I like it and I hope to see it return... as long as the quality continues to be great.

I really like it, though I knew as soon as this was announced that there'd be a big divide in regards to this.

Surely we can debate how well it was implemented but it's going to be a polarizing element. If you don't want a voiced PC then you can't really debate on matters of preference.

I prefer the more cinematic style of dialog myself. I play mostly in third person and enjoy seeing my character be more emotive in this game. I feel my character has been invited with a lot more personality and I really like the voice acting.

But like I said it's largely going to be a matter of preference. I like the change, but obviously not everyone will.

That pretty much sums up everything that is wrong with it right there. This isn't an immersive game where you are the character, but instead closer to a movie where you watch the main character. I'm not saying all games shouldn't try to be like movies, but there should be games that let the player fill these gaps. If I want witty movie like dialogue, I'll play some Naughty Dog game, and not a Bethesda one.

I wish, in that old-school way, you could select a personality type for what kind of voice you'd like. Because my character's voice does NOT reflect his appearance and demeanor.

Well except that was you the person playing the character providing the voice. The problem here is someone else is providing the voice, setting the emotional content and personality of my character. That's fine in a game where I'm playing someone else's story. But Bethesda games are supposed to be about "living another life" not watching someone else's life.

This has nothing to do with not being used to hearing the protagonist talk, I played plenty of games with talking protagonists. But just because it works in one game or genre doesn't mean it must be done in all games. Variety is the spice of life and what makes Bethesda games stand out from the crowd are the differences in gameplay and the focus of letting the player be who ever they want and do what ever they want. The whole "world is moving on from silent protagonist" comment is just not true. We've had games with talking protagonists for decades it works in the right sort of game for it. I personally don't think Fallout is, or should be that sort of game and I am certain that The Elder Scrolls isn't.

Agreed! For me it really doesn't matter how good the voices are or even how many options there are it's a issue of tone, style and atmosphere. I want to play AS my character not watch him.

It suits my legacy character well.

But like others have said, not a big fan of the random comments like "Nice!" or "I'm out of bobby pins!".

No. No I don't.

It's interesting because I've always felt that the silent protagonist thing was down to budget issues, ie too much work hiring multiple voice actors for a huge amount of dialogue for the player to choose from. I have played the first two games, and even Tactics, way back in the day and loved them. Yet, I just personally would prefer to choose a dialogue option and watch it play out rather than reading a bunch of text and using imagination in my head. I grew up playing 8bit and 16bit consoles so personally I just appreciate these modern games evolving more and more. That's what I meant by the "moving on" comment, it wasn't meant ot be condescending and this is probably the first time I read about people preferring a silent hero for roleplaying reasons. I always thought it was about money.

I love it. I think they did an amazing job with it. The only issue I take with this system is that the four options provided don't always give a clear indication of what you are going to say.

I have mixed feelings. I certainly prefer the old dialogue system, and would prefer and even more complicated, branching dialogue system, with skill/SPECIAL checks and everything. Also, less of a defined character. That being said, I enjoy playing with the voice because it's well-acted and the dialogue is enjoyable, just evidently less complex, at least compared with New Vegas. Dialogue was never good in Fallout 3, so I'd consider it a step down from New Vegas, and a step up from Fallout 3. Also, with the character being so defined, almost to a Shepard-like extent, I will likely just play one male, on female character. Either way, I love the game. I do think it's Bethesda's best, even if it isn't what I necessary want in a Fallout game. That's what I was expecting, though.

I really don't know... cause it's a little goofy depending on how you made your character look. If there were some super high tech voice modulator that enabled you to change the tone and amplitude of your voice I'd be right on board, but that's eons in the future I think.

One other thing I don't like about a voiced main character is that you can't skip through the dialogue. It's interesting the first time but when you do multiple characters it gets really tiresome. I'm already tired of Codsworth and I'm only on my third character. (I like to try out different special stats before going ahead.)

Feel like it's just kind of a useless addition by Bethesda to take away our unique gameplays and keep us forced into this pre-determined character. Instead of like previous Fallout games where our character is whoever we want them to be, we have a preset voice, background, history, family life, and goal set(ie. finding your son). They could have left out a voiced protagonist, had our entire family killed off with no survivors at all, allowing the specifics or our past/future to be up to us. You could say that there's still plenty of freedom to create the type of character you desire, and in a way that's true, but the very core of your character is being forced on you and many choices would be a big stretch because of it. Even though the voice niffs me, I could deal with it, but the whole 'locking me into the character you want me in' thing is breaking to me. It's like others games I've played(ie GTA, Metro, Witcher), I'm looking through the eyes of someone else, not of my character which I base upon myself. Many times I've enjoyed games, like the ones I mentioned, it's just not what I've come to expect in the Fallout universe, nor something I cared for it to be in. Just my two cents at least.

Strong YES and Strong YES.

Playable char voice is great (kudos to the voice actor(s)).

No, and I don't need to have played the game to know this. I'm a game designer and from what I have seen, the very fact someone is speaking responses out loud changes how conversations are written as well as interpreted. In New Vegas, the designers and writers would write dialogue based on the limited options of text inputs by the player. By it's very nature, because no tone of voice had to be taken into account, just the words alone, even when leaning to one side or another, would still be responded to in what feels like the fairest manner.

The thing is, I think that the problem could easily be solved if the dialogue wheel were removed and the player's text weren't given a voice actor. Then, the reactions of the NPCs to the answers we choose to give would feel like they came out of their own insecurities and background, making the NPCs feel more like they have a history of their own to carry into the conversation. The text you choose to be your words are what you see and what you get; or so it feels like it.

I have a very definitive idea of what my character is like. My character is a Filipino with a family history in Chicago, whom has a complicated relationship with his professional attitude towards crime and assassination. He used to have a little sister, whom tragically died because of a racially motivated punk who didn't understand you don't mix race or business with family. If he needs to calm his nerves, he plays the guitar and smokes a scented cigarette. He has a 3 foot long balisword he designed himself as a novelty, signature weapon, though he in reality prefers the use of sub-machine guns and rifles. He has a crush on a caucasian brunette caught in a feud fueled by a misunderstanding her intended savior didn't survive lo clear up. He accidentally taught her to smoke when stressed like he does. They fight sometimes, but her confidence and her clarity in her own motivations almost always give him the opportunity to make their fights result in something nett-positive. He is smart, but formally educated only in industrial manufacture (barely), relying more on his wit than his knowledge pool, while his crush has a lot of intuitive understanding of the world at large through reading the news and reading books, but requires more guidance practically.

All of that shapes my character and what he sounds like. He prefers to mellow out after the stresses he has been through. He can get impatient over lack in digression and discipline, though. Hell, I hoard toys and musical instruments in New Vegas because that's the sentimental kind of guy he has to be to compensate all the chilling experiences he has had. And there's a whole heap more where that came from. My character happily points out irony, but does so in amusemant, not spite. I simply do not know how the voice actor will use sarcasm or in what tone. While sarcasm on the dreaded dialogue wheel is apparently a common option, I will never use it. Not even if it were spelled out for me; changing the emphasis in the sentence alone would throw me off. 99% of the time, I know in advance that my character wouldn't say it the way the male voice actor says it.

Simply turning the voice actors off allows me to fill in the emphasis in the sentence and attribute any reactions from NPCs as legitimately out of proportion instead of understandably mad. That is, if I can filter the responses more accurately than what the dialogue wheel allows me to currently.

He sounds decently like a man

Always had an issue with the Nord character in Skyrim, yelled like a girl

No to both.

I guess I can tolerate the female voice until I finish the game [if I finish the game]. It isn't grabbing my attention that much so far. I started playing last night, and didn't find it all that hard to quit at a reasonable time. I played again tonight for a couple of hours, and again, didn't have a problem with quitting. When I got Skyrim and got it loaded, the clock magically went from 6 p.m. to 3:15 a.m. before I realized that "just one more look over there" wasn't a good idea since I have to be up 5:30 a.m. for work. I don't think I'll have to worry about this game doing that. I even found myself wondering what my guildmates were up to in ESO instead of what I need to do next in FO4. I think part of it is due to the voices and the "I have no idea what the character is going to say". It isn't my character, just like Shepard wasn't. For me, personal opinion time, is that having a voice that can't be changed along with a beginning that didn't really engage me that much, makes it that much easier for me to not get invested in the character.

If Beth does a voiced character for ES, I won't get it. That would kill the series for me.

I like the males voice. I like how he whispers when sneaking, and how he speaks with power armor on. I don't mind if they bring it back in FO5 just keep it out of the tes games.

You hit the nail on the head for me, man.

I think I'd be able to handle things a bit better if either: the characters had longer lines with a little more flavor about who they are as a person, or just ditched the VAs and added more options so we can define that ourselves.

Yes, in Fallout. No for ES series

I love it. I simply can't enjoy a game without VC. And yes I love both actors voices. Great choice. BUT the dialogue choices (or lack there of) are EXTREMELY DISAPPOINTING and limited. I want them to improve on that in the next games. Since It's Bethesda first try at voiced PC, I am willing to give them a pass this time. Also, was a realtime pitch changer like in saints row too much to ask for? That would instantly make the game more enjoyable for people who are not very happy with the VPC. I would like to see a feature like this patched in.

In reality a pitch changer is pretty useless, it works (kind of) in Saints Row because it's a silly game so a silly sounding character is okay. I suppose some folk may be happy with a weird sounding squeaky or deep voice in Fallout but I imagine most of the people who aren't happy with the voiced main still wouldn't be happy with a voiced main that had a higher or lower pitch shifted voice. Anything other than the tiniest of changes with pitch shifting just sounds freaky.

Even multiple actors wouldn't really address the problem as far as I'm concerned because voice is inextricably linked to character and I want to define the character not choose one from a limited list of predefined ones. It's also a matter of resources and priorities, voicing the main character even once or twice (let alone multiple times) costs a lot and the more complicated and extensive the dialogue the more expensive it becomes. Given that silent main works better for a lot of folks and seemed to be fine in the older games is it really a sensible use of resources and a worth while compromise of the quality of everything else it affects?

Sadly it seems the majority are against me in this and if The Elder Scrolls go's this way it'll be a great loss and the last great AAA game maker to lose my business. I'll then turn my hopes to the Indie game market for my next open world RPG fix.

Seriously?

It is terrible.

Don't get me wrong, the voice actors did a great job but Fallout/TES are the wrong games for such a feature.

If you do your first playthrough and play the PC like Bethesda wanted him to be then its great but it does not work for roleplaying.

I greatly prefer it to being a mute, which in itself is immersion ruining, not that I couldn't enjoy bethesda games before. To me complaining about the voice is as arbitrary as complaining about ... oh this nuka bottle doesn't look like I imagined it to be... Better not buy this game... And for every single piece of graphics. I mean how could you guys ever enjoy anything, but text adventures... if they didn't also ruin whatever you imagined it to be.

Ok, that sounded harsher than I meant it. I do get the immersion ruining and I do think there should have been an option to turn it off, but I still think it's a somewhat arbitrary thing to complain about.

I give a wholehearted 'no', not because it sounds bad... in fact, it does sound good for what it is. My problem with it is that it instantly severely limits the amount of dialogue in the game, which is VERY bad in an open world RPG. The fact is... this game has one voice for each gender and limited dialogue choices, because that's all they could do because they chose to voice act it. It takes an exponentially higher amount of time and money to voice act a role than it takes to write it in text... in the time it took to voice act one voice for this game, they could have had personality-themed text dialogue for a several different personalities for both genders, and more dialogue options in general to boot.