Don't you think Zelda should have full voice acting by now?

Many games today have full voice acting in order to make a more immersive experience, unfortunately, Zelda Skyward Sword is still full of text, and for a 50-100 hour game, according Miyamoto, I imagine lots of it. I think it's about time Zelda take a step forward and have some proper voice acting, even Metroid have voice acting, and while I wouldn't say it's perfect, I still prefer having some talking rather than no talking. IGN had a poll some time ago that showed that the majority of IGN readers would prefer to see some talking in Zelda by now. Would you really prefer to see the characters randomly open and close their mouth for no reason, or hear the people of Hyrule make random Sims noises and grumbling sounds while text appears for you to read?

I understand that most fans would prefer that Link remains quiet, well then, they could still take a more Metroid Prime 3 way and make Link silent, but everyone else talks, that's not so bad now is it?

So GameSpoters, I left a poll, vote and show what would be your prefered choice.

Maybe do the voice acting like Metroid Prime 3 where the protagonist stays silent, but give us the option to turn it ON or OFF.
I wouldn't care if they do or do not include voice acting in the next Zelda game. I don't mind reading and I really liked MP3's voice acting.
I would care if Link starts talking. No. Please don't, Nintendo. Link stays silent.

And I thought the silent protagonist model would never go out of style.

And I thought the silent protagonist model would never go out of style.

pikaby

I dont see the big deal, are we supposed to believe that a large amount of gamers cannot read? If not than why are so many people upset about actually having to read something. Better keep away from those scary silent books

Voice Acting should stay out of Zelda. Lack of voice acting is a design choice, and I will have to say that I agree with Nintendo that it doesnt belong in Zelda. Zelda feels like a storybook in some cases.

Here are advantages to not having a voice acted game.

• Voice acting will most likely mean we wont be able to name link anymore, or any other characters.
• Reading is a lot faster than Voice acting. A 30 minute cutscene can suddenly become a 10 minute read if there is no voice acting.
• Waste of resources.
• Considering the high quantity of characters a Zelda game can have (this includes more than just major characters). Chances are we would see one actor playing more than one character.
• Most VA is bad anyway.
• Skyward Sword will have a lot of dialogue options. As it has been proven many times, full VA and dialogue options dont mix very well.
• Reading can be a lot more immersive.
• Reading leaves more room for the player's imagination. Reading is also more interactive than viewing.
• Reading is good for you.

I would only ever tolerate voice acting if it is done in planescape torment level, no more VA than PST had.

Nah, I think it's fine, look at Super Mario Sunshine, which had voice acting. It was a good game, but nothing compared to Galaxy 1&2 which were full text. So I don't think it'll make a real difference according to the quality of the game.

I've never cared for voice acting.

The only time I really liked the voice acting was in Portal, and Portal 2.

I wouldn't mind either way, but Link should do more then yells, gasp,and grunts. Also keep away from the weird mind craps he had in Twilight Princess.

I personally feel, and know, that if link, or for that matter, almost anybody else in the Zealda Uneviers were to talk it would ruin how I precisive Link, how I see him. I don't want some personality to be forced on him. One of the many beauties of the TLoZ games is that you get to imagine how ever charcter is like, how they sound, it's a game series that allows one mind to run with it. To me that makes a game more interesting.

I would like for the characters to have good voice acting wile Link remains without one, but since it'll have a original japanese VA with a english dub, it would suck hard. Most japanese to english dubs suck horrendously, there are extremely few exceptions (Metal Gear Solid, and even this series suffers from some poor voice actors). If it would only have a japanese VA with subtitles then a lot of people would hate on it.

No point risking it, no voice acting is infinitely better than a poor choice of voice actors that could obliterate everything The Legend of Zelda stood for. And it's far more immersive for me to actually read.

Im 100% against VA, but this option stuck out to me, "Yes, everyone talks, but Link remains silent". The reason this WOULD NOT work is because many times the character's ask link a question like "What is your Name" & You never see a reply from link then the character automatically says "Link? That's a nice name". How stupid would it sound if that was voice acted? How stupid would it look & sound if ppla re talking to link & he never once says anything? Ppl who are for VA need to think about this. it would not work

Im 100% against VA, but this option stuck out to me, "Yes, everyone talks, but Link remains silent". The reason this WOULD NOT work is because many times the character's ask link a question like "What is your Name" & You never see a reply from link then the character automatically says "Link? That's a nice name". How stupid would it sound if that was voice acted? How stupid would it look & sound if ppla re talking to link & he never once says anything? Ppl who are for VA need to think about this. it would not work

painguy1

They would design the dialogue differently to suit the new change.

[QUOTE="painguy1"]

Im 100% against VA, but this option stuck out to me, "Yes, everyone talks, but Link remains silent". The reason this WOULD NOT work is because many times the character's ask link a question like "What is your Name" & You never see a reply from link then the character automatically says "Link? That's a nice name". How stupid would it sound if that was voice acted? How stupid would it look & sound if ppla re talking to link & he never once says anything? Ppl who are for VA need to think about this. it would not work

Lucianu

They would design the dialogue differently to suit the new change.

Well first off zelda's stile(GS censors the real word) of dialogue is something I would not want changed, but lets assume they did. Link still would not be able to replay & that would sound & look stupid. Also the feeling of the entire game would change.

Well, you have two acceptable options:

1: Good voice acting

2: No voice acting.

No voice acting is better than bad voice acting. Either way, like stays silent.

No, never. I don't even care if it had good voice acting, the design choice works perfectly for the emotions the games try to convey. The belief that VA is some sort of modern requirement. doesn't sit well with me.

Story and voice acting in video gameshas never been important to me. It's all about the gameplay.

I honestly wouldn't mind if Zelda had voice acting, though I thoroughly feel that Link should stay silent! Let the voice in your head (the narration you use in your life and thoughts) be the one for Link!

If it's like the VA in Other M, then no.

If anyone's reasoning is it should have it because everyone else does; you need to re-evaluate how you think. And that's always what it is with Zelda, the reasoning is never what the inclusion would mean for the series. Its just "Do it because everyone else does" That's piss poor reasoning to do anything but breathe.

Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.meetroid8

That made absolutely no sense, I mean zero. Hell that's a negative 5, you owe sense for saying that.

Link has to remain silent!

Hylian with subtitles, except for Link and I'm good.Wintry_Flutist

That seems awesome!!!
+1

No. I don't want Zelda games to longer development times to add something that I probably won't like, especially since it would take up space for stuff I would actually want.

If anyone's reasoning is it should have it because everyone else does; you need to re-evaluate how you think. And that's always what it is with Zelda, the reasoning is never what the inclusion would mean for the series. Its just "Do it because everyone else does" That's piss poor reasoning to do anything but breathe.

[QUOTE="meetroid8"] Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.Sepewrath

That made absolutely no sense, I mean zero. Hell that's a negative 5, you owe sense for saying that.

If they ever try to make another "cinematic" game in the same style as TP they will need to. The silent characters were just awkward in emotional scenes of TP, its very difficult to convey any real sense of emotion with silent characters. Also I call bullocks on the constant "I don't need voice acting because I use my imagination" Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.meetroid8

In your opinion perhaps. But imo no voice acting>>>voice acting. Reading is 10 times more immersive than listening to me.

Also, making Twilight Princess cinematic was a mistake. The only voice acting that I would tolerate would be Hylian spoken language with english subtitles.

Hmmm. I don't know if I would like Zelda with voice acting. I think it's cool the way it is, where the characters have little vocalizations, but no voice acting.

Now that I think about it, Zelda doesn't need voice acting. I just watched the entire Skyward Sword intro (shame on me) and voice acting would have been a distraction to the wonderful orchestrated music.

BTW, the intro is the most epic Zelda intro I have ever witnessed. Similar, but much more epic than Wind Waker's intro. :shock:

Pretty sure they will be voice acting in Zelda game for Wii Ultra ...its just a matter of Nintendo getting the right voice for it. Then there will be argument of course what Link sounds like, like in Metroid. :P

Yes. Everyone but Link.

Look to Metroid Prime 3: Corruption as a prime (no pun intended) example of how voice acting should work in a Zelda game.

[QUOTE="Sepewrath"]

If anyone's reasoning is it should have it because everyone else does; you need to re-evaluate how you think. And that's always what it is with Zelda, the reasoning is never what the inclusion would mean for the series. Its just "Do it because everyone else does" That's piss poor reasoning to do anything but breathe.

[QUOTE="meetroid8"] Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.meetroid8

That made absolutely no sense, I mean zero. Hell that's a negative 5, you owe sense for saying that.

I think meetroid you're over exaggerating. I will absolutely agree, as to modern day standards, a AAA franchise should receive the AAA presentation treatment which does include full voice acting (except for Link ;) )

That said, there is something about the imagination of reading Zelda dialogue. I think it is very effective. And it is exactly for this reason that Link should not speak. I want to retain the position of imagining how I would react as Link. And I'm sure many would agree with that sentiment.

If Ninty gets good voice actors, then by all means. However they have shown in the past that, for the most part, they are incapable of finding competent VAs. So, I'm gonna go with "no" on this one.

Look to Metroid Prime 3: Corruption as a prime (no pun intended) example of how voice acting should work in a Zelda game.

sonic_spark

It makes even less sense to have to use my imagination to pretend that something that actually isn't present exists. But that is the reasoning people like to use. Why include voice acting if we can make up our own voices for characters? On that note why play games at all if we can just imagine up a few of our own?meetroid8

My reasoning for why they should leave it out is that's simply too late. If Skyward Sword was the first Zelda game, I would be wondering where the VA was too. But after 25yrs of this series, to give voice to what players have already given voice to would be a disaster. Its no different than Other M, Samus had an absence of character for the prior 24yrs, so people decided to give her character. When Other M stood in contrast to that--a s***storm ensued. That would be the exact same outcome for Zelda, when Zelda doesn't sound right, when Deku is pronounced "wrong" when "Gorons cant sound like that" starts getting thrown around. There is nothing to be gained from voice acting in the series, except for it to be doing what everyone else is doing. That is not a good enough reason to do it and the inevitable outcome makes it pointless to do so.

Also I call bullocks on the constant "I don't need voice acting because I use my imagination" Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.meetroid8

However they have shown in the past that, for the most part, they are incapable of finding competent VAs. turtlethetaffer

I don't think it will have any significant impact on how much I enjoy the game, but if done right (meaning Link doesn't talk and it is all done with great actors) I am all for it.

[QUOTE="meetroid8"]Also I call bullocks on the constant "I don't need voice acting because I use my imagination" Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.foxhound_fox

Link is a mute. I believe it's a running joke in the games, at least (other characters mentioning how he doesn't speak). In any case, I don't see voice acting as, necessarily, a progress. There's a certain charm in games where you imagine the voice of a character (or shape it according to the noises he makes when he speaks) instead of hearing it -- and text-based games never run the risk of bad voice acting. I mean, how would Link sound? Or Zelda? Maybe I think Zelda should have a more feminine voice, and bam! She's given a voice I dislike, slightly more grave than I expected. I would feel a distaste towards the character that I had liked in previous games in the franchise. Anyway, that's just my opinion. For what it's worth, I liked Samus' VA in Metroid: Other M.

Interesting. I'd like to respond to a couple of concerns that has been raised so far.

-Dialogue/voice acting problems with a namable character

Dragon Age had terrific voice acting, you can name your character, no problems there.

-Bad VA

I don't think we should worry too much about bad VA. It could be a problem, but I'm sure Nintendo will be able to find good VA, I think Mario's voice is perfect, and Other M wasn't that bad, though some would disagree, ultimately, I don't think bad VA should be a problem. Why risk it you ask? Well I guess it isn't a necessity, but....

-No reason to have it/Reading is more immersive

...a reason to have is that it will be a more lively experience. It makes no sense to hear a person go "HEEEEYYY" and remains silent for the rest of the conversation while the text takes over. If there are good voices, I think the experience will be better and messages can be conveyed in much more realistic manner. Voices are already present in Zelda, they just need to make the people do full conversations instead of "Hi!!!........" and "Hello!!.................". Full voice acting will allow developers to fully present the feelings and emotions through sound, allow the characters in the games to express their feelings fully through voice and words, and allow the players to feel more connected to their world like they would a real person expressing their feelings to them. Plain text just doesn't do the job well enough although....

-Imagination is better

...This is rather subjective as everyone is going to have a different level of imagination. If you have very good imagination, sure perhaps it will be better, but if you don't, some voices will make the experience far more engaging. So here's what I say, what if there was an option? English, Japanese voices and subtitles, so you can have English voices, or just disable the voices and still play the same old Zelda with just text, and if for some reason you hate English, you could use the Japanese voice, maybe even pretend Japanese is Hylian. This should resolve all issues.

There were 2 Zelda games with VA. The results were awesome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuYbIwXP0QQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4SLjLen7-c&feature=related

Honestly I'm indifferent to this. if they add it, great, if they don't, I don't care.

[QUOTE="sonic_spark"] Look to Metroid Prime 3: Corruption as a prime (no pun intended) example of how voice acting should work in a Zelda game.

wiifan001

It's by no means amazing. But in terms of NPC's speaking but Samus remaining silent is what I was getting at.

[QUOTE="meetroid8"]Also I call bullocks on the constant "I don't need voice acting because I use my imagination" Get over yourselves, real voice acting>>>your imagination any day of the week.foxhound_fox