The Problems With Video Game Voice Acting

The Guardian's Games blog explores the tendency of modern video games to suffer from poor voice acting, a flaw made all the more glaring by increasingly precise and impressive graphics. Quoting: "Due to the interactive nature of games, actors can't be given a standard film script from which they're able to gauge the throughline of their character and a feel for the dramatic development of the narrative. Instead, lines of dialogue need to be isolated into chunks so they can be accessed and triggered within the game in line with the actions of each individual player. Consequently, the performer will usually be presented with a spreadsheet jammed with hundreds of single lines of dialogue, with little sense of context or interaction. ... But according to David Sobolov, one of the most experienced videogame voice actors in the world (just check out his website), the significant time pressures mean that close, in-depth direction is not always possible. 'Often, there's a need to record a great number of lines, so to keep the session moving, once we've established the tone of the character we're performing, the director will silently direct us using the spreadsheet on the screen by simply moving the cursor down the page to indicate if he/she liked what we did. Or they'll make up a code, like typing an 'x' to ask us to give them another take.' It sounds, in effect, like a sort of acting battery farm, a grinding, dehumanizing production line of disembodied phrases, delivered for hours on end. Hardly conducive to Oscar-winning performances."

Comments

Like the games themselves

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Who would have thought it?

Rush jobs typically exhibit signs of low quality and lack of attention to detail.

Re:Like the games themselves

[sopssa]

It takes some talent, but if you have played Bad Company 2 you know how great the sound environment is. Voice acting doesn't sound as bad when rest of the sounds are done correctly and when having a dynamic sound world. It's amazing how good it sounds in BC2 - you hear close things like team mates talking, huge explosions and everything happening around and in distance, and voice and gun sounds sound different inside and outside buildings.

If you're only listening to talking, even mediocre voice acting will sound bad. Surrounded with all the other sounds in the world and it doesn't sound so bad anymore. However, it doesn't mean it all has to be explosions and high volume - while sneaking in a jungle you could hear the grass you're walking on, leafs, bugs, and your team mate whispering to you while at the same time hearing distant sounds. It takes the whole thing to make one part of it to feel good.

Re:Like the games themselves

[theaveng]

I don't understand people who say "This voice acting is terrible". Sure if I play something like Mario Sunshine, which has atrocious voicing, then I'll notice but for the most part I don't. It's just vocalized reading of the words on the screen.

Of course I also don't understand people who say "Babylon 5 has lousy acting" or "Japanese anime sounds better in Japanese". To me B5 acting is no worse or better than Star Trek stiltedness. And my copy of Love Hina (old but a classic) is just as funny whether I watch in Japanese or English.

Maybe I'm just not as picky or sensitive to voice nuances.

Re:Like the games themselves

[feepness]

Of course I also don't understand people who say "Babylon 5 has lousy acting"

With coaching even those with Asperger's can learn to read other human's emotions.

Re:Like the games themselves

[Tekfactory]

Of course I also don't understand people who say "Babylon 5 has lousy acting"

Many of the actors in B5 were theatrical stage performers not TV actors, you get some things like Delenn's visual shorthand of biting her knuckle whenever she was concerned, worried, distressed because in the theater people can't see you make a concerned facial expression from the back row. In TV-land and the movies, cameramen will do closeups so you get that shot, but some of the B5 actors hadn't made that transition.

I expect the actress was better by the time 'Lost' came around, but I never watched.

Sinclair (can't remember the actor's name) is cut from the same Oak as Kevin Sorbo where wooden acting is concerned. On balance I'd put JaKar (Andres Katsulas) and Londo (Peter Jurassik) up against Alan Rickman and Kenneth Branagh for scenery chewing and watchability anyday.

And no, B5 (Casablanca in Space) was no worse off than Star Trek TOS with its two-fisted Captain and strong Western influenced (Wagon Train in Space) themes.

How about fixing accents?

[Anonymous Coward]

Getting voice over artists who understand the accents they're meant to be using would also be nice.

Having CoD4 ruined by the "British" voices pronouncing "depot" and "missile" in the USAian way (DEE-pot and MISS-le; rather than DEP-ot and miss-ILE) and using "cellphone" instead of "mobile". Five minutes work with a British person would have highlight this and minimised that ranting that I shouted at the computer screen.

Re:How about fixing accents?

[feepness]

Or better even: claiming that someone is British and then letting them refer to someone's butt as her "fanny". That doesn't mean what you think it means, Americans.

It's where you might keep a pack of fags, right?

Re:How about fixing accents?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's where you might keep a pack of fags, right?

If you're Bill Clinton.

Re:How about fixing accents?

[HopefulIntern]

What really threw me is the word "lieutenant" which in US english is pronounced lew-TEN-ant, but in British english "leff-TEN-ant". When one of the british guys in COD4 said it the latter way, the subtitles actually wrote out "leftenant" complete with the quotation marks. A similar thing happens in Need for Speed Shift. The "coach" which appears simply as a voice instructing you, is British. The courses you drive are also mostly British. And yet, instead of driving a "nis-san three fifty zed" he makes you drive a "nee-sahn three fifty zee".... On a similar note, can Seth McFarlane please learn british words/phrases properly, rather than just putting on a faux accent?!! Case and point: "fanny", "sweater", "sneaker" (words americans use, or have a different meaning for).

Re:How about fixing accents?

[AP31R0N]

i checked the wikipedia entry for fanny (as Brit slang), which linked to vulva. i've forgotten which part was the vulva so i clicked.

That page is NSfW!

And not a bookmark.

Re:How about fixing accents?

[Abcd1234]

i've forgotten which part was the vulva

Only on Slashdot...

Now now, to be fair... he could just be married.

start with the basics

[fish waffle]

Games have improved tremendously in this respect over the last few years. Using the narrative context more so it's not just a collection of spoken phrases cut-and-paste together would help a lot. But you know, there's some even more basic problems remain:

1) Use the same actor for the same character. Always. If you need to re-record or add more dialogue, and your original actor isn't available, then live without or re-record everything.

2) Record the sound in the same place, or use a standard background sound. It is disconcerting when the recording quality and background noise changes between sentences.

3) Tell your voice actors not to replicate the errors in the text. Convince them they are voice actors, not just fleshy text-to-speech translators.

4) If your voice actors attempt to mimic strong accents of any form, beat them.