kara24601 wrote:I'm actually not a big fan of voice acting in fan-made games.
And it made me wonder about voice acting, which is now coming to fruition in fan-made games thanks to games like Senior Year and My Teacher (recently vaed).
Now, while working on my project, I've come to a question: to voice act or not to voice act? What are the downsides of each? Which do you prefer? What makes you choose between voice acting and no voice acting? Which do you prefer when you're playing a game?
Going Voiced
Pro:
- More exposure(Some players prefer to hear rather than read)
- Made it kind of professional
Con:
- Takes time to form a group of voice actors.
- Depends on the demand, many trial and error are needed to get the best tone.
Going Voiceless
Pro:
- It is rare, but some prefer to have their game voiceless, and let their imagination goes wild.
- Takes only effort in making the game.
Con:
- Some might get turned off by a voiceless game.
There might be some that I cannot think out. I'll let others to fill in those parts.
As for me, like most makers, I think I'lll prefer voiceless so that I don't let other to do the dirty work on my project. Not that I hates voiceacting(I will be damned if I say I hate Rumi's VA), it is just my personal thought.
I will point out that in Ren'Py games, voices can be turned off fairly easily. (One day I need to implemented a checkbox, and a way of disabling individual voices.)
Supporting creators since 2004 (When was the last time you backed up your game?)
PyTom wrote:I will point out that in Ren'Py games, voices can be turned off fairly easily. (One day I need to implemented a checkbox, and a way of disabling individual voices.)
I was just about to say - voices are more or less always welcome, since those who don't like them can switch them off.
The only drawback is game size, but maybe it isn't such a big deal anyway.
So in the spirit of advocating wine, but drinking water myself I'll just say VA is always a good feature. But personally I have no plans to have VA. There are a few cases in which I'd go with VA, but the circumstances for them haven't yet come.
Counter Arts wrote:Hmm... I guess first you should have a voiceless one.
Then if it gain a lot fans... release a voiced one commerically with added extras like another secnario or something.
it really depends on taste
like 2200AD will be with voices (fully even male except main hero) - and making voiceless will take too much time after voice version is done (which has higer priority than voiceless)
PRO OF VOICES:
- professional look (main pro)
PRO VOICLESS:
- file size (nothing else - but i think voices dont take as much size as it was before - like using compressed voice is only few megs - my teacher it was around 6 megs)
From what I've heard, it really comes down to file size. I guess once my game is done, I'll have to look at the file size and decide whether I'm willing to add the extra megabytes.
In all honesty i think it depends on the quality of the voice acting, if done right voice acting can make a game highly immersive and generally more enjoyable to play. If done badly however or even on low quality equipment it both breaks immersion and makes the even the best games look or at least feel unprofesional. This is before having to worry about how much it would increase file size.
All in all, if you feel it sounds good and the +'s outweigh the -'s go for it.
I agree , if file size is truely not a big issue ( although I fail to see how adding voice won't make the file size much bigger ) ...it's more about the quality of the voices. I'll bet even some official ren'ai games will / do have not-so-good voice acting.
Graduation , if I remember correctly , has one or a few ren'ai-ish paths but overall it's not what I'd consider a ren'ai game and the American VA are so bad ...but so bad they're funny. http://www.rightstuf.com/cgi-bin/catalo ... 5400/4/0/0
And then I gave the game away.