Annoying Voices

[Didz]

Anyone out there know how to change the annoying American voices the Roman Army have adopted.

I always thought Rome was in Italy anyway?

I'm surprised after MTW with its appropriate latin command acknowledgements that I am bombarded with 'Sir! Yes! Sir!' every five minutes from supposed Roman Legionairies.

Has anyone got an alternative set of sound files or mapped the MTW one onto RTW?

The only problem I had with MTW was the noise it made when you selected a spy or assassin which was so awful it set my teeth on edge. Fortunately, I managed to swap it for the equivalent STW sound file which was much more bearable. Perhaps something similar is possible in this instance too.

[danimal]

Lets swap them for ridiculous G W Bush sound bites.

[Quietus]

Yeah, they copied a lot of phrases from Command & Conquer Red Alert 2.

"Sir, yes sir"
"We're Under Attack"
"Orders?"
"Aye Captain"
"Ship ready" and alot more!!

[Didz]

Bit poor don't you think?

[The Marcher Lord]

Agreed, very poor, all part of the new dumbed down Total War I am afraid. Those voices are really beginning to p*#s me off.

[GFX707]

Yup, I would've taken ANY accent over an american one. Oh well.

[Didz]

Yup, I would've taken ANY accent over an american one. Oh well.

To be fair they're not all American the admiral sounds like an escapee from a poor production of Treasure Island.

[SpencerH]

Some of the voices for the Selucids sound like Chekov from Star Trek.

[Taiko]

Yup, I would've taken ANY accent over an american one. Oh well.

An American accent. Is that even possible when speaking English? I mean, we were the ones who perfected the language. It's everyone else who has an accent.

[Akka]

I agree, the english speech is something quite irritating, especially after the extremely immersive latin from MTW.

And Romans are among the less annoying. Just wait to use the Greeks with their "hoplite" shouted out loud, or their "yes, strrrrrategos" with heavy I-don't-know-what accent.

[jbluvchild]

It be cool if the spoke Latin with English subtitles.
But I guess its going with the latest theme of Historic Based movies with bad english (well british) accents.

[Spino]

Yes, the guy who was cast to do the Roman voices in battle is awful. Whenever I hear his voice my first response is always, "Oh, shut up you whiny gimp!"

Also, as much as I am loathe to admit it but I have come to despise hearing the voice of the man who made Minsc such a joy to hear! His voice is too cartoonish for me to take seriously as the voice of the Seleucids and other N. African/Middle Eastern factions.

I was so hoping CA was going to use a classically trained actor who sounds like Lawrence Olivier to do the Roman voices. I want to envision Olivier in full armor on horseback, not some dopey geek who plays the goofy best friend character in an American network television comedy!

The best voice actor I've ever heard play a Roman was the fellow who did most of the voice work for Caesar II, Impression's city building game. Now that guy had presence! Olivier would be proud... he was great!

"PLEBS ARE NEEDED!!!"

[Oaty]

Personally I think Carthages is horrible. Especially the intor video, the guy's voice sound like he just came out of an assylum and needs to go back

[Mori Gabriel Syme]

I can handle the voice-over for the Roman battles--as long as he doesn't warble, "The Day Is Ou-ou-ours!!!" at the end.

As a side note, I didn't really think of the voices as American until this thread, but I don't have TV & the voices sound nothing like the people I know. I suspect the accent is "American actor generic."

[LittleRaven]

I can handle the guy from Carthage. I can even handle the Romans, though "The day is ooours." does get irritating.

But one of the Greek voices absolutely drives me bonkers. When you drag a ram up to the walls, the guy shouts something like "Our rams have reached the walls!" That's fine. But on the last word he forgets that he's doing the My Big Fat Greek Campaign accent and slips into a British cockney accent. It's just terrible. *sigh*

[Orvis Tertia]

I agree that the "day is ou-ur-s!" line is really terrible. That's the only one that genuinely gets on my nerves. Sure, I'd love to hear Shakespearean actors instead of American-ish voices (and it seems to me there are some Brit-sounding voices in the mix, but I can't think of where specifically). But really, having British voices would be no more relevant to Rome than American. Patrick Stewart and Brian Blessed would have sounded great, though.

At least we didn't get Kevin Costner.

Using the authentic languages would have been way cool.

The voices on the strategic map remind me of Civilization Call to Power, which was a horrible game, but it was put out by Activision, so I wonder if there is some direct connection...

I am soooo glad that they didn't do to the Total War series what Activision did to Civilization with that horrible Call to Power. But much of the strategic map looks like they borrowed some of what (little) was good about Call to Power.

[solypsist]

I got used to the voices, so they don't bug me. But the spy/assassin voices on the campaign map remind too much of Command and Conquer (who also spoke similarly when you moved them on the RTS map). So I agree with whoever also said C&C.
As for the American accents, well....traditionally in the movies the Romans have always had Brit accents; it's too bad Activision couldn't splurge to get David Bowie to do the voices of the commanders.

I'm surprised after MTW with its appropriate latin command acknowledgements that I am bombarded with 'Sir! Yes! Sir!' every five minutes from supposed Roman Legionairies.

[metatron]

To the walls!

[GFX707]

An American accent. Is that even possible when speaking English? I mean, we were the ones who perfected the language. It's everyone else who has an accent.

If by perfected you mean completely destroyed then yes. There's a different forum for that kind of discussion, though, Im sure.

A nice classical English accent would have been fine for the Romans.

but oh no, we have to get "Wassup my brotha, da enemy general be dead ho"

[GFX707]

I agree, the english speech is something quite irritating, especially after the extremely immersive latin from MTW.

And Romans are among the less annoying. Just wait to use the Greeks with their "hoplite" shouted out loud, or their "yes, strrrrrategos" with heavy I-don't-know-what accent.

Sorry I'm just curious....is it hop-lit-ay?

[ElmarkOFear]

I got used to the voices, so they don't bug me.

Solypsists: Why doesn't that surprise me? Sounds like your mental health sessions are finally working! hehe

When I read the title I thought it was about someone's young children yelling in the background while they were trying to concentrate on the making thier next moves.

Either that or about the girlfriends/wives yelling at them to; "GET OFF THE PC AND PAY ATTENTION TO ME!"

[frogbeastegg]

I have dubbed one of the Roman voices 'Bruce the Fake Australian'. Victoria gave me a nasty shock when I first heard her talk. Based on the Res Romanae I had been imagining her with a cut glass English accent which tends ever so slightly to sarcasm ... er, no she's a posh Australian.

The Roman victory in battle voice makes me wince, a teenaged boy "the day is :voice breaks and soars: ours!". I think half the middle eastern factions sound like dodgy carpet salesmen, "hey, you wanna buy carrrrrpit, no? Is fine carrrpit, yis?"

I think the worst overall belongs to a barbarian warband unit. I saw them in my Julii game, stood under missile fire, 23 people died in two volleys, and I heard :pulls the deepest, most gravelly male imitation voice her froggy vocals will allow: "We're under attaaaaaack!!!" Gosh, you don't say. I annialated that unit, just to shut the nasty voice up.

I miss Sean Pertwee.

[Tricky Lady]

I agree that the "day is ou-ur-s!" line is really terrible. That's the only one that genuinely gets on my nerves.

Re: "The day is ours!"

I bet they hired the same actor who does also Grampa Simpson's voice.

[Didz]

To be honest I got the impression that many of the voice clips used had been stolen from other games like Command & Conquer.

Considering the quaility of the rest of the game its a sad situation that they couldn't be bothered to put a bit of effort into the voices.

Has anyone investigated the feasibility of modding them from MTW?

[R'as al Ghul]

I didn't have any "latin" voices in MTW since I own the german version.
The same in RTW, german voices but also annoying ones.
What's the most horrible for me is the constant feedback of the units on the campaign map. Mrs al Ghul keeps shouting "Aye Sir" and "We can't go on" (their german counterparts of course) from the other room everytime I touch a ship. The agents sound a lot like AoE while the armies keep shouting "Herr" with a million "r" (meaning Master/Lord).
The more armies and agents I move, the more I tune down the sound.

R'as

[The_Emperor]

That barbarian "We're under attaaack!" sounds too funny to me... I almost expect the Gauls to start shouting "Zug Zug, Daaboo" or "Stop poking meee!".

[Didz]

I didn't have any "latin" voices in MTW since I own the german version.

That's weird why would they edit the latin voices out MTW for the German market. After all I don't speak latin either, have German's got something against latin as a classical language?

[Beirut]

I guess they did the voives at 3AM and the janitor and his family were the only ones available to speak the lines.

[DisruptorX]

The romans have the best voice acting in RTW. That said, it still isn't pretty.
But the worst are the greeks and the like. They sound like the frenchman from monty python's Holy Grail "I blow my nose at you".

Whenever you win a battle with the Romans, though, you get to hear the guy's voice crack as has been said. The day is ou-*cracks*-rs.

The voice acting in MTW was just as bad, but the difference was that, in MTW, you heard it very rarely.

That said, there are MUCH more important issues regarding core gameplay problems that should be fixed before the voices.

[Soulflame]

Well, at least the units can't get weird if you click them too much. Would have been odd if one of the peasant troops just said "We found the witch! May we buuun her?" or "YOU'RE the king? Well I didn't vote for you" .