Best voice acting.
The Mass Effect Series. When I first watched my husband play it, he did so with the male Shepherd, and I thought his voice was okay. Then I watched it with Fem Shep and oh my lord, Jennifer Hale. There’s just no comparison. How anyone could play that game without picking Fem Shep is just beyond me. Not that the guy is terrible, but her voice acting is just far more superior.
The entirety of the series is just peppered with amazing voice acting. I mean they got Michael Dorn to voice a krogan and Marina Sirtis as Matriarch Benezia (an asari). There’s also Claudia Black as one of the quarian admirals. I’m not as familiar with her unfortunately, but her voice is gorgeous. There are parts of the games I go back to just for the sole purpose of hearing certain lines, because they’re that good. The people they tapped for voice work were just perfect matches for whom they were portraying in the situations they found themselves. Absolutely brilliant.
What game do you think has the best voice acting? Who is your favorite voice actor in a game?
The Shameful Narcissist Speaks 
Dragon Age: Inquisition and Mass Effect 2 had great voice acting, but there were a few duds in them (mostly NPCs). I’d give it to Gone Home.
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BioWare just knows how to find the good voice actors. Gone Home…ah! Yes, I knew it sounded familiar. One of the many on my backlog. I’m glad I have awesome voice acting to look forward to.
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I prefer Google’s voice to Siri’s any day. Google answers questions with concrete conviction whereas Apple’s effort vacillates ‘twixt intellectually foolish and ineffectual foppery. I think I’ll leave it at that. 🙂
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I don’t think I’ve ever heard Google’s voice! I’ve heard Siri quite often and even Cortana.
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Google is smarter (in my experience).
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The Google knows all!
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Just in terms of its ability to respond meaningfully to natural language. I mean, I studied AI at Uni and my final project was writing something like this myself, so I know how hard that is. ‘OK Google’ just continues to amaze me.
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OMG Yes. I loved the voice acting in Mass Effect. And every time I hear Claudia Black’s voice I just… *sigh.* She’s also Matriarch Aethyta (Liara’s father), Morrigan in Dragon Age, Artemis in God of War, and I think she was in one of the Uncharteds. She also played Aeryn Sun in Farscape and Vala Mal Doran in Stargate SG-1. No, I’m not a fan, why are you asking?
Anyway, yes, Jennifer Hale is wonderful. She was my pick, too 😉
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My top 3 voice actors are:
Ali Hillis – For obvious reasons.
Ashly Burch – For masterfully bringing Aloy to life in HZD.
Roger Craig Smith – For being the amazing Italian voice of Ezio Auditore in the Assassin’s Creed games (my third favourite video game character). I almost fainted when I found out he also did misc. voices for Final Fantasy XIII, haha.
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Patrick Stewart
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Did he voice act in a game?? That wasn’t a Star Trek one? I can’t remember if he’s done any other games, but hell yeah! I love Sir Patrick. Captain Picard is my favorite heroic character, and that man’s voice is just amazing.
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Lands of Lore, Castlevania Lords of Shadow series, Forgotten Realms Demon Stone, off the top of my head. He’s done a bunch.
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*puts on list*
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Witcher e for me!
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Damn phone… Witcher 3
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I’m the opposite. I prefer Male Shep’s voice over Fem Shep. If I had to choose a game with the best voice acting I’d have to give it to The Witcher 2, and 3 followed very closely by the Mass Effect series.
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Half-Life 2, for me – it’s very natural and believable. I generally find most voice acting in video games is awful, but Valve delivered big time with its big old masterpiece there.
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Natural and believable is exactly what voice acting should be. I think it’s improved over the years and will hopefully continue to get better! I should check out Half Life at some point. I certainly hear enough about it.
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Half-Life 2 is definitely the one to go for – it’s one of, if not the, best games I’ve ever played. It’s super cheap on Steam, so I encourage you to give it a whirl, if you like sci-fi FPS games!
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You grabbed me with “sci-fi,” but alas I’m not a fan of FPS. I can always watch a Let’s Play though 😊
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I’m not a FPS fan, either. This is the greatest FPS of all time, though, so I dived in and I found it to be one the greatest video games evs. ‘sup to you, of course! I’m not trying to trick you into playing it, but if you don’t you’ll owe me £5, FYI.
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You know I wasn’t a huge sci-fi fan at first either. Ack that’s like $10!! 😋
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Okay, we’ll call it evens at $1.
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Someone just reminded me about Portal, so I now have to eat crow. There’s ALWAYS that exception to the rule.
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While I’m not necessarily a fan of the game, The Last of Us had great voice acting.
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I was warned that it could easily make me cry (not that that’s too difficult).
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I totally agree with you about female Sheppard. I actually never got to hear the male lol.
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He’s not awful, but he’s no Fem Shep!
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I love voice actors – it’s kind of a hobby of mine to go to cons and meet them. One of my personal favorites is definitely Charles Martinet as Mario, just because he is the one of the nicest and happiest people I have ever met. As far as a fully voiced game though, I like the voice acting that goes into anime games like the Tales series and adventure games like The Walking Dead and Life is Strange. There’s constant talking that propels the story in those games, which is why I value the voice acting there so much more.
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I saw your article about that! I love when celebrities are awesome people. It makes me feel even better about liking them, as opposed to when they’re not so nice, but I enjoy their work. I usually still can, but it’s a bummer.
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Awesome, thank you! I’ve always been fascinated with voice actors since I was a kid watching them in Pokemon. I never knew that I’d get to meet them one day, and that most of them would be very cool and down-to-earth! I think it’s because they voice anime and games and not bigger profile works like western cartoons. Not to say that the bigger actors aren’t nice, but they charge premiums for autographs and photos whereas anime voice actors will do it for free. Thing is, they could charge. Some do, but most refuse to so they can serve their adoring fans.
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I hate how you have to pay to get a picture with the bigger names 😦 It’s not even up to them either. I think it’s something their agents or someone set up, because they know fans will pay. it kind of stinks.
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Stan Lee was at a con near me. His last year there. Cost $100 just to see him. Never saw him. 😦
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Some are like upwards of $300! It’s pretty ridiculous. I wanted to see Tom Hiddleston at Wizard World in Philly, but you had to buy a package deal, and it was like $300
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Oh! Speaking of which, I’m going to meet the English voice of Barret tomorrow. I’m so excited! I thought you might like that. XD
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o.O :O Omg, that’s amazing! I hope you’ll write a post about that!!
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I’ll hopefully be writing on voice actors I’ve been meeting lately! I met him today (Beau Billingslea) and he’s a nice guy! Very mellow and happy to talk to fans!
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