It's time to add voice acting to raids.

[Zabuza]

This thought occurred to me when I was doing the new 8 man raid.

As I was going through the fights and the story, with no voice acted dialogue whatsoever, all of a sudden there's voice acting in the final fight, but only in the fight. There was no voice acting in P1-P4 whatsoever. This was jarring to me and makes no sense.

All Eden tiers had voice acting, but only in the fights and not the actual story itself. What is the logic SE is using when determining voice acting? There's no way their budget is this constrained to still be this limited with voice acting. That may have been a valid excuse back in A Realm Reborn, but no longer.

Even in the main story, when the main characters are talking, some scenes are voice acted and some are not. Why is SE still skimming on voice acted content to this extent and being so inconsistent with the placement? It's so strange to get out of a voice acted cutscene with a character to then have silent dialogue from that same character thrown at you straight after.

I'm not saying every scene in the game needs to be voice acted, but c'mon. It makes no sense for SE to voice act select raid fights but not use those voice actors for raid story. This is a game that uses its story as one of its main selling points and you have the budget so please SE, consider pouring some additional funds into this.

[Jeeqbit]

The reason they have given is that the text could need to be changed all the way up to release and for scenes that they decide to voice act, they have to be certain it won't change so they choose these scenes carefully. There is also a possibility of them being changed in the future (for example, text changes that explain why the characters are now coming with you as trusts when they didn't used to).

There are games that have no trouble with this, but SE has localization teams to consider and they don't want to be giving work to voice actors unless it's final.

[Raoabolic]

but SE has localization teams to consider and they don't want to be giving work to voice actors unless it's final.

Gotta add more larboard in the script~!

[Deveryn]

Eden had voice acting in 2 fights ...

There is such a thing as going too heavy on the voicing. As much as it adds in certain spots, it takes away in others. Close in the Distance is one example, though slightly unrelated. It had a great impact when it hit, but to have it on loop for eternity seems a bit much.

[Raoabolic]

Close in the Distance is one example, though slightly unrelated. It had a great impact when it hit, but to have it on loop for eternity seems a bit much.

I swear, every time I go to Ultima Thule it sounds like I teleported into a Cymbalta or any antidepressant commerical. lmao

[Gemina]

Interesting thing about the VAs is that Alliance Raids are filled to the brim with them. Argath immediately comes to mind, along with many of the bosses from the Ivalice raids. Anyone want to type out all of Cid's dialogue? Aglaia also is no exception to this.

With that in mind I never actually realized how devoid of VAs the 8-man raids are. Final boss of Eden has a considerable amount, but happens more so during transitions, so it does not have the same impact. Trials are basically in the same boat.

IOW, they can take a thing or two from the Alliance Raids in this regard, because the VAs in those really add an element of excitement to those fights. I will gladly sign this petition with a felt tip.

[Kaurhz]

To a degree the issue of voice acting wouldn’t always really be a budgeting issue but really more or a logistical and availability issue. Seeing as they would need to have VA across multiple languages and equally would want to have the same VA for a given character across all those languages. Sure, it would be nice though.

[Ransu]

I wouldn't really be against it, but raids are side stories, so I'm not really bothered by the lack of it either. Then again, I grew up with game stories being entirely text based, so I'm just generally used to it I guess lol.

[Rhus]

If we had VA it would give away the big reveal and ruin the surprise this patch…

[MoofiaBossVal]

The reason they have given is that the text could need to be changed all the way up to release and for scenes that they decide to voice act, they have to be certain it won't change so they choose these scenes carefully.

To a degree the issue of voice acting wouldn’t always really be a budgeting issue but really more or a logistical and availability issue. Seeing as they would need to have VA across multiple languages and equally would want to have the same VA for a given character across all those languages. Sure, it would be nice though.

Meanwhile, WoW raids are changed all the way up to release and are fully voiced in over a dozen different languages.