I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent...
I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Ehm? Tolkien Ehm..?
You do realize he was a linguist and just about every high-fantasy streotype is based on LotR yes?
I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent...
I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
Agree, stereotyping american black accents as gangsta homeboy is "politically incorrect" while doing the same with "evil and snooty" birtish accents and "effete and perverse" french ones (etc etc) is somehow ok. Another not-so-subtle example of casual american cultural imperialism. (Or yankee imperialism to be more precise, southern yahoos and texan cowboys get the same treatment. Only the yanks are allowed to be three-dimensiona human beings)
Not entirely true, both East Coast and West Coast Americans are generally above stereotyping, so it isn't just yankees as you put it.
The English accent on Imperials in the original film is largely a legacy of the majority of the "extras" being local hires, as it was primarily filmed in the UK at Pinewoods. If you analyse the major actors from the original films you will find that there is minimal type-casting, most of the Imperials weren't roles worthy of noticeable hires, they've just become larger than the role intended over time.
I'm actually happy to hear more than just American accents in the game, it doesn't happen often enough, with the exception of the Russian bad guys a lot of FPS games have.
I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent...
I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Ehm? Tolkien Ehm..?
You do realize he was a linguist and just about every high-fantasy streotype is based on LotR yes?
I missed the part where Dwarves were Scottish in the books... Are you getting confused with the movies?
The dwarvish language Tolkien created had nothing to do with Gaelic even... it has more to do with Jewish. Even the Cirth (the runes) were invented by the elves and only adopted by the dwarves.
In fact, the Jewish theme runs strongly through Tolkien's dwarves; 'According to the 2007 book The History of the Hobbit, Tolkien was now influenced by his own selective reading of medieval texts regarding the Jewish people and their history.[5] The dwarves' characteristics of being dispossessed of their homeland (the Lonely Mountain, their ancestral home, is the goal the exiled Dwarves seek to reclaim), and living among other groups whilst retaining their own culture are all derived from the medieval image of Jews,[5][6] whilst their warlike nature stems from accounts in the Hebrew Bible.[5] Medieval views of Jews also saw them as having a propensity for making well-crafted and beautiful things'
Well, I'm from Barcelona, Spain and don´t feel that BW is attacking us for using EU accents for the Evilish Side. In fact we have been, Europeans, the most expansive and greedy civilization in History, so that We have something in return: the view of the Old Colonies on us is not the good We´d wish. (I speak Queens English as well. East Anglia purests).
Loke666, Dwarves with Scottish Dialect is really weird for me, too. They should have their dialogues in Gaelic, translated to Average English in the Text window. It´d be a real deep feature. But well, MMO's have not a very, let's say real or at least moderate, if so... interest in culture.
i think it would have been better if the republic had the brit voices,we make the best baddies lol..heck we have the best actors in the world anyways.
Apparently we do if Hugh Laurie fools Americans into thinking he's an american!
I can't watch House; I've seen far too much 'Fry & Laurie' & 'Jeeves & Wooster' to take the american accent seriously.
I was amazed to find James Marsters from Buffy wasn't a brit though, so I'm not claiming any kind of superior fake accent-spotting ability here!
As an Englishman, I like that the Imperials have British (mainly English to be fair) accents (if not dialects - there are an awful lot of americanisms that get dropped in that grate terribly), it is a stereotype, but it's bloody good shorthand; and as a common northerner, I have just as much dislike for English upperclass poncy tw*ts as the next man.
Bioware completely missed the established Star Wars lore for accents.
British accents are not "Imperial" like Bioware would tell you in their bad game. They're accents that are meant to be attached to natives from Coruscant.
Just like Twi'leks are supposed to have French accents. Which they of course do not in this game.
They got it wrong, and infact... made it quite insulting as well.
Most amusing thing about this is that BW did it the same way in KOTOR - so nice try with the "bad game" reference, but again you're trying to jump on the "It's cool to hate SWTOR" bandwagon when this way of doing the accents was in one the most popular and best loved RPGs of all time...
I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent... I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Warhammer dwarfs are yorkshiremen not Scottish, region of England famous for mining and a gruff no nonsence attitude. Half the warhammer dwarf mentality can be put down to the monty python sketch where the 4 yorkshiremen try to out yorkshire each other. Wow dwarfs are Scottish though
I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent...
I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Warhammer dwarfs are yorkshiremen not Scottish, region of England famous for mining and a gruff no nonsence attitude. Half the warhammer dwarf mentality can be put down to the monty python sketch where the 4 yorkshiremen try to out yorkshire each other. Wow dwarfs are Scottish though
I think the Scottish accent is merely a convenience. In most literature dwarves are from mountainous regions, highlands and frequently the author gives them a Scottish accents (appropriate for a highlander) to distinguish them.
It is sufficiently memorable that people just assume all dwarves are Scottish, where in fact, few really are. Warcraft is one of a very few audio sources where they do highlight the Scottish accent, most don't.
I can understand why they do it like this, people from different parts of the universe should have different accents but it is annoying that the good guys always have the American accent...
I am more confused about the fact that dwarves usually have a Scottish dialect in games... That makes little sense to me (I could understand if they sounded Welsh since there are plenty of miners from there but Scottish?).
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Warhammer dwarfs are yorkshiremen not Scottish, region of England famous for mining and a gruff no nonsence attitude. Half the warhammer dwarf mentality can be put down to the monty python sketch where the 4 yorkshiremen try to out yorkshire each other. Wow dwarfs are Scottish though
I actually had them, in my mind, as Norse, but I can see where your coming from
I always just assumed that for most folk the jump from Norse to Scottish was small enough to cause the confusion (indeed, I think the Norse settled Scotland pretty heavily and grew into the Norse-Gaels).
The idea that half the Imperial military on Dromund Kass is from Wales and Lancashire always seemed quite amusing to me.
Just to note, the IA accent is what you might call, 'BBC English', i.e. it's pronounced correctly but is suppose to sound neutral and without any regional inflections. It's how someone might sound if they went to private school here and spent some time boarding rather then there from a posh family. There's a difference, maybe not noticeable to anyone from outside however :P
To answer your question, It doesn't bother me, although I do agree the Jedi Knight male voice does sound like a dork, (even more dorking then Male Shephard). I think Europeans in general are used to VA with American accents from American games, especially for the protagonist. There hardly going to change it when the language is similar. I think it's interesting, especially on the Imperial side, how many different accents there are compared to the Republic side. I don't think though the accents have any lasting impact on whether you enjoy the story or not.
I've found the Imperial side to be more to my taste but maybe thats just because I'm evil rather then I have a thing for people from Manchester :P
From the first time i saw Star Wars I always thought the Imperials were fasioned from the German army from the World wars. the colour of the uniforms even the imperial badge somehow to me anyway says german!.
From the first time i saw Star Wars I always thought the Imperials were fasioned from the German army from the World wars. the colour of the uniforms even the imperial badge somehow to me anyway says german!.
Lucas drew influences from lots of places, I don't think anyone other than him could say for definite what anything anywhere is based on. And we know he won't because he likes Star Wars to stand on its own merits, rather than be compared to things that went before.
In fact, it often takes a great actor to play a convincing villain, and so in a way it's often an acknowledgement of the excellent talent we export in that area.
It definitely is a compliment. Something that I've always noted and that my girlfriend recently brought up is that there are a lot of great actors from across the pond.
Must be something in the water.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I love the voice acting, specially the Bounty Hunter one which is the class I play, it reminds me of the actor for the character Garrett from the thief series.
In fact, it often takes a great actor to play a convincing villain, and so in a way it's often an acknowledgement of the excellent talent we export in that area.
It definitely is a compliment. Something that I've always noted and that my girlfriend recently brought up is that there are a lot of great actors from across the pond.
Must be something in the water.
It's because to become involved in US movies as a European you generally have to be a very good actor, while as an NA citizen it's enough to just look to Hollywood standards while having the acting talent of a brick wall.
In fact, it often takes a great actor to play a convincing villain, and so in a way it's often an acknowledgement of the excellent talent we export in that area.
It definitely is a compliment. Something that I've always noted and that my girlfriend recently brought up is that there are a lot of great actors from across the pond.
Must be something in the water.
It's because to become involved in US movies as a European you generally have to be a very good actor, while as an NA citizen it's enough to just look to Hollywood standards while having the acting talent of a brick wall.
I'm not even talking about US movies. I've seen plenty of foreign movies where the Europeans are just good. There are too many US "actors" who are actors because they look good and therefore think they can act.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I am an Englishman and will confess to being relatively well spoken. My Italian gamer friends joke its "like the perfect english they learned in school", never sure if that is good or not!
I am not offended I am simply bemused by all of this. I know USA and the UK have had our share of wars, you won the whole War of Independence and we burnt down the Whitehouse, stopped your invasion of Canada and won the war of 1812 (debateable). But why are we still the villains? Its been 200 years since 1812! It does make me chuckle though to hear the different regional dialects spoken by the Empire.
Sadly I play republic and am forced to listen to an American accent (Kills all immersion immediately) and fight people with a fellow English accent. It shouldn't make a difference to game enjoyment but sadly it does. Like an itch or ache that won't quite go away...
I'm American, but I had a hard time accepting the dorky way all the Jedi speak. The voice doesn't at all look like my character (I tried to make him look like Michael Jordan...lol).
My best friend is black - he made a black character and felt the exact same way. He thought none of the voices sounded 'right' or even close for his character and thus the voiced player character was actually offputting to him.
Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
I'm American, but I had a hard time accepting the dorky way all the Jedi speak. The voice doesn't at all look like my character (I tried to make him look like Michael Jordan...lol).
My best friend is black - he made a black character and felt the exact same way. He thought none of the voices sounded 'right' or even close for his character and thus the voiced player character was actually offputting to him.
Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"
I'm American, but I had a hard time accepting the dorky way all the Jedi speak. The voice doesn't at all look like my character (I tried to make him look like Michael Jordan...lol).
My best friend is black - he made a black character and felt the exact same way. He thought none of the voices sounded 'right' or even close for his character and thus the voiced player character was actually offputting to him.
Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all.
are you taht sensible that cant hear / read the word black or dark skinned without getting offended and call one racist? i may be white but im from the caribbean, i got black family members and in the caribbean nobody gets offended by talking that way unless its an insult. Just making it clear
the people i quoted in my post actually made sense. Voice overs should have accents by region instead of factions
Yeah defintiely nice link, I was lucking for this... didn't think to look here.
One of my mates and me are both Brits living in Texas. We generally laugh at the the accent, for me it's just as funny to speak to an Imperial soldier with a Geordie acccent as it is to speak to a Twilek criminal with a New Jersey accent, I like my BH handlers southern US accent. I like my Sith Inquisitors accent and also my Bounty Hunter.
To add to what the another poster said, Brits generally get cast in both evil and non-American roles so they sound foreign,
I'm American, but I had a hard time accepting the dorky way all the Jedi speak. The voice doesn't at all look like my character (I tried to make him look like Michael Jordan...lol).
My best friend is black - he made a black character and felt the exact same way. He thought none of the voices sounded 'right' or even close for his character and thus the voiced player character was actually offputting to him.
Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all.
Going forward, any British people of African decent shall be hence forth known as Britanicus-Africana.... happy now?
Originally posted by rojo6934 Originally posted by GMan3
Originally posted by rojo6934
Originally posted by DeaconX
Originally posted by TROLL_HARD
I'm American, but I had a hard time accepting the dorky way all the Jedi speak. The voice doesn't at all look like my character (I tried to make him look like Michael Jordan...lol).
My best friend is black - he made a black character and felt the exact same way. He thought none of the voices sounded 'right' or even close for his character and thus the voiced player character was actually offputting to him. Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter. i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all. are you taht sensible that cant hear / read the word black or dark skinned without getting offended and call one racist? i may be white but im from the caribbean, i got black family members and in the caribbean nobody gets offended by talking that way unless its an insult. Just making it clear the people i quoted in my post actually made sense. Voice overs should have accents by region instead of factions
Wow. That would be pretty expensive. I mean even more expensive that it already was. It would be cool to pick your avatar's voice though.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Comments
Ehm? Tolkien Ehm..?
You do realize he was a linguist and just about every high-fantasy streotype is based on LotR yes?
i think it would have been better if the republic had the brit voices,we make the best baddies lol..heck we have the best actors in the world anyways.
Not entirely true, both East Coast and West Coast Americans are generally above stereotyping, so it isn't just yankees as you put it.
The English accent on Imperials in the original film is largely a legacy of the majority of the "extras" being local hires, as it was primarily filmed in the UK at Pinewoods. If you analyse the major actors from the original films you will find that there is minimal type-casting, most of the Imperials weren't roles worthy of noticeable hires, they've just become larger than the role intended over time.
I'm actually happy to hear more than just American accents in the game, it doesn't happen often enough, with the exception of the Russian bad guys a lot of FPS games have.
I missed the part where Dwarves were Scottish in the books... Are you getting confused with the movies?
The dwarvish language Tolkien created had nothing to do with Gaelic even... it has more to do with Jewish. Even the Cirth (the runes) were invented by the elves and only adopted by the dwarves.
In fact, the Jewish theme runs strongly through Tolkien's dwarves; 'According to the 2007 book The History of the Hobbit, Tolkien was now influenced by his own selective reading of medieval texts regarding the Jewish people and their history.[5] The dwarves' characteristics of being dispossessed of their homeland (the Lonely Mountain, their ancestral home, is the goal the exiled Dwarves seek to reclaim), and living among other groups whilst retaining their own culture are all derived from the medieval image of Jews,[5][6] whilst their warlike nature stems from accounts in the Hebrew Bible.[5] Medieval views of Jews also saw them as having a propensity for making well-crafted and beautiful things'
"
(quoting wikipedia for speed)
Well, I'm from Barcelona, Spain and don´t feel that BW is attacking us for using EU accents for the Evilish Side. In fact we have been, Europeans, the most expansive and greedy civilization in History, so that We have something in return: the view of the Old Colonies on us is not the good We´d wish. (I speak Queens English as well. East Anglia purests).
Loke666, Dwarves with Scottish Dialect is really weird for me, too. They should have their dialogues in Gaelic, translated to Average English in the Text window. It´d be a real deep feature. But well, MMO's have not a very, let's say real or at least moderate, if so... interest in culture.
It is a question of fangs.
Apparently we do if Hugh Laurie fools Americans into thinking he's an american!
I can't watch House; I've seen far too much 'Fry & Laurie' & 'Jeeves & Wooster' to take the american accent seriously.
I was amazed to find James Marsters from Buffy wasn't a brit though, so I'm not claiming any kind of superior fake accent-spotting ability here!
As an Englishman, I like that the Imperials have British (mainly English to be fair) accents (if not dialects - there are an awful lot of americanisms that get dropped in that grate terribly), it is a stereotype, but it's bloody good shorthand; and as a common northerner, I have just as much dislike for English upperclass poncy tw*ts as the next man.
/edit
fixing the bally spelling, what.
Most amusing thing about this is that BW did it the same way in KOTOR - so nice try with the "bad game" reference, but again you're trying to jump on the "It's cool to hate SWTOR" bandwagon when this way of doing the accents was in one the most popular and best loved RPGs of all time...
I think this has it's roots in Warhammer Loke, and then picked up by Warcraft... from there I think it just became jut how it is.
Warhammer dwarfs are yorkshiremen not Scottish, region of England famous for mining and a gruff no nonsence attitude. Half the warhammer dwarf mentality can be put down to the monty python sketch where the 4 yorkshiremen try to out yorkshire each other.Wow dwarfs are Scottish though
I think the Scottish accent is merely a convenience. In most literature dwarves are from mountainous regions, highlands and frequently the author gives them a Scottish accents (appropriate for a highlander) to distinguish them.
It is sufficiently memorable that people just assume all dwarves are Scottish, where in fact, few really are. Warcraft is one of a very few audio sources where they do highlight the Scottish accent, most don't.
I actually had them, in my mind, as Norse, but I can see where your coming from
I always just assumed that for most folk the jump from Norse to Scottish was small enough to cause the confusion (indeed, I think the Norse settled Scotland pretty heavily and grew into the Norse-Gaels).
The idea that half the Imperial military on Dromund Kass is from Wales and Lancashire always seemed quite amusing to me.
Just to note, the IA accent is what you might call, 'BBC English', i.e. it's pronounced correctly but is suppose to sound neutral and without any regional inflections. It's how someone might sound if they went to private school here and spent some time boarding rather then there from a posh family. There's a difference, maybe not noticeable to anyone from outside however :P
To answer your question, It doesn't bother me, although I do agree the Jedi Knight male voice does sound like a dork, (even more dorking then Male Shephard). I think Europeans in general are used to VA with American accents from American games, especially for the protagonist. There hardly going to change it when the language is similar. I think it's interesting, especially on the Imperial side, how many different accents there are compared to the Republic side. I don't think though the accents have any lasting impact on whether you enjoy the story or not.
I've found the Imperial side to be more to my taste but maybe thats just because I'm evil rather then I have a thing for people from Manchester :P
This looks like a job for....The Riviera Kid!
British Empire = Imperial Empire, at least in my eyes
From the first time i saw Star Wars I always thought the Imperials were fasioned from the German army from the World wars. the colour of the uniforms even the imperial badge somehow to me anyway says german!.
Lucas drew influences from lots of places, I don't think anyone other than him could say for definite what anything anywhere is based on. And we know he won't because he likes Star Wars to stand on its own merits, rather than be compared to things that went before.
It definitely is a compliment. Something that I've always noted and that my girlfriend recently brought up is that there are a lot of great actors from across the pond.
Must be something in the water.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I love the voice acting, specially the Bounty Hunter one which is the class I play, it reminds me of the actor for the character Garrett from the thief series.
It's because to become involved in US movies as a European you generally have to be a very good actor, while as an NA citizen it's enough to just look to Hollywood standards while having the acting talent of a brick wall.
My Signature
I'm not even talking about US movies. I've seen plenty of foreign movies where the Europeans are just good. There are too many US "actors" who are actors because they look good and therefore think they can act.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I am an Englishman and will confess to being relatively well spoken. My Italian gamer friends joke its "like the perfect english they learned in school", never sure if that is good or not!
I am not offended I am simply bemused by all of this. I know USA and the UK have had our share of wars, you won the whole War of Independence and we burnt down the Whitehouse, stopped your invasion of Canada and won the war of 1812 (debateable). But why are we still the villains? Its been 200 years since 1812! It does make me chuckle though to hear the different regional dialects spoken by the Empire.
Sadly I play republic and am forced to listen to an American accent (Kills all immersion immediately) and fight people with a fellow English accent. It shouldn't make a difference to game enjoyment but sadly it does. Like an itch or ache that won't quite go away...
Ah well,
God Save the Queen.
Healing the world since 2005
Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"
are you taht sensible that cant hear / read the word black or dark skinned without getting offended and call one racist? i may be white but im from the caribbean, i got black family members and in the caribbean nobody gets offended by talking that way unless its an insult. Just making it clear
the people i quoted in my post actually made sense. Voice overs should have accents by region instead of factions
Yeah defintiely nice link, I was lucking for this... didn't think to look here.
One of my mates and me are both Brits living in Texas. We generally laugh at the the accent, for me it's just as funny to speak to an Imperial soldier with a Geordie acccent as it is to speak to a Twilek criminal with a New Jersey accent, I like my BH handlers southern US accent. I like my Sith Inquisitors accent and also my Bounty Hunter.
To add to what the another poster said, Brits generally get cast in both evil and non-American roles so they sound foreign,
Going forward, any British people of African decent shall be hence forth known as Britanicus-Africana.... happy now?
Personally, the only voice acting I actually liked was for the Bounty Hunter.
i agree as well. I think they should have hired Lester Speight (cole train voice actor) to do voice overs for dark skinned male character creation choices. That would have been just perfect.... "Look at all that juice!!!!!!!!" after shocking vette LOL
This is about the most racist group of posts I have seen on a gaming forum so far. Good job all.
are you taht sensible that cant hear / read the word black or dark skinned without getting offended and call one racist? i may be white but im from the caribbean, i got black family members and in the caribbean nobody gets offended by talking that way unless its an insult. Just making it clear
the people i quoted in my post actually made sense. Voice overs should have accents by region instead of factions
Wow. That would be pretty expensive. I mean even more expensive that it already was. It would be cool to pick your avatar's voice though.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.