First off, I'd like to say that Oblivion was great and all that jazz, but if there was something about that game which really bugged me was the lack of different voice actors.

Not only you'd constantly encounter villagers and other npc's who sound exactly alike, but when there were certain quest npc's with their unique voices, you could ask them about rumous and their voice would change and they'll repeat the same generic old rumors heard from the common npc's, again, with a different voice. (i.e. when asking beggars about Gray Fox - he's a fairytale yadda yadda)

So, has there been any info about how much voice talent Bethesda has hired for the game?

The problem with Oblivion was they spent all their money on Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean. The only confirmed celebrity voice actor for Skyrim as of now is Max von Sydow (Minority Report...Shutter Island). If they keep it to just one celeb voice actor the potential for a variety of voices in Skyrim is great.

Not much, aside from "more." Which I still rather expect to translate, in actual experience, to "still not nearly enough."

I expect now you might have to talk to 4 or 5 people before "Hey, you've got that other guy's voice!" kicks in rather than 2 or 3. :shrug:

I think the topic's name should have been "The amount of voice acting in Skyrim".
Talent feels as if Oblivion's voice actors weren't good enough.

Anyway. All I want is more voice actors. It doesn't necessarily need to cost more. Because the total amount of voice acting is still the same. The only thing that changes is that more people are doing less voice acting. And since I'm pretty sure voice actors are being payed for how much they voice act, it wouldn't really cost much more money.

The only problem would be finding more than good voice actor for special voices like argonians, khajiit and orcs.

One thing I'm hoping for in Skyrim as well is different voices (not necessarily different voice actors, just... the voice acting done differently) for different kinds of people. Like rich people should sound different. Monks should sound different. Poor people as well, etc etc. And by sounding different I'm of course meaning something more appropriate to their place in society.

I'm sure voice acting will be plentiful and diverse.

Oh yeah, you're right. I did mean "voice acting", so excuse me for the typo!



I agree, I don't really care who delivers the voice acting, aslong as it's there. I'm generally not a big fan of famous voice actors, because whenever you hear a character being voiced by someone you know, it kind of breaks the immersion and it makes you concentrate more on the person who's voicing the character rather than on the character itself.

Bring back Jeff Baker! (Dunmer male)

:poke:

I haven't heard anything on this, I can just confirm that I agree with the first and second post.

I really don't see why they have never seen this as a big thing. I think while playing many people actually won't consciously notice it, but unconsciously it will hugely effect their immersion. It seems with Oblivion they wanted to make all the individual npc's more lively with their 'radiant AI' thing. How radiant is it if it's basically three different voices?



I don't like them using celebrities purely because this stagnates the market. I'm sure there's a lot of young and old talent out there, actors and voice actors alike that would gladly do some quality voice acting for a (relatively) small price. But people focus too much on having recognisable celebrities in their games,especially the more commanding voices. I love Max von Sydow's voice, but I would rather they hire 5 other individuals who i've never heard before and give them a chance for probably the same price. This will not only result in less recognisable voices which helps immersion, but a richer, fairer market.

Ah yeah, that's a very good point. Hearing Patrick Stewart made me think of that as well.
I never realized that Martin was Sean Bean though...

Compared to Oblivion? Good enough for me.

I heard there is going to be 80+ voice actors for Skyrim, although I want to find the source to this info.

WHOA man!!! i almost forgot thaat!!!!
yeah you right they need more voice actors! xD

i think in all oblivon ( AWSOME GAME REALLY) there was hardly 3 voice actors...xD! they must have more for sure! female voice actors too :turtle:

Random turtle?

turtle is random

In a podcast, Tod Howard said that they will be using more voice actors in Skyrim. To help them do so, he said they are turning to more local talent that they can hire cheaper for smaller roles.

If that is true, then that is awesome.

I'm laughing hard if I hear an Orc say "Dakka Dakka!"

Anyway, I'm sure it's going to be more awesome.

Does hiring celebrity voice actors even seem like a good use of resources? I have trouble believing that Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean actually helped Oblivion sell enough extra copies to justify the cost of hiring them.

I really think there is no point in enlisting celeb voice actors if you can hire decent ones for much less money. I love Sean Bean but Martin just didn't sit right with me at all and I failed to even recognize Patrick Stewart's voice when I first played the game. It didn't add any depth for me.

Nope, but this thread was actually about general use of voice actors, and not celebrities. Sorry about the misleading thread title.

Also,

If a celebrity is doing voice acting correctly you will NOT easily recognize their identity. If they are not able to produce a voice that makes the character sound unique and is appropriate then they are shoddy actors and should not be hired by anyone!

The problem is hiring actors to be voice actors, which they are not.

they should get voice actors that can do a lot of voices, like Hank Azaira (sp) or Billy West. not those people specifically but versatile voice actors like that.

specific voices i would love to see in a TES game:
The guy that did the male dunmer voices in Morrowind
H. Jon Benjamin
Christopher Walken
That guy who does the voice of Spike in Cowboy Bebop, who was also a voice in new vegas.
Mel, from flight of the conchords.

and i want a young Bob Dylan to do a number on the lute.

This is probably a very good point. Sure, I loved hearing their voices in the game, but I wouldn't have liked the game any less if they'd had unknown actors play the roles instead. I had no idea anyone famous had done voices in the game until I looked it up, curious about who the voice actors were. I agree that I would rather they have more diversity in voices by using more actors, rather than less diversity just so they can hire someone famous. :spotted owl:

Having James Earl Jones would make this more epic than it already is.

NPC: "Adoring fan never told you what happened to your father..."
PC: "He told me enough... he told me you killed him!"
NPC: "No. I, am your father..."
PC: "Thats not true... THATS IMPOSSIBLE!"
NPC: "Search your feelings, you know it to be true!"
PC: (wangsty) "NOOOOO!! NOOOOOOO!!!!" *leaps off qrrbrbirlbel*
NPC: "winguardium leviosa! Dangit! That never works!" *walks off in huff*


To be serious (as if that will ever happen) I constantly hear about 80+ voices for characters. It means that there is likely to be more than 80 voices, maybe even 90! It will certainly be more hilarious to hear the same voice actor talking to himself once, and more immersive in the long run.

If those 80 actors could do even just two distinctly different voices, it would be more than good enough for me