Speaking units, recommended

[Darth Fool]

I don't see size as the problem. Any implementation of this would have to not crash wesnoth even if the sound files weren't present, so it would be easy enough to have the speach files distributed seperately. Size is a red herring. Also, coding the ability to do this is not really a problem. The big problem is content. Getting good sounds for existing units attacks and defenses is hard enough. Getting a good recording of a good voice actor doing a voice over of all the text for a given character is hard. If we had such a set of recordings, I can virtually guarantee that the code would be written to enable it. People who are interested in moving this project forward should pick a character and start recording and posting samples. Or, for an easier more gradual start, pick some existing units that don't have sounds for their attack or when they get hit and make some recordings. So I guess what I am saying is, put your mouth where your keyboard is.

[Aleksi]

When i talked about size i wasn't thinking of Wesnoth's stability as an application. There where talks of putting music as an "extra pack" to limit size. It seems like there are still quite a few people using 56k modems out there. Thats the problem...

[Redeth]

Well, you could have the 'core' files with a few basic sounds and music, and then the optional music-pack and speech-pack add-ons, similar to what these guys offer:

http://www.agdinteractive.com/KQ2.php

[Darth Fool]

When i talked about size i wasn't thinking of Wesnoth's stability as an application. There where talks of putting music as an "extra pack" to limit size. It seems like there are still quite a few people using 56k modems out there. Thats the problem...

That is what I was addressing. I don't think it is a problem because I think that if there were a serious # of speach files, they would have to be delivered as an optional download, not as part of the main distribution. I don't think doing this complicates the necessary coding to enable the speach at all. Therefore, I don't consider the size of the files a problem. If they get too big they will be distributed as an extra download. As I said, the real problem is getting content that we would want to distribute in the first place.

[shevegen]

The 56k people will get less and less over the coming years.
Recently my town announced that it will provide glass fibre for EVERY house within the town. (Its a project that will take years, but its an announcement that will be realized over the next coming years.)

Frankly, I believe the 56k people should not hinder development. After all, they can get the reduced version of wesnoth anyways.

[Aleksi]

The 56k people will get less and less over the coming years.
Recently my town announced that it will provide glass fibre for EVERY house within the town. (Its a project that will take years, but its an announcement that will be realized over the next coming years.)

Frankly, I believe the 56k people should not hinder development. After all, they can get the reduced version of wesnoth anyways.

I said that because that was the answer i got from the lead devellopers two years ago when we already discussed the project. But i'm fine with it. If i could, i would put my music in aiff!

[sophie]

Well, you could have the 'core' files with a few basic sounds and music, and then the optional music-pack and speech-pack add-ons, similar to what these guys offer:

http://www.agdinteractive.com/KQ2.php

That's what I'm talkin about.

[Airk]

Based on the quality of the voices in many commericial titles, getting people who can say this stuff without sounding like complete idiots is -way- harder than any technical hurdles the developers may need to jump through.

[Viliam]

I think there would be no problem if voices are downloaded separately. The WML should simply say "play this OGG file", and if the file is there it will be played, if it is not there nothing happens. So if I download the voice, I will have them, and even if my voice files are a few versions behing the code, some units will speak, and the others will not. The voice information should only be an addition to written text, so whether I hear the voice or not, I receive the same information.

The localization would be a huge amount of work, but I think it is not necessary. If someone wants to translate the voices, OK, but I as a player absolutely would not mind hearing the voice in English as long as I see the dialog texts in Slovak. The voice simply adds to the feeling of the game.


For the beginning I suggest making some "general voices", instead of real dialogs (less work; faster done; and we can add dialogs later). For example less important units could simply always say the same thing, when they appear in dialog. (Just like in Warcraft, a clicked unit always says the same phrase; different unit types say different phrases.) Important campaign units could have 3-5 phrases with different moods, for example: normal speach, question, "attack!" exclamation. So the goal of voice is not to tell the story, but rather to make an accoustic addition to unit image in dialog box.

There could be 2 voice packages later - the general sounds, and the real dialog speech. If player downloads whole speech, one gets higher quality with more MBs; if one downloads the general sounds only, one gets lower quality with less MBs; and without voices playing is possible too. The WML tag should provide more voice options, and the best one found should be played. For example:

Code: Select all

[message]
  description=Konrad
  message= _ "Master Delfador! Look, there are Orcs coming from all directions! What shall we do?"
  voice=httt0001.ogg, konrad_question.ogg
[/message]
[message]
  description=Delfador
  message= _ "There are too many to fight, far too many. We must escape!"
  voice=httt0002.ogg, delfador_normal.ogg
[/message]
[message]
  description=Konrad
  message= _ "But to where? This is the only home we have! What about the Elves?"
  voice=httt0003.ogg, konrad_question.ogg
[/message]

So for example in the first sentence program tries to play the sound file "httt0001.ogg" (the real speech "Master Delfador! Look, there are Orcs coming from all directions! What shall we do?") if it exists; if it does not exist, program tries to play "konrad_question.ogg" (some all-purpose question, e.g. "What now?"); and if it does not exist, there is no voice.

The "general voice package" would contain some 100 phrases like "konrad_normal.ogg", "konrad_question.ogg", "konrad_attack.ogg" (the most frequest actions of Konrad), etc for other characters. The "perfect voice package" would contain 10000 phrases "httt0001.ogg" to "httt9999.ogg", and would probably never be completed, but still nice to have if one does not mind downloading a big file.

[TimothyP]

If we get into voices, then we'll need ambient environmental sound effects as well. Voices without sound effects would sound a bit goofy, I think. We would need nature sounds, or battle sounds, or something. Depending on the scene in the game. If you've ever seen something like this done without ambient sound effects you know what I'm talking about. Very cheesy.

So, what I'm saying is, if we're going to do part, we would really need to do whole. Otherwise it might seem kind of weird.

--Timothy

[Aleksi]

If we get into voices, then we'll need ambient environmental sound effects as well. Voices without sound effects would sound a bit goofy, I think. We would need nature sounds, or battle sounds, or something. Depending on the scene in the game. If you've ever seen something like this done without ambient sound effects you know what I'm talking about. Very cheesy.

So, what I'm saying is, if we're going to do part, we would really need to do whole. Otherwise it might seem kind of weird.

--Timothy

Yes, you are very right! And its a huge work for all these sounds to be made... i'm not quite sure how this is possible... if we really want to make it good.

[TimothyP]

Well, I'm 100% composer so I'm not sure how useful I would be on effects. I'm no sound expert. Good luck to everyone who knows what they're doing with this stuff!

--Timothy

[Dave]

IMHO what would be cool is if e.g. when a unit is clicked on or moved they say something, but in our own, made-up language. Elves would speak one language, humans another, orcs another, and so forth.

David

[Jetrel]

IMHO what would be cool is if e.g. when a unit is clicked on or moved they say something, but in our own, made-up language. Elves would speak one language, humans another, orcs another, and so forth.

David

Actually, that's the very thing, although I'm not going to go about making up languages myself when a certain tolkien fellow already made some perfectly good ones for the elves et al. I've seen commercial and shareware games use tolkien's languages before, so I doubt there's any legal problem there. The reason tolkien's made-up languages worked was because they were constructed like proper languages - linguistics was the man's specialty, and his languages actually had substance. I strongly urge against just pulling something out of our collective butt. I do, however, agree with this idea.


The biggest problem that we have is that we have dozens of user languages for our game. To make voiceovers for one is a task with dubious success. To attempt to make voiceovers for all of them is preposterous. The realization I came to, whilst watching some subtitled animé shows, was that we don't have to. Material in a foreign language can easily be just as moving, if not moreso, than material in your native language so long is it is "translated" to the native language well. The most important thing is to have proper intonation; to accurately depict the emotion in your voice. That's a universal, and potent quality.

We would need a somewhat universal language - something no one speaks anymore. It can't be the native speech of any of our players, or some demographic is going to laugh at it. It would also help if this language conjured up the air of an age with technology and culture appropriate to our game. It would also help if everyone could reference and use this language.


Latin. For the humans, it's perfect. It's a REAL LANGUAGE, with valid structure and meaning. It fits the timeframe/setting, we already have everything translated to it, and it's something that all of our contributors can access equally. Even japanese people could contribute sound recordings in latin, and verify the quality of them.

And it'd be pretty f'ing unique, I daresay - I don't know of many games that have been done with latin voiceovers.

It would also have the benefit of attracting "classics" geeks from all over to help out. They'd probably be happy to help, as I suspect they'd think it was awesome.

[Dave]

Actually, that's the very thing, although I'm not going to go about making up languages myself when a certain tolkien fellow already made some perfectly good ones for the elves et al. I've seen commercial and shareware games use tolkien's languages before, so I doubt there's any legal problem there.

I believe you're right -- I believe it's been decided that a language can't be copyrighted. I think using Quenya for the Elves would work nicely.

And it'd be pretty f'ing unique, I daresay - I don't know of many games that have been done with latin voiceovers.

Actually there is one I know of: Civilization 4. They actually did something very cool: units of the Civilization you've chosen speak in their native language. If you're the English, your units speak in English. If you're Chinese, they speak in Chinese, and yes, if you're the Romans, they speak in Latin. It's very very cool.

And yes, we could do it too -- the humans in particular could speak in Latin.

Now we just need the right combination of talented voice actors and linguistics.

David