Suggestion: Get some black voice actors next time

[Brendon 0]

Seriously, Master Sergeant Miles isn't fooling anybody. If you've heard him, you know there's a problem. He's the blackest person in game, with a white computer nerd voice. When I first heard him talking, I thought it was someone else.

I'm not being racist or anything, but it would be like giving a fully grown man a babies voice, and visa versa. English voice acting in the game, in general, is pretty horrible. Marines don't talk, nor sound like that.

[MindSpray 10]

Read my mind. Just tried the demo and thought about posting about it, but I thought people would take it the wrong way, etc. I guess they spent all the money getting John Di Maggio :bounce3:

[hoak 0]

I agree, in fact the Sound Design and Production aren't even close to the standard of the rest of the game. Some of it is actually a bit funny, but I supposed that's not good either...

:)

[Alex72 1]

He didnt say a'ight or shiiiit enough times?

Marines dont talk like what? They all talk a certain way you mean? like cool with deep voices like in the hollywood movies?

Voices could maybe be better but... Its good enough. Campaign is such a small part of this game if not the smallest.

Alex

[Mark XIII (DayZ) 18]

Hasn't the sound in these games always been under par compared with the rest ? I'm not sure who or how they aqquire these sounds but I think it comes down to time & money. I personally think this is the best effort out of the three games so far. The thing that most people don't appreciate is how many new sound slots we have compared to the older games.

Arma 1

Per Vehical = 2 sounds

Per Weapon = 1 sound

Bullethits = 4 different surfaces

Arma 2

Per Vehical = Over 30 sounds for land, 10 for Air

Per Weapon = As many sounds as you like

Bullethits = 16 different surfaces

and thats just an example, I've not even looked into the rest yet..So I think you'll see big improvements when us soundmodders start getting stuck in....

[Heatseeker 0]

Hehehehe... i couldnt agree more on this one, especially Coops.

Its not the a'iight or any of that slang black americans use, its the voice tone.

Too late now i guess :D .

[Uziyahu--IDF 0]

As someone who served in the U.S. Army, I know exactly what you're saying.

The biggest issue, I think, are the missing words, the variable levels of volume between words, and the broken timing when the words are pieced together.

It must be a nightmare to code that for multiple languages.

(Oh, and it's been "OFP", not "OpF", ever since Goatmasters changed the name from "Flashpoint" to "Operation Flashpoint".)

[Heatseeker 0]

(Oh, and it's been "OFP", not "OpF", ever since Goatmasters changed the name from "Flashpoint" to "Operation Flashpoint".)

Im not willing to discuss this anymore.

And Goatmasters is not wright because there are no goats in Dragon poop, there are goats in Arma II though...

[Sulu 10]

I agree with the voice of Miles, he sounds more Ben Afleck than Denzel Washington!

[hoak 0]

He didnt say a'ight or shiiiit enough times?

Marines dont talk like what? They all talk a certain way you mean? like cool with deep voices like in the hollywood movies?

Don't be ridiculous... While there certainly are Marines that talk like that, and many do train heavy, use steroids, and have concomitant deep voices -- that is not the point or even close to it.

The point is the voice acting is poor to outright horrible, there are more then a few examples of strongly European accented barely articulate English in the U.S. Marine voice messages, the Sound Design and Production quality is... well abysmal, and that's being polite...

Just the blatant seams between messages alone is one example of how ridiculously bad the Production Quality is; modern tools modest editing talent, and even average voice actors with a little exposure to radio technique can easily produce material for seamless messages from sentence and phrase particles, as radio technique is monotone in character, and both editing and doing a large volume of fast retakes is so easy with digital audio now.

The in-game 'radio' simulation also offers one (among many) example of how bad the Sound Design is, which is actually more on par with DOS games that got their first use sound cards, then even a half ass studio attempt at emulation of radio transmission effects on transmitted audio. Any Sound Designer worth his salt can replicate the radio transmision characteristic of a specific radio set model to a standard where even an experienced Radio Operator can't tell the difference between the emulation and the real radio.

Voices could maybe be better but... Its good enough. Campaign is such a small part of this game if not the smallest.

Alex

Yes, I agree, but it's sad to see a game that shines so brightly with its SOTA engine be taken down by such abysmal Sound Design and Production, and to use such a lousy sound manager.

The immersive and functional qualities of good Sound Design and super Foley can add to a game should not be undervalued; when you step through a door even with your eyes closed at night you can tell you've moved from indoors to outdoors, a larger or smaller space, if there are people near, and where they might be etc. The spacious and directional sounds of crickets chirping or motor traffic and complex interactions of wind give you a sense of not just the size and scale of the landscape reinforcing what you see, they give you directional cues that constantly help you orient yourself. This is actually more pronounced in games where our senses are a bit dulled to begin with.

Sonically ArmA II while a step up from ArmA is far from being realistically subtile, rich and offering Sound Design and Production standards that are even remotely close to parity with the game's 3D render capabilities... As an experienced Sound Designer when it's obvious you working solo could managed both Production and Design on less of a budget then was probably spent for a few stock and custom sounds, and local voice talent, it spells it out in big red letters...

:huh:

Edited June 28, 2009 by Hoak

[Brendon 0]

When I said Marines don't talk like that, I'm talking about the script as well. They sound more like confused teenagers than they do Marines, especially Miles. How many times can one shout "Lets go Marines" during a firefight? Real Marines don't do that stuff during firefights.

Cooper isn't too bad. He's passable, it's Miles that sounds like a 13 year old white kid. I'm glad I didn't have to listen to him for long. The way they also portray the 'American' accent is horrible too. We do not all sound like Larry the Cable guy.

In the End, you have someone who looks like this:

Sound like this:

Edited June 29, 2009 by Brendon

[-=seany=- 5]

I have to agree, I heard my character start to talk when I was playing the campaign for the first time. I had to switch to external view, because I thought my avatar was black and sure enough he was. The voice sounds so painfully white its comical.

Oh, and regardless of colour, the soldiers should swear a hell of a lot more, Company of Heroes style :D

Edited June 29, 2009 by -=seany=-

[Starfire 10]

Maybe there's some nuance in the accent I am missing, but honestly, white Americans and black Americans just all sound like Americans to me (Australian here). Down here in the Land of Oz, people generally all sound the same as long as they were born/raised in Australia, regardless of their ancestry. Sure, there are slight variations in intonation, but that is more due to locale than ethnicity.

If you're saying he sounds too young for his age, then maybe I'd understand your point. But saying he doesn't sound black enough just doesn't seem to make any sense. I'm not being disagreeable, just honestly not getting it.

Edited June 29, 2009 by Starfire

[Brendon 0]

If you're saying he sounds too young for his age, then maybe I'd understand your point. But saying he doesn't sound black enough just doesn't seem to make any sense. I'm not being disagreeable, just honestly not getting it.

I live in New York City, so I'm around a lot of black people, hispanic people, and white people. Since Australia isn't much of a cultural melting pot, you probably will have a harder time telling the difference.

I cannot really explain it. It's not that they always have a deeper tone, but if I'm talking to someone on the phone, I know what race they are, lets put it that way.

Here, this is the best way to put it as well.

[sparks50 0]

You have to applaud them for having a afro-American main character though. I still remember the mod that changed CJs skin to white being by far the most popular mod for GTA San Andreas, even more so than the hot coffee-thing.

[kremator 1064]

Nothing like pigeon-holing different races - WTG !

Seriously catch a grip. IF people reading this have Sound Engineer talents, or voice acting talents or WHATEVER then get making alternatives for us and not whine at what was given. This is an amazing community - lets start sharing.

[Leopardi 0]

He didnt say a'ight or shiiiit enough times?

Marines dont talk like what? They all talk a certain way you mean? like cool with deep voices like in the hollywood movies?

Voices could maybe be better but... Its good enough. Campaign is such a small part of this game if not the smallest.

Alex

One of the biggest complaints is the horrible dialog so it's not small.

[11aTony 0]

Oh man, after switching from Arma1 I love everything that has to do with voice in this game. In A1 it was so poor that I couldnt stand it. Here its so much better that I would say its great actually. After patch of course. Sure Miles could be better but Im fine with it. He dies soon anyway... Queen's Gambit story a bit.

[r71 0]

Going to lmao @ at this when the black guy that did the voice comes on here and ask whats wrong with his voice :p

The campaign was a big deal to me back when OFP came out.... loved it!

Im not willing to discuss this anymore.

And Goatmasters is not wright because there are no goats in Dragon poop, there are goats in Arma II though...

and yes its OFP http://forums.bistudio.com/forumdisplay.php?f=10

[Prydain 1]

The voice acting was shit, nuff said. But the single player is not worth playing in the first place so who really cares?

[sparks50 0]

I liked the campaign despite almost being broken to the point of unplayable. And many others shares my thoughts, so you may want to look around the forum a bit.

[dpolwarth 10]

There is a black voice actor in the game - he does Private Smith, who you meet at the checkpoint in the Manhattan mission.

Except the character private smith looks a white redneck with a black man's voice.

I'm sure there's a moral to this point, but I can't find it.

[Apocal 10]

The issue is less one of race than of the fact that 1SG Miles' voice does not match him at all. His character is not unique in this, but he does stand out as the worst. I heard him talking and was honestly confused as to who was speaking until I reloaded and went through the sequence again, watching his lips move.

[Zeinger 0]

Seriously, Master Sergeant Miles isn't fooling anybody. If you've heard him, you know there's a problem. He's the blackest person in game, with a white computer nerd voice. When I first heard him talking, I thought it was someone else.

If you had looked into your manual you'd noticed that the voice actor for Sgt Miles is named Mamadou Diavando.

So I guess you are pretty wrong about the black-white male voice thing.

Edited July 5, 2009 by Zeinger

[Prydain 1]

So because his name is constructed in a certain way he is black? Wha, how racial...