Voice Acting Killed One of my Favorite RPG Features
I first noticed it in Tales of Vesperia.
While this wasn't the first JRPG I played with voiced lines, it was--for me, at least--the first in which voice acting enhanced the storytelling experience. Troy Baker's sweet, dulcet tones probably played a large role in that.
As I was browsing through Vesperia's menus, I found that I could rename any of my playable characters. Problem was, the voices (understandably) would never reflect those changes. That's when I realized that as games featured more and better voice acting, I would likely lose the ability to give my characters clever or offensive names.
And that's a huge loss.
My first console RPG was Final Fantasy VII, which I played when I was an edgy, rebellious teenager. My starting trio of playable protagonists consisted of Horny, Black, and Woman, which led to hilarious and strangely fitting dialogue. After VII, I went back to play all the Super Nintendo Final Fantasy titles, along with Chrono Trigger and Terranigma, where many characters suffered the same treatment. I took being able to name my characters whatever I wanted for granted.
Voice acting crept its way into more and more video games as the medium was pushed to become more "cinematic." In those early days, the likes of Resident Evil and Symphony of the Night peppered its cut-scenes with voiced dialogue to add cringe-inducing drama, seemingly just to check off the "Yes, we have voices" box. They certainly made the games more enjoyable, but probably not for the reasons the producers intended.
Voices eventually spread to other genres, and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment was the first RPG with voice acting that I played. Yet, for some reason, I didn't realize until much later that I couldn't change my characters' names in that game. And it took a little while after that for me to pinpoint and articulate why that mattered.
That only happened when I experienced the way Vesperia handled character name customization. I could change Yuri Lowell's name to "Girly Man" or Raven's to "Gonna Betray You," but all I was doing was changing a label -- not a name. I was still playing a great story, with an incredible narrative arc, and likeable, relatable, sympathetic heroes and villains, but it was no longer my story. Because of that, Vesperia's story, for better or worse, felt less like playing through an RPG and more like watching a very good anime series. Ditto Persona 2.
So how does an RPG reconcile voice acting with customizable names? How do you preserve both a crucial cinematic storytelling element and the player's sense of agency in the game's story? Persona 5 does it by consistently referring to the protagonist in spoken dialogue as, "hey you," and, "that guy."
Of course, there's also Fallout 4's method of basically brute-forcing it, using spoken dialogue for every possible name:
But I think on the whole, we can't really expect the two to mesh together very well. On the one hand, voice talent (if done right) serves to make RPGs more compelling and immersive, and returning to a more "classic" formula of silent protagonists and text-only dialogue would certainly feel like a step back.
On the other hand, I don't like losing the power to swiftly dash away any dramatic tension in a scene by having a character call themselves something dumb. It's my story, and I should reserve the right to ruin it.
While this wasn't the first JRPG I played with voiced lines, it was--for me, at least--the first in which voice acting enhanced the storytelling experience. Troy Baker's sweet, dulcet tones probably played a large role in that.
As I was browsing through Vesperia's menus, I found that I could rename any of my playable characters. Problem was, the voices (understandably) would never reflect those changes. That's when I realized that as games featured more and better voice acting, I would likely lose the ability to give my characters clever or offensive names.
And that's a huge loss.
My first console RPG was Final Fantasy VII, which I played when I was an edgy, rebellious teenager. My starting trio of playable protagonists consisted of Horny, Black, and Woman, which led to hilarious and strangely fitting dialogue. After VII, I went back to play all the Super Nintendo Final Fantasy titles, along with Chrono Trigger and Terranigma, where many characters suffered the same treatment. I took being able to name my characters whatever I wanted for granted.
 |
| Can't pull this kind of crap anymore. |
Voices eventually spread to other genres, and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment was the first RPG with voice acting that I played. Yet, for some reason, I didn't realize until much later that I couldn't change my characters' names in that game. And it took a little while after that for me to pinpoint and articulate why that mattered.
That only happened when I experienced the way Vesperia handled character name customization. I could change Yuri Lowell's name to "Girly Man" or Raven's to "Gonna Betray You," but all I was doing was changing a label -- not a name. I was still playing a great story, with an incredible narrative arc, and likeable, relatable, sympathetic heroes and villains, but it was no longer my story. Because of that, Vesperia's story, for better or worse, felt less like playing through an RPG and more like watching a very good anime series. Ditto Persona 2.
So how does an RPG reconcile voice acting with customizable names? How do you preserve both a crucial cinematic storytelling element and the player's sense of agency in the game's story? Persona 5 does it by consistently referring to the protagonist in spoken dialogue as, "hey you," and, "that guy."
 |
| Oh, it's that guy. |
But I think on the whole, we can't really expect the two to mesh together very well. On the one hand, voice talent (if done right) serves to make RPGs more compelling and immersive, and returning to a more "classic" formula of silent protagonists and text-only dialogue would certainly feel like a step back.
On the other hand, I don't like losing the power to swiftly dash away any dramatic tension in a scene by having a character call themselves something dumb. It's my story, and I should reserve the right to ruin it.
What's wrong with FO4s method? Text to voice is pretty decent these days. Best of both worlds? I think FO4 doesn't use the player's name that much though. The world is too large to do that. But with a smaller script, why not?
ReplyDeleteI think it's fine for FO4 and other games where the PC's name won't come up too much. That's a small piece of the overall RPG pie, though.
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