Does anybody else get the impression...

[SpongeLikeCow]

I don't think the beggar dialogues is a blip. As you may know, most beggars are contacts for the thieves guild, but only a select group of people are supposed to be aware of this. That's why they talk like "thank ye kind sir" in public, but sound more like intelligent folks once they know you are trustworthy. If you are not an associate of the thieves, than they will probably always be just beggars to you.

It's because only a handful of people voiced all the npc's. If two npc's sound exactly alike, it's because it's the same sound file.

I think the only unique voices are Martin and the Emperor. I'm pretty sure the rest go by race and gender. All Breton males sound like Jauffre, all Redguard males sound like Baurus, etc.

[TheCrimsomBlade]

There were in fact 118 people that did voices for the more than 1000 npc in the
game. The thing that they did that I thought was stupid is the main quest was all
done by only 12 differen't people playing over 400 people and they didn't do much
to change their voices from one NPC to the next.
Linda Carter did over 200 women by herself and the rest were done by employees of
the three companies making the game. Also the higest paid voice in the whole game
was the king by patric Stewart. There was a write up in the "Entertainer" a
Hollywood actors magizine back in December 2005.

[ 04-12-2006, 11:57 PM: Message edited by: TheCrimsomBlade ]

[Sever]

And Patrick's only in the game for 15 minutes or so...

Whilst we're on the subject of voices (this aint a gripe) i'm 99% sure that whoever does the voice for some of the Argonian and Khajiti males is the same guy that voices Minsc from BG2! Or was that common knowledge?

Also from BG2 is the voice of Ellesime (sp?) though the ridiculous accent has been dropped thankfully. Is that Linda Carter?

And who does the voice for Jauffre and about a hundred other NPCs. I know his voice from a movie but can't seem to place it.

[JrKASperov]

I haven't seen any names from BG2 on the Oblivion list though...

Check IMDB.

[Sever]

IMDB?

[SpiritWarrior]

I have noticed the voice changes with the beggars too and it bears mentioning that their voices change even if you do the mini-game for the very first time.

I am more troubled and actually dissapointed in the lack of patching by Bethesda for these errors such as typos and of course the usual slew of bugs....

[johnny]

We better get used to it then. Some German magazine did a little research, and according to them, 79% of all gamedevelopers think it's normal to release a game that instantly needs patching. I don't know about the rest of you, but i think that's a very disturbing attitude and shows little or no respect for the customers. I'd call that unfinished business, and asking money for an unfinished product, is equal to ripping people off in my book. In my line of work, when i don't deliver the people what they expect from me, than they have every right not to pay me, and there would be nobody else to blame but me. It's THAT simple. Personally, i think software distributors should be fined for releasing unfinished products, maybe that'll teach them to work a little more efficient in the future.

[WSBoaBoa]

Problem is Johnny in the software industry this is common practice now a days. It's so friken sad I get upset at our marketing team almost daily. And I don't do games I work on mission critical defense surveillance sytems and this kind of practice is normal! Go back 20 years and this kind of behaviour would have landed you in court.

[Sever]

Ya, it's the same old story across many industries including the one that i work in. Guy at top wants product to produce cash, guy in middle forced to make product by the time guy at top specifies. Guy at end buys unfinished product.

As long as the company remains professional and true in its after market duties and service, then it's sort of acceptable. At least, i can empathise.

My gripe with Beth is that they are placing too much emphasis on the graphics and not enough on the meat of the game. Have they released an official patch yet? My bet is it'll be centered on graphics with a few minor MQ and guild quest fixes.

[Luvian]

I've seen tons of npcs that changed voices. It's really annoying, and it's not just the beggars. I didn't take notes when it did it, because I thought everyone would run into it eventually.