Bethesda games are always so big in scope, in almost every aspect except voice lines. Notoriously, each Bethesda game only has a handful of actors for its NPCs, so you end up hearing a lot of characters that sound exactly alike to each other and often repeat the same lines.
Skyrim is one of the main offenders, with players long complaining about the lack of voice diversity in the game. Now a modder is doing something about it – and it doesn't involve using AI. No, Nexus Mods users are having a hard time recruiting new voice actors to bring NPCs around Skyrim to life, giving the world some much needed diversity.
Skyrim Revoiced will add new voice acting to Skyrim
As you can hear in the video, the Skyrim Revoiced project is well underway. Here we get a preview of some of the NPCs that now have unique voice actors, helping to set them apart from other NPCs dotted around the map.
Modder spdude has created a similar mod before, Skyrim Vocal Diversity. But these new voice lines were generated with AI, so understandably many players would want to avoid it. With Skyrim Revoiced, we can see that spdude has made an effort to cast new actors, making it feel much more human. The mod creator says it should change the voices of 50 NPCs, and they expect the mod to be ready for download soon.
At least Bethesda seems to be aware that the lack of voice diversity in their games is a problem. Oblivion Remastered actually fixed this by adding more voice actors to the game, so now each race is played by a unique actor. You still have the problem of the main characters in the main story sounding exactly like your average trader, but at least it brings Oblivion up to par with modern Bethesda games. So hopefully The Elder Scrolls 6 brings even more variety. Bethesda really had time to get the actors in the booth…
In the meantime, this work from spdude and the actors they collaborated with is impressing Skyrim fans. It's really wild to see what this community is capable of so far after launch.
- Released
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November 11, 2011
- ESRB
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M for Mature: Use of alcohol, blood and grime, intense violence, sexual themes
- Engine
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Creation
- Expansions
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Skyrim: Dragonborn, Skyrim: Hearthfire, Skyrim: Dawnguard
