This is revealed very early on when you first leave to go out and do some adventuring. You are on a rollercoaster, as opposed to an adventure. There are very few deviations from the main progression route. The thing is, Solasta is incredibly linear. It has a world map, it has large areas, and you are free to do side quests. Solasta does its best to pretend it has freedom. This method of voice acting has existed since Baldur’s Gate, and it continues to live on in the likes of Pathfinder and Pillars Of Eternity. You can then focus on those smaller snippets and make sure they are delivered on point. In this instance, we would probably limit the voice acting to key scenes or snippets of dialogue. It’s also not an issue you can fix without just cutting things. It’s not a good look - well, it’s not a good sound. This leads to a lot of awkward delivery, and in some cases, the same actor voices multiple characters in a single conversation. This is very impressive for a first attempt at a game - especially one in a genre that is known to have a lot of dialogue. Secondly, the game voice acts every single conversation you have. They just added a bit of gruff or a badly formed accent to try and mask it. Firstly, the game didn’t have a big budget so it looks like they had a handful of actors doing a lot of voices. Had Solasta stayed within this genre norm, then you would likely never know the game was clearly on a budget - the blemishes would be hidden. How would we fix this? Easy, use the Pillars Of Eternity, Divinity 2, Pathfinder, and practically every other CRPG method of dialogue - text boxes and keeping the camera isometric. Heck, despite the game being incredibly polished everywhere else. It looks unfinished - almost like an early access title despite the game being fully released. This is highly unusual for this genre, and frankly, in this case, it doesn’t work.Ĭharacter models look hideous up close, facial animations are incredibly janky, and there are clearly visual bugs and hiccups. Solasta makes the mistake of looking unfinished because it insists on dragging the camera down to emulate a Mass Effect or Dragon Age style of dialogue system. There’s one catch - this only applies from a distance. Environments are detailed, enemy designs are clear and interesting, and there is just enough lighting and special effects to sell this as a good-looking CRPG. That would, in my opinion, be quite perfect, and avoid devouring the budget while getting the most out of the characters.Īlthough, all things considered, I suppose I could also say that the phrase "Do it like Baldur's Gate" can never really go far wrong in my book.Solasta plays like a dream. A little something at the beginning to give you a better feel for the character, tidbits interspersed here and there at important points, where voice acting would really have the most effect (Jahiera's lines spring to mind, when she finds a certain something has happened in Irenicus' dungeon. That isn't, of course, to say I'm in favor of voicing all lines. You can read something and take it a hundred different ways, in a hundred different styles, but when you hear it, it's quite a bit more visceral, gets me in touch with who this character is and what he is like much better than text alone. Having some bit of (good) voice acting for all major characters who are to have a fair amount of dialogue would be incredibly helpful, in my opinion, towards giving the player a better feel for the tone of the character (tone in this sense being both how he sounds and what kind of person he is). If his lines had only been text, I doubt that I myself could've imagined anything quite as perfect as he made it, nor would I have enjoyed the rest of his non-voiced dialogue nearly as much as I did without Warner's interpretation to serve as a template for it. I would certainly like some voiced combat bits, which is like BG, and a largely voiced antagonist.įor example, David Warner's portrayal of Jon Irenicus really made that character for me.
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