work and Trahearne needs a new actor bad! Past that I think you might be able to work it by changing the animations of the emotion.

World Ambience:
Honestly I find it great, minus sometimes they are a bit speedy or standing a couple twenty feet away from eachother you feel like your in a world, they still get hit by the norn and how bad they are but past that you feel your moving from area to area. (LA could use some new lines here and there though since that is the main town and all.)

Not only is the voice acting emotionless, dry and completely unconvincing, but the dialogue is poorly written as well. At times it feels like the dialogue given to my human male was written by a child. In combat he yells “Urge to kill rising!”, which completely kills any sense of seriousness in a fight. The story mode cut scenes are quite terrible as well. I love many aspects of this game, but an RPG without a story isnt really an RPG, and this game does not deliver any sense of story from level 1 all the way to 80.

BobbyStein.2315:

Are your criticisms mostly being leveled at the personal story and cinematic conversations, or also with the ambient scenes and events?

Personal story cinematic conversations are terrible. I am not sure if its the voice acting or the writing but i have a sense of dread when i think about pushing another toon through story mode.

Story is not what I tell my friends when I try to get them into this game. I normally disclose my distaste for it but only after I think I have them hooked on the things i love about this game.

Defiantly not the quality of original guild wars 1. Reminds me of the half kitten job done in factions.

There’s a lack of emotion and realistic tone throughout the cutscenes and even with NPCs in the world. For starters, the animations need to fit more with the dialog and really need to be the drive for the emotion that the actors are giving us, however, the emotion is lacking as well.

A lot of the dialog feels too straight-forward and therefor kind of comes off as just dull. A lot of the characters arn’t original enough, in that they don’t feel different enough between each other. Don’t be afraid to exaggerate more (without being too dramatic). I would even take the animations further by really breaking the barrier with your current cutscenes. Don’t just have characters stand around on screen, have them really interact with each other. For example, when Logan and Rytlock are fighting, they could engage physically – Rytlock shoving Logan etc. You could go beyond that with more effects for specific characters interactions. Just… innovate more. =D

I would look into two of (arguably) the best franchises that have proven to make real raw emotions come alive in video games – Dragon Age & Mass Effect. Hell, I even cried during the ME series. It’s powerful stuff, which really isn’t seen in this game.

I’m hoping one day I’ll feel the emotion, as I don’t doubt you guys and your efforts. Still, you’ve got work to do, imo.

I felt pretty detached from the story having played it from start to nearly finish (I need a party for the final dungeon) and I find voice acting to be one major contributor to this, but I can’t exactly find it as a primary cause for that. To stay on the focus on voice acting for this thread, I agree there is major repetition issues and a general lack of emotion in most of the characters’ voices whether they are a player or NPC.

I feel the voice acting problems might be caused by stretching out the same voice actors across multiple characters, which contributes to the repetition complaint. The same voice actor will have the same accent or voice for multiple characters. This makes many characters – especially of the same race – run together and not feel very unique which then puts strain on having to make awesome writing for their dialogue to make them stand out which is not always the case. I feel this may have been out of necessity for the developers and VAs as you can only make so many different voices for so many characters in such a large MMO and because of that I’m not really sure how one can address this issue (even if we could retroactively redo the voice acting which isn’t possible anyway). Having an ensemble cast perform hundreds and hundreds of lines for a video game can be very costly! Makes you wonder the expenses of, say, Skyrim’s voice acting.

One possible way to fix this a little in the future is to make the voice acting for the player characters unique and not reusable among NPCs. For example as a human male, I sometimes hear ‘my own voice’ from enemies. Another mentioned suggestion in this thread is to reduce the repetition of the background dialogue, especially in crowded cities where players might idle to do things like crafting or trading. This can also be accomplished by fixing up dialogue triggers and other technical bits that make a conversation start. But I think the problem as a whole is just a result of the game’s production and limitations due to the scale of it being an MMO so I’m somewhat in a loss as to what else can be done.

While the overall quality of voice acting is good, there is some bad that needs to be ironed out. There are certain instances in both the personal story and random events, Trahearn, all Quaggons, etc where one would question if the voice was just recorded and tacked on, without any editing. You also have scenarios of overacting, The Witch Queen being my biggest example. TBH, I just got so tired of the same exchange of dialog between NPCs, the same sayings from the player, and the annoyingly, randomly, loud NPCs located throughout Tyria; that I have been playing GW2 with the dialog volume off for quite some time. In fact, I feel that this has improved my game play experience and immersion. Now I don’t have to worry about my speakers getting blown up from the exchange between the children, every time I go to the banker in LA. I no longer have to suffer with random tidbits of overacting, or monotone NPCs. One thing I would like to see is an option to change the dialog to another language and keep the text English. At least this way you do not have quiet cut scenes, and you have no clue if the voice acting is good or bad.

I’ll leave you with this:
“Take heed! I haven’t taken leave of my senses! I’ve seen creatures of metal and steam!”
“Always be loyal to your Krewe….”
“I can outrun a centaur.”
“More violets, less violence”
“It’s a bad time to be travelling.”
“I often talk to the spirits but they rarely answer.”
“Care to spend some coin?”
“There is no profit in the eternal alchemy.”
“For great justice!”

“Excuse me! Do you have a moment?”
“Careful, if our parents find out, they’ll kill us.”
“The centaur’s are coming, RUN!”
“Seize the moment!” Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zeNHmvAY5o

Specterryu Quipter, how could you have forgotten the outhouse line from LA

I won’t say GW2’s voice acting direction is perfect, but it’s far, far better (save SWTOR, from what I’ve read) than other games in the same genre. The story voice acting could have used a bit more gravity, but when you consider the presentation style (two characters standing across from each other, talking against a drawn backdrop), it’s fitting. It’s almost like the characters are narrating a storybook. That’s the theme – GW2 is “your story”, and they tell it as such.

And the general and character banter is just terrific, especially the Asuran males. Nolan North captures that snarky, confident attitude he’s so famous for with the Human Male, and Jennifer Hale is, as always, terrific as the Sylvari Female player.

I’m not saying it’s not without flaws and doesn’t deserve some criticism, but the voice acting in the game is FAR from bad. In fact, Anet’s done a great job of breathing life into a game in a genre of generic responses and exclamation-pointed NPCs. It’s more than they could have done, and I enjoyed the voice work throughout the personal story.

Well, except maybe for Trahearne.

I only play human characters and i dare to say without any doubt…

Voice acting is the worst part of the game, without any doubt,

I’m really sorry but the story is so so so so so awesome, it’s epic and gorgeous but the voice acting ruins it all during the cinematics,

Sounds so artificial, without any interest… like if the guy behind the voice was bored and tired,

There’s no angry, there’s no sadness, there’s no scare, there’s no anxiety, there’s no love, there’s “no feeling”,

I don’t want to be mean, gw2 it’s the best game i ever played, (and i played a LOT of games),

Voice acting hurts the story too much, i’m sorry to say it,

It’s a shame with such lovely music and story but lore is destroyed due voices,

EDIT:

Sometimes, (maybe the worst), it’s not like a conversation, it sounds like a chat message, (I say something, then you say something, etc etc), this is not a voice acting problem,

Ey hi, it’s me Logan, how are you?

(two seconds of silence and then…)

Oh my god, Logan it’s you ! (Of course it was me, didn’t you see me comming?)

I’ll say it’s like two blind people talking each other sometimes,

This and the lack of feeling ends with artificial conversations,

EDIT2:

Trahearne is just awfull… sorry Trahearne,

LOL EDIT3:

Worst part didn’t means “horrible”, voice acting it’s like “the worst of the amazing”,

The rest of the game is so great that voice acting, being the worst it’s not that bad at all,

I doubt they’ll have the time and/or will to re-record all of the story dialogue. However, I would LOVE them to add in the ability to (at least outside of the story dialogues) change your characters voice. It’s one of the things that I really just didn’t understand why you couldn’t change it. You have all this customization from personal storyline, to dyes, to armor transmutation and so on, but you can’t even change the pitch of your voice. Even PSO let you choose different voices.

ovoToxin.3950:

I doubt they’ll have the time and/or will to re-record all of the story dialogue. However, I would LOVE them to add in the ability to (at least outside of the story dialogues) change your characters voice. It’s one of the things that I really just didn’t understand why you couldn’t change it. You have all this customization from personal storyline, to dyes, to armor transmutation and so on, but you can’t even change the pitch of your voice. Even PSO let you choose different voices.

This in an horrible idea.

It’s likely that one of the reasons why Traheanne talks so much is due to how it’s easier to record a single voice actor delivering all those speeches than record the same with the 8 voice actors who play the player characters.

Were ArenaNet to add one single other option to each race/gender combination, we would go from 8 voice actors to 16 voice actors. And don’t fool yourself into believing that merely artifical pitch modulation would work; we would only get even more complaints about the voice acting than we already do.

When ArenaNet were to add a new race, instead of needing 2 new voice actors, they would need 4 voice actors. Two new races later, they would need to record every single line spoken by our characters with 24 different voice actors.

24. Different. Voice. Actors.

A game in which characters only growl and scream can easily offer a big array of voice options. A game that actually wants to tell a story through those characters cannot afford that kind of luxury. Unless you want something like the huge success of The Old Republic, that used a small fortune in voice acting and today, well…

Hopefully, the sylvari player gets his voice made more Caithe and less 12 year old child “OMG, that’s bad, I’m gonna tell Mommy Pale Tree! You can’t do that, because it’s bad!”

There’s a difference in being righteous and a gallant, and a completely cheesy do-gooder fool. I’d like for my sylvari to sound a bit more intelligent and savvy/jaded than the current voice he has.

Not an anti-hero, but crudely put more capable of being a ba-d-@-zz (this word is filtered -_-)

P.S. My favorite story moments were lv 1-30. Could give it up to 40. Then the game completely loses racial identity and order identity and shovels you into the same old “kill hordes of tricky undead and listen to Trehearne ramble in monotone”.

I guess the Order of Whispers and Durmand Priory were wrong about dragons, because we only took Zhaitan down one way, and it was the Vigil way. No puttting him back to sleep, and no gathering knowledge of why he rose and how to properly combat a dragon.

BobbyStein.2315:

I hope you’re all comfortable voicing your opinions here. We value your honesty, and read as much of your feedback as we’re able. I can’t be too specific right now, but rest assured that we’re making some changes to how we write, edit, cast, voice, and present story in the game. The past few live releases should hopefully give you a small idea of where we’re headed.

This might be a bit off-topic, but considering it was stated here, are there any plans to change the instance “cutscenes”? Even minimal changes (example: adding physical interaction between characters instead of just having them face each other) could greatly enhance storytelling, and certainly help guide VOs, too.

BobbyStein.2315:

That stated, all ideas are valid. We had discussed finding ways of giving players new voices, or building a pitch slider for those who wanted such a feature. We settled with what we have now due to time and resource constraints, however.

Is there a possibility that you’ll revisit this in the future? A pitch slider would be pretty awesome.

Actually, I didn’t find the cutaway scenes to be “terrible beyond all belief”.There were moments in the personal stories I’ve experienced where the dialogue felt robotic and “disconnected”, but there were moments where I snickered at a scene (and no, it wasn’t just for the asura), teared up a little, and even flat out laughed.

In some ways I feel like the issue may be the mode in which dialogue is delivered to us. Rather than invest a ton into “moar voice-acting!”, I’d rather see some of that go into the cinematics department. Most times, the voice-acting in the cutaways were fine; the problem is the cutaway cinematic format doesn’t often do the writing and VO justice.

For example: At the end of the human story arc for the missing sister the scene...where the main character and his/her sister are reunited is emotionally intense. In that kind of moment I expected my character to drop his weapons, stumble forward slightly before sprinting to his sister's side. Hugging ensues. Right? Wrong, my character and his sister are separated by the impersonal wall that is the cutaway format.

Looking back at where cinematics were in GW: Nightfall and GW: Eye of the North and where they are now, I feel like ArenaNet took a big step foward in the animations department. The characters actually have expressible emotions, smoother gestures, etc. I was and am still thrilled by the progression. The problem is that I feel I lost the cinematic experience of watching my characters interact with much of the story in the open world (while talking, that is).

Of course, cinematics can be expensive (probably one of the reasons Nightfall and EotN didn’t get their own shiny CGI trailers like Prophecies and Factions did, though they did a good job on the last two games’ trailers anyway) and animating cutaways looks less time-consuming than it would be to script out cinematics that take place in the actual game world. Lack of time and/or money are always two unfortunate and limiting factors; the trick is finding which needs more love, cinematics, or the actual voice-acting?

BobbyStein.2315:

Also, the game is made in America, we write it in American English, and most of our actors live in Los Angeles. That stated, I agree that we could use some more vocal diversity in the game, but I don’t want Guild Wars 2 to sound like every other fantasy title out there with the standard British accents on every character. So aside from more British accents, what other types of voices would you like to hear?

And yes, some of the pronunciations are a little janky. That sometimes happens. We fix what we can, when we can. I’ve also named a clear owner of our pronunciation guide, which should minimize these kinds of gaffes going forward.

If you’re actually taking voice suggestions, I wouldn’t mind hearing some more Elonian sounding voices. Unless Elonian dialects were washed out by a dominating Krytan dialect though I hope that isn’t the case.

And while there may be future plans to change this anyway. Is there any chance that not every single tengu has to be male and voiced by Yuri Lowenthal (not that I don’t like his acting, it’s a little weird that they all sound the same).

And for an even more ridiculous request, if we ever meet the tengu emperor, can he be voiced by George Takei? It’d be awesome! \o\

BobbyStein.2315:

For the record, Nolan doesn’t show up to VO sessions in a codpiece.

BobbyStein.2315:

I don’t want Guild Wars 2 to sound like every other fantasy title out there with the standard British accents on every character. So aside from more British accents, what other types of voices would you like to hear?

As a British person, I can tell you that there are a LOT of accents in Britain itself. I wonder if by “standard” British accents you mean either of the ones Americans tend to know; kittenney (Dick van kitten in Mary Poppins), and Posh (the rest of the cast of Mary Poppins) (The filter is stopping my from naming the Dick van kitten accent, but it is a regional accent from London. Oh wow, I can’t even type his name. This censorship is insane). You could also try (and I know I’m lumping a lot of regional variations and/or dialects together here);
Welsh,
Scottish,
Northern Irish,
Geordie,
Scouse,
Northern English,
Midlands,
South-Western English.

By far and away the worst voice acting I have ever heard is Detha in AC saying, “but I have to build them myself”. A completely ridiculous emphasis on the word “build” makes this sound absolutely comical.

This is one thing I had noticed. Sadly I don’t remember specifically which Sylvari NPC it was, but there is one in the Grove that shifts from intensely posh English to kittenney in one sentence. Made me jump first time, now it just makes me chuckle.

lol, seems swear blocker doesn’t like the name for people from a specific part of London, touche.

BobbyStein.2315:

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Malin.2490:

Personal story/cinematics: HORRIBLE
Ambient scenes and events: AWESOME

I still can’t believe the difference. Possibly two different teams?

Yes. Separate teams handled writing the different content types leading up to ship. That is no longer the case. My team is now responsible for the final output of all text and VO in the game, and I am now fully responsible for the quality. As a result of this change, I am now empowered to take the writing and VO in a direction that’s more consistent with the ambient scenes and events.

Bourbz.8712:

Personally, my biggest concern with the voice acting in this game is the lack of variety of accents. EVERYONE in the game sounds american, and they all speak in AMERCIAN english rather than British english, or just pronounce words how people would pronounce them if they had come from the same part of america. Prime examples are “CenTAR instead of CenTOUR” (thats the main one I can think of off the top of my head because it is said so much) but I have noticed many, many others that could have more diversity to them in order to add to the immersion. (Imagine if every english speaking person in the world said things exactly the same)

That’s not entirely true. We have a number of non-American accents in the game that are delivered by natural speakers. Here’s a small list as an example (but there are more).

• Robin Atkin Downes
• Gideon Emery
• Jane Windsor
• Roberto Medina
• Lin Gallagher
• Jenny Veal
• Etc.

Also, the game is made in America, we write it in American English, and most of our actors live in Los Angeles. That stated, I agree that we could use some more vocal diversity in the game, but I don’t want Guild Wars 2 to sound like every other fantasy title out there with the standard British accents on every character. So aside from more British accents, what other types of voices would you like to hear?

And yes, some of the pronunciations are a little janky. That sometimes happens. We fix what we can, when we can. I’ve also named a clear owner of our pronunciation guide, which should minimize these kinds of gaffes going forward.

LobsterEntropy.1238:

It’s always a little bit awkward when you’re about to write a post criticizing the writing and voice acting of the game only to see that the game’s lead writer is watching the thread. Even so, I’m going to agree with everyone else- ambient dialogue is great (if a bit repetitious in LA) and story writing and voice acting is generally quite terrible…Conclusions: ambient dialogue is great, the cutaway conversation scenes highlight the worst parts of the game’s voice acting and writing. Norns are bad, Asuras are great, and Nolan North is playing Nathan Drake with a codpiece.

I hope you’re all comfortable voicing your opinions here. We value your honesty, and read as much of your feedback as we’re able. I can’t be too specific right now, but rest assured that we’re making some changes to how we write, edit, cast, voice, and present story in the game. The past few live releases should hopefully give you a small idea of where we’re headed.

For the record, Nolan doesn’t show up to VO sessions in a codpiece.

ovoToxin.3950:

I doubt they’ll have the time and/or will to re-record all of the story dialogue. However, I would LOVE them to add in the ability to (at least outside of the story dialogues) change your characters voice.

Rewriting and re-recording the entire game would be too time consuming and cost prohibitive, though we have analyzed certain parts of the game to see where we could make some improvements, if given the resources. It’s safest to assume that the current voiced content will remain, and that new additions to the game will reflect a new direction. If that changes, we’ll be sure to let everyone know.

Erasculio is right that adding additional player voices is hugely expensive due to how many lines are assigned to the PC (player character). Whenever the player speaks in shared content, that line must be recorded a total of 10 times (5 playable races x 2 genders). Also, due to how variant lines are used in the game, the contents of the line have to be written exactly the same, which makes it hard to do any meaningful voice or roleplaying differences between characters.

That stated, all ideas are valid. We had discussed finding ways of giving players new voices, or building a pitch slider for those who wanted such a feature. We settled with what we have now due to time and resource constraints, however.

i always thought sylvari should have had a cletic accent, but that’s just me and i prefer that over British.
also another personal opinion, i really think Trahearne should have been played by this guy >_>
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aJCrMDl-H4

I liked all the personal stories I’ve done so far, and I thought the Claw Island story Arc was pretty epic the first time I did it. As far as the voices are concerned, I actually didn’t have a problem with most of the acting. In fact the only voice acting that I disliked are Trahearne and the Female Charr. I love the Norn, and Asurans are by far my favorite. Especially the ambient dialogue where the one female Asura is complaining that her notebook was moved 1 micrometer to the left, and the Male Asura is like, “well that does seem suspicious” lol.. cracks me up!

Honestly, I don’t understand the complaints with voice acting besides Trahearne. They’re all pretty exceptional and get the job done well, with notable praise to Zojja and ALL Male Sylvari! Their enthusiastic, adventurous, yet cute, innocent voice really stands out, making them a pleasure to listen to! I also have to give some praise to various Asura characters such as Magg.

However, a part of me misses the cheesy voice of Master Togo…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8gHHFWOjHQ

Also, for Detha’s emphasis on build, isn’t she supposed to be a sarcastic character?

Kain Francois.4328:

Honestly, I don’t understand the complaints with voice acting besides Trahearne. They’re all pretty exceptional and get the job done well, with notable praise to Zojja and ALL Male Sylvari! Their enthusiastic, adventurous, yet cute, innocent voice really stands out, making them a pleasure to listen to! I also have to give some praise to various Asura characters such as Magg.

I’m with you. I started playing the game with German voices and text, which was an absolutely horrible experience because of the number of mistranslations, bad pronounciation and, quite honestly, bad voices. I first started playing a male Norn, which wasn’t too bad, but then I switched to human (because the Norn felt so slow) and the male human voice is way below c-movie standards.
Anyway, I’ve not experienced such problems with the Englisch version. I don’t have a problem with Trahearne as well. Sounds like a Sylvari to me. But maybe what Bobby said comes into play here – English is not my native language, so I just don’t hear the mistakes. I’d still hear a “bad” voice though.