Voices and Butch on Next Gen

I already talked about the piece on Fallout 3 published in the last issue of Edge, now you can read it online on the Next Gen site:

“War never changes,” grumbles ubiquitous voiceover favorite Ron Perlman in Fallout 3’s opening cinematic. Of course, the one major bugbear among diehard fans of previous turn-based Fallout games is that war has actually changed rather substantially with the coming sequel. Thankfully, as we see more and more of the game, it seems like these detractors are misguided.[...]

“This is the Vault bully, Butch, and his little cronies,” says Hines pointing at a table of youths. “They’ll start talking about how they’re forming a gang and what they want to call their gang. He wants the sweet roll that Mrs Palmer gave me, and there are a variety of different options here. I can wuss out and give it to him, I can ask him if we can share, I can spit on it and give it to him, I can tell him to go suck his head, I can insult his mom – so we give the player a lot of choices and how Butch will react depends upon these different choices, so if I choose one of these last two options he basically gets up to fight me.”

Hines instead opts to spit on the sweet roll and offer it to Butch. “I don’t want your nerd cooties,” replies Butch. “You’re going to be sorry you did that.” The choice here, says Hines, then affects how other characters view you.[...]

As for the quality of the dialogue’s delivery, Hines emphasized that all the voice-acting, apart from Liam Neeson’s turn as your father, was temporary – a point well illustrated by the distinctly gruff tones of your mother. But if there was any area in which Bethesda risks falling down it is this – The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion wasn’t a sterling demonstration of voice direction, failing to squeeze anything other than wood from Patrick Stewart or Sean Bean. Liam Neeson’s efforts here also felt a little staid. However wry or smart a script Bethesda produces, it could be jeopardized if the voice-acting doesn’t match its written standard.

That Mother’s voice is the voice of Emil Pagliarulo. You can read the rest here.

Desslock: Where Have the M-Rated RPGs Gone?

Image Van Buren team/NMA

In early 2007 PCGamer Columnist Desslock wrote some thoughts on the state of RPGs with mature themes and visuals. We now have an expanded version of that column as a featured article on this blog.

It’s thought provoking and bring us a few questions that seem appropriate for some reflexion while we wait for the M rated (but toned down in some ways) Fallout 3.

I want to thank Desslock for allowing me to publish this, now here’s a small excerpt:

Tremendous sales of M-rated shooters have demonstrated that it’s not commercial suicide to produce games with mature content. It’s a shame RPG developers seem less willing than their shooter counterparts to risk ostracism from commercial outlets like Walmart in order to produce M-rated games, when there’s no genre where such content is more appropriate.

You can read the rest here.

Fallout 3 Around The World

From the BethBlog:

While on a trip to Australia last week, I picked up the May issue of Hyper, which includes four pages where the editors talk Fallout 3 with Lead Producer Gavin Carter. Here’s a sample where Gavin discussing Ron Perlman’s contributions to the game:

“Ron Perlman’s involvement in Fallout games should definitely be made into a law! War never changes, after all. He reprises his role as the intro and outro narrator in Fallout 3 — it wouldn’t be the same without him.”

Issue #189 of Edge has a new second look at Fallout 3. Here Pete discusses an example of dialogue choices found within the game:

“‘This is the Vault bully, Butch, and his little cronies,’ says Hines pointing at a table of youths. ‘They’ll start talking about how they’re forming a gang and what they want to call their gang. He wants a sweet roll that Mrs. Palmer gave me, and there are a variety of different options here. I can wuss out and give it to him, I can ask him if we can share, I can spit on it and give it to him, I can tell him to go suck his head, I can insult his mom — so we give the player a lot of choices and how Butch will react depends upon these different choices, so if I choose one of these last two options he basically gets up to fight me.’”[...]

Over in Italy, GMC has a second look at Fallout 3 in their June 2008 (that’s Giugno 2008) issue.

In Sweden, the May issue of PC Gamer has a second-look preview on the game.

Finally, in the South American market, issue #17 of their magazine Xbox 360 includes a six-page feature — including an interview with Pete.

I didn’t get that “South American market” bit, in what countries was it released?