Possibility of a Silent Protagonist Option?

[moonsglow]

Would it be possible to get a "silent" voice profile for both Operator and Drifter?

I know concerning old Operator voices there's been a lot of back and forth about their lines, and I've seen a lot of opinions leaning negative. But I was actually a big fan of the sound of my character's voice, and even found most of the lines to be appealing from their perspective, having just woken up in a different society. It was exciting getting further in the story, doing harder missions, and hearing the inflection change on different topics, or hearing them gain more confidence in their power.

Honestly, when I first started playing, I kind of got a lot of gender euphoria from crafting the design and getting something that sounded so close to kind of what I tried to train my voice to be. I mean absolutely no shade on the great work the new cast is doing, so I hestitated posting this for quite awhile...but it just doesn't fit for me, anymore, in sound or attitude, and has turned me off from playing as much as I used to.

Now, I love my Drifter and I think he's got a super cool vibe!! I don't have any issues with his sound, but I favor roleplaying most of my journey in the Origin System's regular missions, and many story missions, on the Operator. I'm incredibly excited for the new story drop today, but the previous one was a bit jarring, and took me out of the moment in some places, and while I'll still be playing this update with the exceitment of new lore, I am worried of experiencing the same here, or in future patches, should there be an option to select my Operator. Because there's a fair chance I'll want to where possible.

I want to continue enjoying the voice acting for the rest of the story, and still enjoy selecting my Operator, so I feel a good compromise to handle these feelings, and for anyone else who may still have issues, would be a possible silent profile. I don't really want to specify the profile I was having issues with so as to not come off as disparaging the work of the actor, but can if it is relevant to any further discussion.

Thank you for reading.

[morsecodex]

I think a silent protag option is great- anything that gives us more options and control over the roleplay elements of our characters is something I'm fully in support of. 

[(NSW)MasterMewtwoIwantNeeko]

Well, for normal missions you can already toggle whether the Operator makes comments throughout the missions. I would fear having them mute/silent for story and cutscenes would limit the amount of context you'd have during certain cutscenes, especially where I think Operator frequently communicates through speech and has conversations. Been a while, but quests like New War (especially since the silent choice has to be on Drifter too, if it's on their 'primary' counterpart, and by extension Duviri Paradox) and War Within are probably ones that would need a hefty rework to change most cutscenes accordingly.

...Other than a possible large workload on the devs to make new voice clips and animations to work around one character having a "no talking" option, I wouldn't mind if they decided to go with it.

[moonsglow]

On 2024-08-24 at 1:34 AM, (NSW)MasterMewtwoIwantNeeko said:

Well, for normal missions you can already toggle whether the Operator makes comments throughout the missions.

Oh yeah, totally! For most missions my Operator still has the sound I liked so I keep the sound on. I def don't have an issue with transmissions then. It's mostly the actual cinematic cutscenes for new story content where it's thrown me off the most.

The Jade patch voice lines felt like the biggest departure from the sound and attitude that got me really immersed in playing that character. Since New War I've tried toggling on and off it for later content as you've said, and I've also tried finding another voice for them out of the current options without success...but I can't really predict where they show up in those new quests, and don't really want to look into spoilers for those...plus I'm extremely fond of my Drifter's voice, so I don't really want to mute transmissions overall.  The easiest thing player side I see happening is to have that empty voice added to the voice options.

 

On 2024-08-24 at 1:34 AM, (NSW)MasterMewtwoIwantNeeko said:

...Other than a possible large workload on the devs to make new voice clips and animations to work around one character having a "no talking" option, I wouldn't mind if they decided to go with it.

I don't really need-need to have a lot of work put into it? I'm not looking for extra dubs or alternate languages or anything atm, and I'm certain they went this route because it's what was going to work for their story intent and actor availability. And because this is very personal preference and not a functional issue, I don't really mind whose lip sync they use or the subs for their lines, I just want there to be an option where it routes to an empty sound clip. Operator and Drifter can already set their voices independently, swapping between Falcon, Heron, Raven and Owl freely, so another bird there in those appearance options folks could grab if they so chose. 

But there's merit in what you mentioned now that I'm giving it more thought. If they could update the animations and responses for a silent protag for both Operator and Drifter as "Finch" or something, that'd be pretty incredible and would probably add more appeal for the option for other players. I could see people swapping to it first and then changing to something else if that's how their character develops, or vice-versa.  

I really, really love everything else about the game and want as many resources used into fine tuning or adding to the gameplay and story for everyone. I can still enjoy most bits as is and probably tune it out if it continues being a big issue for me. I did like Lotus Eaters after all. But if this were an easy to add thing, or a value-adding thing for them that were worth the resources, I'd like some thought given to implementing it. It'd definitely make me want to spend more time in game after story quests if the new sound stays much the same on my Operator's current voice.