I just came across this little paragraph from wikipedia:

Lead Designer Ken Rolston found the plan to fully voice the game "less flexible, less apt for user projection of his own tone, more constrained for branching, and more trouble for production and "disk real estate" than Morrowind's partially recorded dialogue. Rolston tempered his criticism with the suggestion that voice acting "can be a powerful expressive tool" and can contribute significantly to the charm and ambience of the game. "I prefer Morrowind's partially recorded dialogue, for many reasons. But I'm told that fully-voiced dialogue is what the kids want."

Regarding this, I want to say to everyone, please get smarter and think about the consequence of your actions, so that skyrim will be something the devs think will be good.

Yeah, after Oblivion had a single voice (per gender) for all elves, etc.. I certainly would not complain if developers wanted more freedom in the writing without having to make sure every part was voiced.

I think maybe that was what was wrong with Oblivion. They cared too much about what "kids" wanted.

Hasn't it been confirmed somewhere (I think the GI article) that 'many more actors' have been hired?

What else do 'kids' want?

I think it was to boost sales when it was first released on the new wave of consoles they marked Oblivion with a teen rating until the "raters" (or whomever they are called) saw heads off corpses and corpses without heads. So yeah sales boosting, hopefully they will go with what they think is good.

Yes it did. I remember many people suggested they use their voice actor budget to hire more unknown actors vs spending the budget on big names. I wonder how much they spent on Patrick Stewart for his relatively small role?

:facepalm: :facepalm:

... You know, sometimes I think it'd be better to not have a forum altogether. Just let the devs make the game that feels right and good to them, rather than the game they think people want.

What people think they want and what they love isn't necessary the same thing. A good example from another entertainment area. The Wire wasn't by any standard a series that fit the popularity criteria. Too many characters, no archetypes, no plot that's common and easy to follow. And because they tried to create something original rather than catering to the audience, they did surprise and please even more.

Didn't think what I wanted from a game was hours of mere walking. Turned out that forced me to explore Morrowind, and made me attached to the land in a way I never got to be to Cyrodiil.

Personally, I didn't like the voice acting of oblivion. i hope they go back to the morrowind system. it allowed much more content.

They should listen to what people want. It's, after all, people who buy the game
Whether people counts as kids or advlts, matters none the less.

After they've listened though, the devs should make their own decision, of course.

Yeah, but where does most of the money come from? The kids' parents who buy them the games Bethesda releases.

It's a shame he feels like that I for one would prefer a fully voiced game but if that's a pressure on any game features they feel would be better served then they should do it their way, for that is best, listen to ur passenger, but drive your self.

someone's taking this a little to literally....

They definately should listen to what the end-users want.
All good design research is done this way.
I would even say the fans on these forums would count as the expert users, especially the mod makers.
Bethesda can anolyze the data that has accumulated over that last few years from here and elsewhere, then do what they think is best.

It's all a moot point by now. Based on some of the features being discussed (NPCs talking to you while going about their business) it's obvious that the game is going to be fully voiced. However it sounds like they're taking a different approach. If I remember correctly all of Oblivion's dialog was recorded early in the development cycle. For Skyrim it sounds like they just got started recording dialog. Also based on something mentioned in one of the more recent videos it sounds like the dialog is going to be much more dynamic in how it's used.

Well, we are the ones buying the game, without us they wouldn't be making such a great game.

God your making alot of threads, just looked at your account and all of them were yesterday and today, but it only shows five of em.

Those kids are our future. And they are just as important as we old folks are...more so really.

Dude a troll trolling trolls in order to troll. This dude (the op) is the real deal.

I hope the dialogue is fully voiced and would be pretty surprised if it isn't after taking into account the past few Bethesda releases.

The game is already far into production to create big changes.

They probably just look at the forums/fanbase to see the broad idea of what the some want, but ultimately its their say.

Some may value the fanbase opinion and some don't don't give a ____ and do their own thing.


- I do not believe deutschland is a troll, but this thread could lead to heated(pointless) arguments no doubt.

Are you serious? You are going to blame "kids" for voice overs in Oblivion that some developer supposedly complained about? I don't think you are giving Bethesda enough credit. One reason why I love Bethesda is because they are risk takers, and they will do things other game developers wouldn't even consider trying. If that means adding a more realistic experience with voice overs even if it makes things more difficult, Bethesda will find a way. Oblivion may have had flaws, but voice overs isn't one of the major issues that comes to mind. The moment developers start making excuses for their games is the moment problems begin to arise.

Oblivion took a risk, and I like that. Sure you could tell they re-used so many voices that it almost hurt, but the fact is that they tried it. Its a huge game, and to even attempt what they did is insane. I personally hope Beth continues with the insane ideas, and improves upon the insain ideas of yester-year.

I completely didn't mind the Morrowind text-box dialogue. The only thing that annoyed me was when you walked near someone, they would say the same thing, the same way another person said it five minutes ago.

:slap: don't call folks trolls....we will warn you!!!!
http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/724862-forum-rules-and-general-information/

Heh, no worries. In "kids" really I include myself - I'd like to be surprised by something original and intuitive and fun to play. A game designed according to my specs would quite certainly be horrible.

Enjoying something doesn't give one creds to create. I have more music than most, but still would not be able to play a note, much less create even an awful song.