Seeing the races Bioware is going for I'd rather have the voice-over.
They're only including human-like races anyway. We're getting red people, blue people, people with tiny horns, blind people, green people with headtails etc.
What more do you want? Purple people with white dots? People with pointy ears?
We are the bunny. Resistance is futile. ''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\ ( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o) (")("),,(")("),(")(")
The OP mentioned that listening is just reading with your ears. Well, I submit that reading is just listening with your eyes.
Except both of those are rather assinine statements. In my opinion listening takes far less effort and instills less boredom than reading. I read novels for fun, but for some reason these short quest snippets always make my eyes gloss over and just look for the objectives. That might be due to poor writing, but listening to NPCs in ME or DA:O has provided far more entertainment for me.
For me VO takes it over races. But that's assuming they could only work on one or the other, which is in itself a bit ridiculous as one is visual and the other is aural. Two completely different departments.
I do NOT understand this. What is this "race" about? Are we talking about visuals? What are we talking about? Say GW2, there are 5 different races. But if you are telling me that there should be 20 races, and no voice overs then I disagree.
Different races usually have different backrounds, different characteristics, different cultures, different goals etc etc. The roleplaying and immersion possibilities of more races presents a larger variety in how you play the game, assuming you like to immerse yourself in RPGs. The possibility to deviate from those standards only adds to the variety.
Having audible dialog, on the otherhand, actually goes against the RPG ideal that much of the gameworld is left to the player's imagination. For example, in Mass Effect Shepard has only a small list of possible ways to make his/her voice. If there was no audible voice of the character, the variety of possible voices becomes endless.
One could argue that having strictly defined races would go agains the RPG ideal mentioned above, which I submit sounds like a double standard; or that one race (humans) could share the variable characteristics mentioned above in and of itself without the need for different models and textures. There could still be good guys and bad guys, for example.
The difference, to me, is that the characters you play have multiple aspects, such as stats and personality, but voice is only that: the sound a character makes when they speak. I guess I just like seeing the different characters (racial variety) on screen because it helps me 'get into' character more. But hearing a voice that is not the one I had envisioned in my mind for that character actually breaks the immersion in some cases.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
I would rather MY character not be voiced, and in turn have more choices for race rather than the PCs having voices.
I like that simply for the fact that I like to provide my own voice for my characters rather than have them speak with a voice that might hinder how I imagine them speaking.
I wouldn't trade the voiceover if I had a chance, I just wouldn't have them put one in either way - whether it would be a trade off for something else or not, I just don't enjoy PC voices that much.
Well since Bioware is all about story and this looks to be a single player game with online capability, i'd like to feel as much story as possible with the VO.
We have already seen many mediocre games with large selections of races which fail pretty hard in the fun department. Personally I am much more interested in a game that will keep me thoroughly hooked from start to finish because of the quality of presentation and content. Bioware is known for making games that excel in that department, so I am really excited to finally experience an MMO that can offer what their single player games do.
Well since Bioware is all about story and this looks to be a single player game with online capability, i'd like to feel as much story as possible with the VO.
I just don't understand why people still spout this nonsense. The only real reason to do so is to troll since this is debunked everytime someone brings it up. TOR is an MMO and people who play it should find it very famaliar to other themepark MMOs. Most of the content is group content, only the class quests, which make up a minority of the quests are intentionally soloable.
Yes you can solo to max if you like just like you can in any other themepark MMO, but if you do you're going to be skipping the great majority of the content. There will be large numbers of players per server, there will be a player driven economy, there will be large group based end game content, there will be world pvp zones, and yes the majority of the quests will indeed be group based. If you call this game 'a single player game with online capability' then you can describe ALL themepark MMOs the same way.
You, sir, are a themepark MMO denier, that puts you right up there with flat earthers.
Having audible dialog, on the otherhand, actually goes against the RPG ideal that much of the gameworld is left to the player's imagination. For example, in Mass Effect Shepard has only a small list of possible ways to make his/her voice. If there was no audible voice of the character, the variety of possible voices becomes endless.
Huh?
I'd like to see the official list of RPG 'ideals' you're pulling this info from, because I'm pretty sure that the ideal RPG differs from person to person. The only reason RPGs have been so text heavy in the past is because the technology to provide voice over wasn't there. Neither was there enough HD space to provide this type of thing.
You have games like D&D that allow you to imagine everything. And then you have video games which have a solid world, a solid history, and specific races/classes/ideologies. There's very little left to the imagination in video games. Someone else is specifically doing the imagining for you.
When Playign Masseffect I enjoyed that my character had a voice (irrelevant of whether it was a good one) but when I went and played Dragon Age I was massivley dissapointed, it constantly frustrated me that conversations seemed one sided. This may mean that the conversations are shorter as you dont have to hear your voice, but in Mass Effect there was always the choice of skipping your voice if you wanted, Even if you did skip your voice it still felt like you were more immersed in the game world.
I would like voice acting, but would prefer it to be short. So if given a quest that takes a page to read, the voice acting should be a quick summary. If my character speaks I want it to be short one liners, like "Can I help you" or "Are you in trouble?", lines that can be reused randomly but still give the feeling of immersion.
Having audible dialog, on the otherhand, actually goes against the RPG ideal that much of the gameworld is left to the player's imagination. For example, in Mass Effect Shepard has only a small list of possible ways to make his/her voice. If there was no audible voice of the character, the variety of possible voices becomes endless.
Huh?
I'd like to see the official list of RPG 'ideals' you're pulling this info from, because I'm pretty sure that the ideal RPG differs from person to person. The only reason RPGs have been so text heavy in the past is because the technology to provide voice over wasn't there. Neither was there enough HD space to provide this type of thing.
You have games like D&D that allow you to imagine everything. And then you have video games which have a solid world, a solid history, and specific races/classes/ideologies. There's very little left to the imagination in video games. Someone else is specifically doing the imagining for you.
I didn't say the ideal RPG. I stated it was an RPG ideal; From the pen and paper roleplaying days, exemplified by your second paragraph there. I hear what you are saying, but there are still attributes of characters that are not simply part of the environment. There is still plenty of room in these games for the imagination, in my opinion. My point was that audible dialog can detract from that occaisionaly. I like audible dialog. I was just explaining why I liked racial variety more.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Having audible dialog, on the otherhand, actually goes against the RPG ideal that much of the gameworld is left to the player's imagination. For example, in Mass Effect Shepard has only a small list of possible ways to make his/her voice. If there was no audible voice of the character, the variety of possible voices becomes endless.
Huh?
I'd like to see the official list of RPG 'ideals' you're pulling this info from, because I'm pretty sure that the ideal RPG differs from person to person. The only reason RPGs have been so text heavy in the past is because the technology to provide voice over wasn't there. Neither was there enough HD space to provide this type of thing.
You have games like D&D that allow you to imagine everything. And then you have video games which have a solid world, a solid history, and specific races/classes/ideologies. There's very little left to the imagination in video games. Someone else is specifically doing the imagining for you.
I didn't say the ideal RPG. I stated it was an RPG ideal; From the pen and paper roleplaying days, exemplified by your second paragraph there. I hear what you are saying, but there are still attributes of characters that are not simply part of the environment. There is still plenty of room in these games for the imagination, in my opinion. My point was that audible dialog can detract from that occaisionaly. I like audible dialog. I was just explaining why I liked racial variety more.
Well, I'd disagree that much is left to the imagination in videogame land, but honestly that's a subjective property. If you can use your mind to expand on the scope of the game, then I respect that.
I still don't understand why these two things are even being compared, though. Aural vs. Visual. Paid actors doing VO vs. Artists modeling races. It just doesn't jive with me as a hypothetical one or the other choice.
Maybe the devs will add more races, perhaps in the cash shop; I like to have options, a good choice of races and some voice overs are good; I just hope the VO are not a sleeping pill.
When Playign Masseffect I enjoyed that my character had a voice (irrelevant of whether it was a good one) but when I went and played Dragon Age I was massivley dissapointed, it constantly frustrated me that conversations seemed one sided. This may mean that the conversations are shorter as you dont have to hear your voice, but in Mass Effect there was always the choice of skipping your voice if you wanted, Even if you did skip your voice it still felt like you were more immersed in the game world.
I would like voice acting, but would prefer it to be short. So if given a quest that takes a page to read, the voice acting should be a quick summary. If my character speaks I want it to be short one liners, like "Can I help you" or "Are you in trouble?", lines that can be reused randomly but still give the feeling of immersion.
voice over is a single player feature, it has no place in an mmo.. people will just read the subtritles and skip the vo.. it show things go in mmo's
i for one will nto be waiting for the slow ass vo to tell me what ive alread read!!
I vote for 20 playable races and no vo.. vo is just pointless and demenstrates bioware clutching at straws to try and prevent their game from looking like a wow clone.. that is inevitable.. all themeparks are direct decendents of the wow idea.. its crap it will always be crap and so for for swtor to save some face it should have 20 playable races rather than a gay ass voice over that most people will just skip through anyway.
forum mods -
please dont send me a warning lol for useing improper words.. instead understand the context in how they are used rather than sulking about stuff you mod types dont like.. (this is meant for the impending warning ill get for useing the word gay in my post from the forum mods!! )
i know its worthy of a warning but it'll save time speant having to write one, your warning has been accepted please dont send one you'll save your self alot of time and have a longer tea break, im doing you a favour. besides i have a rough idea what its going to say i already have one or two for reference!
That was never even in consideration, but then again neither was having 20 races considering who the developer is and the game series this MMO is based on.
In your opionion do you really need your character to have their own voice? Couldn't one make the arguement that listening is just reading with your ears.
I would rather see 20 playable races (its starwars) then My character having a voice for cutscenes and such..
(I know this post will change nothing about how the game is being developed or what will be in the game at launch but I like to see others thoughts)
Since we are in the wishing zone, I would choose virtual reality Star Wars over 20 races and VO.
I don't know why people, to whom race is insignificant even play role playing games?? Isn't the choice of race one of the most pivotal choices in a RPG? Maybe some of you guys are playing the wrong sort of game?
Having different race is one of the CORNERSTONES of any RPG. VO isn't! Since for me gameplay always overrules fancy additions like VO, of course I want rather races than VO. I mean, I want to play an RPG, not some interactive movie with action sequences! I want to play a role of something of many choices. People who don't want different races are not even tha audience for MMORPGs. Maybe they should play FPS shooter and IMVPO their opinion should not count, because they apparently play the wrong game. Just my opinion here. Just another bunch of people who drag down MMORPGs because they just want fast gratification and action, and don't care about the RPG core values and thus keep ruining RPGs.
If you don't care about race, you are WRONG here on a site called "mmoRPG"! RPGs have racial choices as a CORE MECHANIC! Try to read about it before you begin a hobby. Saying I don't care about races is like watching porn and say "it's all nice story, but I don't care about all the nude people."
Bizzare!
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
This is BioWare. BioWare makes Mass Effect. Mass Effect has Shepard (you). Shepard has voice. Heroes have voices. Mass Effect great game success on the market. First time a heroe on a rpg has a voice. It WORKS!
You may now lock the topic. o/
It works in a standalone rpg where you are controlling their character. That doesn't apply at all to an MMO where you create your own character and in which the primary characteristic of the genre is interaction of the players with other players, not players with npc's.
It remains to be seen if that will work. Thread back open.
Twenty races, most of which I'll never play, or a fully voiced over game that adds imersion to the experience? I'll take the latter any day.
Ok, yes but its not a standalone game. It's an MMO. One of the things that makes an MMO work is the breadth and depth of the community. The more options people have the more people and the more types of people will populate the game world and make for a better game experience. I want variety not necessarily because I want to experience everything, but becuase I want lots of different type of people playing the game with me.
As far as the immersion goes, again being an MMO, hearing my character speak in a voice that's not the voice I would have chosen, and watching a lot of cutscenes isn't necessarily good for immersion. Lots of different players immersed in their characters creates immersion.
Shrug. AoC has only 4 races, Aion has only 2 races, LotrO has 4, TERA will have 6 and GW2 5. The players and fans of those MMO's seem to be able to cope with the devastating lack of races.
@Elikal: I guess you won't be playing a lot of those other MMO's either, since all of those will have only a few races, severly limiting your creative RPG spark?
Originally posted by Paradigm68
As far as the immersion goes, again being an MMO, hearing my character speak in a voice that's not the voice I would have chosen, and watching a lot of cutscenes isn't necessarily good for immersion. Lots of different players immersed in their characters creates immersion.
I think it's something that people have to experience for themselves, since it's different from what has been in MMO's before. Personally I think that having cinematics, cutscenes, choices in dialogues and VO will immerse (most) players more than the text-based approach to questing you find in current MMO's.
So far, people who experienced a sortlike questing in AoC liked it very much and were disappointed when questing became more the old style after the Tortage island. Also, the vast majority of people who actually played the game seemed to like SWTOR's cinematic questing, even a lot of those who were sceptical about it beforehand.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Comments
Seeing the races Bioware is going for I'd rather have the voice-over.
They're only including human-like races anyway. We're getting red people, blue people, people with tiny horns, blind people, green people with headtails etc.
What more do you want? Purple people with white dots? People with pointy ears?
We are the bunny.
Resistance is futile.
''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\
( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o)
(")("),,(")("),(")(")
The OP mentioned that listening is just reading with your ears. Well, I submit that reading is just listening with your eyes.
Except both of those are rather assinine statements. In my opinion listening takes far less effort and instills less boredom than reading. I read novels for fun, but for some reason these short quest snippets always make my eyes gloss over and just look for the objectives. That might be due to poor writing, but listening to NPCs in ME or DA:O has provided far more entertainment for me.
For me VO takes it over races. But that's assuming they could only work on one or the other, which is in itself a bit ridiculous as one is visual and the other is aural. Two completely different departments.
Assuming both were done to my standards, I'd take more racial variety over audible dialog, especially in an online RPG.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Different races usually have different backrounds, different characteristics, different cultures, different goals etc etc. The roleplaying and immersion possibilities of more races presents a larger variety in how you play the game, assuming you like to immerse yourself in RPGs. The possibility to deviate from those standards only adds to the variety.
Having audible dialog, on the otherhand, actually goes against the RPG ideal that much of the gameworld is left to the player's imagination. For example, in Mass Effect Shepard has only a small list of possible ways to make his/her voice. If there was no audible voice of the character, the variety of possible voices becomes endless.
One could argue that having strictly defined races would go agains the RPG ideal mentioned above, which I submit sounds like a double standard; or that one race (humans) could share the variable characteristics mentioned above in and of itself without the need for different models and textures. There could still be good guys and bad guys, for example.
The difference, to me, is that the characters you play have multiple aspects, such as stats and personality, but voice is only that: the sound a character makes when they speak. I guess I just like seeing the different characters (racial variety) on screen because it helps me 'get into' character more. But hearing a voice that is not the one I had envisioned in my mind for that character actually breaks the immersion in some cases.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
I would rather MY character not be voiced, and in turn have more choices for race rather than the PCs having voices.
I like that simply for the fact that I like to provide my own voice for my characters rather than have them speak with a voice that might hinder how I imagine them speaking.
I wouldn't trade the voiceover if I had a chance, I just wouldn't have them put one in either way - whether it would be a trade off for something else or not, I just don't enjoy PC voices that much.
Thats just me though.
Well since Bioware is all about story and this looks to be a single player game with online capability, i'd like to feel as much story as possible with the VO.
VO over races for sure.
We have already seen many mediocre games with large selections of races which fail pretty hard in the fun department. Personally I am much more interested in a game that will keep me thoroughly hooked from start to finish because of the quality of presentation and content. Bioware is known for making games that excel in that department, so I am really excited to finally experience an MMO that can offer what their single player games do.
I just don't understand why people still spout this nonsense. The only real reason to do so is to troll since this is debunked everytime someone brings it up. TOR is an MMO and people who play it should find it very famaliar to other themepark MMOs. Most of the content is group content, only the class quests, which make up a minority of the quests are intentionally soloable.
Yes you can solo to max if you like just like you can in any other themepark MMO, but if you do you're going to be skipping the great majority of the content. There will be large numbers of players per server, there will be a player driven economy, there will be large group based end game content, there will be world pvp zones, and yes the majority of the quests will indeed be group based. If you call this game 'a single player game with online capability' then you can describe ALL themepark MMOs the same way.
You, sir, are a themepark MMO denier, that puts you right up there with flat earthers.
I only want to get a fun game to play 20 or 100 races does nothing for the fun factor imo and neither does the voice over.
Huh?
I'd like to see the official list of RPG 'ideals' you're pulling this info from, because I'm pretty sure that the ideal RPG differs from person to person. The only reason RPGs have been so text heavy in the past is because the technology to provide voice over wasn't there. Neither was there enough HD space to provide this type of thing.
You have games like D&D that allow you to imagine everything. And then you have video games which have a solid world, a solid history, and specific races/classes/ideologies. There's very little left to the imagination in video games. Someone else is specifically doing the imagining for you.
When Playign Masseffect I enjoyed that my character had a voice (irrelevant of whether it was a good one) but when I went and played Dragon Age I was massivley dissapointed, it constantly frustrated me that conversations seemed one sided. This may mean that the conversations are shorter as you dont have to hear your voice, but in Mass Effect there was always the choice of skipping your voice if you wanted, Even if you did skip your voice it still felt like you were more immersed in the game world.
I would like voice acting, but would prefer it to be short. So if given a quest that takes a page to read, the voice acting should be a quick summary. If my character speaks I want it to be short one liners, like "Can I help you" or "Are you in trouble?", lines that can be reused randomly but still give the feeling of immersion.
I didn't say the ideal RPG. I stated it was an RPG ideal; From the pen and paper roleplaying days, exemplified by your second paragraph there. I hear what you are saying, but there are still attributes of characters that are not simply part of the environment. There is still plenty of room in these games for the imagination, in my opinion. My point was that audible dialog can detract from that occaisionaly. I like audible dialog. I was just explaining why I liked racial variety more.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Well, I'd disagree that much is left to the imagination in videogame land, but honestly that's a subjective property. If you can use your mind to expand on the scope of the game, then I respect that.
I still don't understand why these two things are even being compared, though. Aural vs. Visual. Paid actors doing VO vs. Artists modeling races. It just doesn't jive with me as a hypothetical one or the other choice.
Maybe the devs will add more races, perhaps in the cash shop; I like to have options, a good choice of races and some voice overs are good; I just hope the VO are not a sleeping pill.
This. I hope the devs don't screw up lol
Twenty races, most of which I'll never play, or a fully voiced over game that adds imersion to the experience? I'll take the latter any day.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
voice over is a single player feature, it has no place in an mmo.. people will just read the subtritles and skip the vo.. it show things go in mmo's
i for one will nto be waiting for the slow ass vo to tell me what ive alread read!!
I vote for 20 playable races and no vo.. vo is just pointless and demenstrates bioware clutching at straws to try and prevent their game from looking like a wow clone.. that is inevitable.. all themeparks are direct decendents of the wow idea.. its crap it will always be crap and so for for swtor to save some face it should have 20 playable races rather than a gay ass voice over that most people will just skip through anyway.
forum mods -
please dont send me a warning lol for useing improper words.. instead understand the context in how they are used rather than sulking about stuff you mod types dont like.. (this is meant for the impending warning ill get for useing the word gay in my post from the forum mods!! )
i know its worthy of a warning but it'll save time speant having to write one, your warning has been accepted please dont send one
you'll save your self alot of time and have a longer tea break, im doing you a favour. besides i have a rough idea what its going to say 
i already have one or two for reference!
neither, I'd rather have sandbox
That was never even in consideration, but then again neither was having 20 races considering who the developer is and the game series this MMO is based on.
^ He speaks the truth
Since we are in the wishing zone, I would choose virtual reality Star Wars over 20 races and VO.
I don't know why people, to whom race is insignificant even play role playing games?? Isn't the choice of race one of the most pivotal choices in a RPG? Maybe some of you guys are playing the wrong sort of game?
Having different race is one of the CORNERSTONES of any RPG. VO isn't! Since for me gameplay always overrules fancy additions like VO, of course I want rather races than VO. I mean, I want to play an RPG, not some interactive movie with action sequences! I want to play a role of something of many choices. People who don't want different races are not even tha audience for MMORPGs. Maybe they should play FPS shooter and IMVPO their opinion should not count, because they apparently play the wrong game. Just my opinion here. Just another bunch of people who drag down MMORPGs because they just want fast gratification and action, and don't care about the RPG core values and thus keep ruining RPGs.
If you don't care about race, you are WRONG here on a site called "mmoRPG"! RPGs have racial choices as a CORE MECHANIC! Try to read about it before you begin a hobby. Saying I don't care about races is like watching porn and say "it's all nice story, but I don't care about all the nude people."
Bizzare!
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
It works in a standalone rpg where you are controlling their character. That doesn't apply at all to an MMO where you create your own character and in which the primary characteristic of the genre is interaction of the players with other players, not players with npc's.
It remains to be seen if that will work. Thread back open.
Ok, yes but its not a standalone game. It's an MMO. One of the things that makes an MMO work is the breadth and depth of the community. The more options people have the more people and the more types of people will populate the game world and make for a better game experience. I want variety not necessarily because I want to experience everything, but becuase I want lots of different type of people playing the game with me.
As far as the immersion goes, again being an MMO, hearing my character speak in a voice that's not the voice I would have chosen, and watching a lot of cutscenes isn't necessarily good for immersion. Lots of different players immersed in their characters creates immersion.
Shrug. AoC has only 4 races, Aion has only 2 races, LotrO has 4, TERA will have 6 and GW2 5. The players and fans of those MMO's seem to be able to cope with the devastating lack of races.
@Elikal: I guess you won't be playing a lot of those other MMO's either, since all of those will have only a few races, severly limiting your creative RPG spark?
I think it's something that people have to experience for themselves, since it's different from what has been in MMO's before. Personally I think that having cinematics, cutscenes, choices in dialogues and VO will immerse (most) players more than the text-based approach to questing you find in current MMO's.
So far, people who experienced a sortlike questing in AoC liked it very much and were disappointed when questing became more the old style after the Tortage island. Also, the vast majority of people who actually played the game seemed to like SWTOR's cinematic questing, even a lot of those who were sceptical about it beforehand.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."