I loved the voice acting. It really pulled me into the story.....the first time. Now I space bar everything except class story line when leveling an alt. I had thought that I would want to play the different 'decision' trees through the conversation, but have found them to be inconsequential making the replay not worthwhile.

 

So this I believe will be the first and last MMORPG that offers such an extensive voiced narrative. The cost benefit does not exist to support it. The lead time required for development is also a problem.

 

What do you think?

I have 16 characters I play (some a little more seldom than other) and I rarely spacebar through dialogs, doesn't matter if it's the same quest I've done on 8 other characters since mostly they are either of a different gender, class or "morality" which means that a lot of the responses differs somewhat even if the end is more or less the same.

The voiced missions and class stories really make the game for me.

The voiced missions and class stories really make the game for me.

 

i agree i like them..even after getting to 50

 

the only ones i space through are the dailies i do everyday.. which i think should be given to you from a terminal after you do them once with voice overs.or atleast have the option of getting them from a terminal, or go to the person .. it seems logical since they are redone daily

Edited May 12, 2012 by thomasgallant

The voiced missions and class stories really make the game for me.

 

For me too. It helps me to immerse into the game. Even if it's my 5th alt, it still helps me. I end up caring more about the planet struggles and the npc requests.

I loved the voice acting. It really pulled me into the story.....the first time. Now I space bar everything except class story line when leveling an alt. I had thought that I would want to play the different 'decision' trees through the conversation, but have found them to be inconsequential making the replay not worthwhile.

 

So this I believe will be the first and last MMORPG that offers such an extensive voiced narrative. The cost benefit does not exist to support it. The lead time required for development is also a problem.

 

What do you think?

 

I think the voice acting was an awesome addition to this game, and other games that don't have it pale by comparison IMHO. The lead times are more extensive, but BioWare executed on them quite well and I see no worries about them being able to continue and maintain their pace at adding the new content in.

 

I'll have to disagree on replay. I've just leveled the same advanced class twice, and I found the second time to be just as entertaining as the first. Now I've got a smuggler on Teris again and I see the side missions as gravy for the class mission, since they're always usually along the same path. Sometimes I rewatch the cuts, sometimes I spacebar through, but I still like that they're there. Even spacebarring through the content still gives a "fast-forward view" that still gives some visual concepts of where you are, who you're talking to, their demeanor, etc. It just gets compressed into a shorter span of time.

 

I don't believe anyone has any evidence at all that the time for development of the story content is detrimental overall.

I loved the voice acting. It really pulled me into the story.....the first time. Now I space bar everything except class story line when leveling an alt. I had thought that I would want to play the different 'decision' trees through the conversation, but have found them to be inconsequential making the replay not worthwhile.

 

I think it took me entirely too long to discover the space bar! Re-rolling an alt would be 10x more annoying without the magic space bar. You're right - exploring the "dalogue trees" is almost never worth it, because they ultimately say the same thing anyway and it doesn't matter at all what you have to say to non-companion NPCs.

 

For companion NPCs, the majority of the time they're completely random and unpredictable how they'll react +/- affection, especially for the companions that sign on board later, so even watching for their reactions isn't worth the investment in listening to the voice-overs, just space through it and try again if you get the wrong results.

 

Also, since I don't understand half the British accents in the game and have subtitles turned on (which should be the default if it still isn't) I can read faster than I usually care to hear the NPC voiced dialogue, especially on non-class missions.

 

So yeah, I'd say full voiceovers are NOT worth it if it adds such a length/cost to production-time that it cuts into new sidequest content. Especially with sidequests, they should just use more alien-looped Huttese or whatever that's generic and pump out more content on a much more regular basis.

 

Of course, all else being equal, voice-overs are better than not having any voice-overs, but it's not clear BW would add more side-quests anyway. Actual production time/costs on the voice-overs probably aren't the greatest share of the cost compared to planning/writing/programming/graphic work on new content.

Edited May 12, 2012 by jgelling

What do you think?

 

Totally agree with you, Redcorn.

 

After the 2nd alt the VO's become very tiresome. And your cost-benefit analogy is spot on. Might have been a better option if only the Class missions had VO and the mundane ones were text.

 

I'd still prefer chat bubbles and voice emotes (LFG tool and an in-game Looking for Guild tool). But my wish list would be long, so I'll say ciao for now.

 

The voiced missions and class stories really make the game for me.

 

I agree with that too. The problem with swtor is endgame. There isn't a whole lot to do beside pvping and pve raiding isn't up to par with the current wow raiding, even though it's not all that great either. However, raiding is just one activity that can keep players busy/entertained. Other players spend a lot of time getting achievements. The point is swtor didn't launch with a whole lot of endgame and waiting four months is a very long time for players who play daily. I play weekly at best, which is why I probably haven't been bored yet. I only log in on weekends if at all. Last two weeks been too busy with work so I haven't log in. Just too tired to play and go to sleep lol.

Edited May 12, 2012 by Knockerz

Voiced missions are good, but there are times when it can be a bit too much. Sometimes I feel like voice actors are obliged to talk for 1 min for every mission, even if the mission is a simple one. I'm sure people have experienced cases in real life where someone just drones on and on about something simple. It becomes annoying. To a certain degree, I find some missions have conversations that are too long.

 

In contrast, there are not enough conversations with your companions. Where is the equivalent of Garrus' telling you to wait because he has some calibrations to work on? Where is the equivalent of going through the interesting back-story of Tali?

 

Voiced missions are good, but the execution is off by a bit. Resources also need to be rearranged so that there is more focus on conversations and backstory for companions.

 

This of course is just my opinion, and it may not be shared by everyone.

I agree with that too.

 

Likewise.

Without the voiced missions, it wouldn't feel like SW:TOR. Text just can't cut it in terms of story; voice makes it feel alive, it makes it feel like I'm actually speaking to someone.

I disagree. Voiced quests are really worth it.

 

The things that people complain about aren't related to that, at all. We could've had VO and a group-facilitating interface in at launch too, but the lack of a group finder is a seperate issue from the VO. Same with other features and omissions.

Edited May 12, 2012 by Lheim

Voiced missions are good, but there are times when it can be a bit too much. Sometimes I feel like voice actors are obliged to talk for 1 min for every mission, even if the mission is a simple one. I'm sure people have experienced cases in real life where someone just drones on and on about something simple. It becomes annoying. To a certain degree, I find some missions have conversations that are too long.

 

In contrast, there are not enough conversations with your companions. Where is the equivalent of Garrus' telling you to wait because he has some calibrations to work on? Where is the equivalent of going through the interesting back-story of Tali?

 

Voiced missions are good, but the execution is off by a bit. Resources also need to be rearranged so that there is more focus on conversations and backstory for companions.

 

This of course is just my opinion, and it may not be shared by everyone.

 

I think the problem with vo stories is it doesn't have the same replay value like kotor. I still very much like vo it's just that the story could have been more. Personally, I think it would have been better if the leveling part were neutral. Once the player reaches max level based on your dark/light side aliment and your final grand decision will determine your faction alignment to be imp or rep. That would have added a lot more replay value to story sorta like what happen in the original kotor. I played a many times over for the story element. You also had a better talent level system that promoted replaying the game. The current talent trees for swtor don't encourage you replay unless you play on different faction. It's hard to put my finger on swtor, but it doesn't have the epic feel of kotor. Perhaps cause it's an mmorpg and your character can't be the focus of the entire game like kotor.

Edited May 12, 2012 by Knockerz

While an awesome feature - I'd say it really didn't work out as planned in the long run.

 

How many times have you heard your character say the same tired retreaded line... I'll show them what a Sith can do! Or whatever. My character seemed to lose his personality and was reduced to rehashing a sack of canned responses.

 

This entire SWTOR thing has been a very expensive experiment. Nobody, including myself, knew how a fully voiced MMO would work out in the long run VS a single player game. I think the vast majority of people feel the same. SWTOR shouldn't have happened and KOTOR 3 should have happened.

 

Elder Scrolls should take a few notes before they jump head first into the same treacherous sea.

Totally agree...

 

VO for class quest is great, and that's all that was needed.

 

The money spent for the rest would have been much better used in developping other aspects of a true MMO that many were hoping for:

- lifestyle tools like LFG tool

- a real space combat with cooperative and PVP versions

- world PVP, with vehicle combat, siege, large battlegrounds

- a more dynamic world, which doesnt feel like a wax museum, with mobile mobs (funny hey, mobs are static in TOR, quite a contradiction) and a sense of a living world, you know simple things like 2 patrols of opposite faction engaging each other when and if they meet, not just static spawns pretend shooting at each other, regardless of there is something to shoot at or not.

- big planets worth exploring where every square metre of land is not flagged with an arrow that says "your next quest is here"

- more public dungeon / heroic areas with challenges and loot that make it worthwhile geting a group to crawl through

etc...

i agree with the OP... i think they should have just voiced the class quests,and not the rest of the class givers. if they had done this,they could have had more content/features in at launch.

The VO are good but more effort should have been spent making the main class story a stand out experiences and less effort put into trash quest

There are many of the World Quests that are exceptionally good and I dont mind replaying them with my alts, like the Cult of Revan in Dromund Kass, the Breakout of the Dread Lords in Belsavis, the conflict of the Voss and Gormak is also very interesting and so are many other non-class quests. Edited May 12, 2012 by ChazDoit

I disagree. The best part about this game is the immersive atmosphere and the depth of the storytelling. If I wanted to scroll through quest text and then run off to kill ten droids or kobolds or or whatever, I would just go play another game that is no longer going through the growing pains this one is experiencing.

 

The voice acting is an enormous part of what makes this game so enjoyable. When I explain to people why I like this game so much, it is the first thing I tell them about; the interactive voice-acted cut scenes give it the immersive feel of a single-player roleplaying game, but set in a massively multiplayer universe.

 

If you take away the immersive atmosphere and the storytelling, it is really just WoW in space. Why would anyone ever play that game rather than just playing WoW?

I loved the voice acting. It really pulled me into the story.....the first time. Now I space bar everything except class story line when leveling an alt. I had thought that I would want to play the different 'decision' trees through the conversation, but have found them to be inconsequential making the replay not worthwhile.

 

When you space-bar through, what is your ultimate goal? To get to 50? Why? We know there's only so much content there. This game is about the journey, it is about the deep immersion you get from having a character that speaks and interacts and isn't a silent protagonist.

 

If that's the way you want to play, that's cool, but for my money I'm glad the VO is there.

I certainly enjoyed them the first time around, but unless it's unique class content, I really could care less about someone voicing me the generic kill/fetch side task, as opposed to me reading it myself.

 

It's pretty clear that they cannot create content with meaningful dialogue in any reasonable amount of time, as the new flashpoints, new OPs and new warzone contained at best, a bunch of alien jabber with subtitles, and no interesting story to speak of.

Edited May 12, 2012 by Gungan

I have 16 characters I play (some a little more seldom than other) and I rarely spacebar through dialogs, doesn't matter if it's the same quest I've done on 8 other characters since mostly they are either of a different gender, class or "morality" which means that a lot of the responses differs somewhat even if the end is more or less the same.

 

Exactly this!

 

This isn't like.....Mass Effect where even if I replay over the second time as a Renegade Female instead of a Paragon Male, the overall experience is about the same. Same squad mates, same story, and even same dialog.

 

With SWTOR, I can play as the holy mother Jedi Consular who is uber 100% lightside and does everything by the book. Her playstyle is a Tank [shadow] and she plays with a DPS companion. She has her own skills, her unique set of crew skills, personality and so on. She uses a double-bladed lightsaber as well.

 

THEN

 

I can turn around and play as a "fat" [4th Body type] dirty.....in it for the money Smuggler who is all out 100% darkside and only cares about himself and what benefits him. His playstile is a DPS and he plays with another DPS companion. He has is own skills that is 100% different from the Consular, his unique set of crew skills, personality and so on. Even though he goes through some of the same planet missions as the consular and hears the same NPC voices, the experience is different because it is a different voice actor, with different responses and so on. With my consular, things were guided by the force and she spoke in such manner. With my smuggler, things were guided by wealth and personal gain, and he speaks in such manner.

 

THEN

 

I can turn around and play as a handsome Imperial Agent and have a totally new experience and so on and so forth.

 

So my verdict? I LOVE the voice overs and they were well worth it in the end!

A lot of you make good points for Voice Overs in missions. I personally do the exact same thing as described in the original post. Other than light/dark side points and gaining companion affection there is no real consequence to your journey. It does not branch off like a tree with every decision you make leading you down a completely different path you have never seen before because of your choices. I thought they said that SWTOR was about making choices that really matter. Understood that it would be much too large of a project to do something like that for each class. I like the V.O.'s, but there's always gonna be a part buried deep down that knows it makes no difference what I choose.

Well, to the OP, you are 100% correct, if any company was thinking about doing voiceovers in their MMO, SWTOR will make them rethink doing so. Just so much WASTED budget on a feature that I would estimate 75% of their player base "space bars through", not to mention the corner that they have painted themselves into in the way of expansion missions, just a horrible feature and a shame that BW pissed so much money away on it.