The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

Since the Precursors are redoing the SC2 music, I had a thought: If I was willing to do new voiceovers for UQM, would you guys be behind it? I may have to recruit some help, but I think it would be a fairly simple procedure and wouldn't take long. What do you guys think?

Hmm. It sounds nice in theory, but I have a few questions.
1. What would your objective be in this endeavour? To make better-sounding or higher-fidelity recordings than those present in the 3DO? To make new recordings that include missing information, like the mycon homeworld or the metachron?

2. Are you aware of the amount of work it would take to redo all the voices in UQM? It's probably more than you think. I'm not sure of the exact duration, but there are hours upon hours of edited, processed recordings. Whatever the duration of the 3DO voices, you'll probably wind up recording at least double the amount due to bad takes and such. The sheer amount of voicing that needs to be done for even one race is probably enough to put off most casual volunteers.
And once you have all the sound, you have to edit, process, and master it so that it sounds convincingly alien.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't attempt it. If you think you can do it, go for it, but make sure you know what such an undertaking would entail.

EDIT: Found an old, similar thread (http://uqm.stack.nl/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=Gendiscuss;action=display;num=1091646507) while looking for duration information. Look at what 0xDEC0DE says on the first page, he's right on the ball.

Yeah, I'd insert missing stuff like the MetaChron, or maybe change the Talking Pet dialogue to say Glilandy instead of Benteflork and for Commander Hayes to get the name of the Yehat royal family right (though missing stuff would have to be reprogrammed). I also want it to be better sounding. Higher fidelity, obviously, since the 3DO stuff was recorded a WHILE ago... but there are also some voiceovers for some races that sound... unconvincing.

As for the duration, I know I'm gonna have to do some post-processing stuff on the races with weird voices (Spathi, Ur-Quan, Chmrr, and, God help me, the Syreen), but I don't plan on going halfway and then dropping it. I may release it on a per-race basis.

Here's a demonstration (I advise you to play the Precursors' Talking Pet music in the background to make this sound authentic): http://www.freewebs.com/aquilaeancodex/talkp013.ogg

Any other requests before I commit?

Uuuhhm.. A new microphone?

Unless my XMplay was b0rking it.... Though I doubt it.
(It.. well... I couldn't hear a damn thing because of the noise..)

Oh, JESUS! I just listened to the .ogg and it is completely horrifying! I don't know how or why, buy my .ogg converter completely trashed my crystal-clear .wav file. Let me just post the .wav (it's only slightly bigger) and I'll repost the link. Sorry about that.

I think my ears are bleeding.

Okay, here: http://www.freewebs.com/aquilaeancodex/talkp013.wav

I'm on 56k at the moment so I'll wait till later to download it, but in the meantime I suggest you check out audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/). It's a free multitrack audio editor with a decent ogg export function (and a handful of VST effects).

I love it. This is a good version of the Talking Pet dialogue, in my opinion. Could perhaps use a few effects, but if you want to be faithful to the 3D0, this is good enough. You have my full support for a new version of the entire game's dialogue, and such a thing would of course FORCE me to play the game from start to finish again. ;)

Now just promise me you'll COMPLETELY change the Orz dialogue. I just can't stand talking to them as they are.

And I'm sure you could do a lot of nice effects if you EQ it in cool ways. Nothing like EQ to change the sound completely.

The wav just finished downloading...
Nice! ;D

That's very good for a proof-of-concept. I'd say it was on par with Paul Reiche's rendition in terms of delivery. You've nearly won me over. :)

For the final version, you'll need to work on enunciation just a little bit... most of it was nice and clear, but there were a few places where you slurred a little. That's why I said you'd be taking at least twice as much audio as you will wind up using... it's hard to get that elusive perfect take. Of course, if you're good enough with postproduction you can sometimes make up for it.

If you honestly understand how much work this will take, I say go for it. I'd even be up for doing some voice acting myself if I can think of a race my voice could work for (and you wind up going through with this)... I'm thinking that I might be able to do a halfway decent utwig. Less whiny, hopefully.

We'll see how it pans out.

I have heard a LOT of complaints about the Orz. If I were to change them, what would you have me do? Is it something about their voice, or is it the actual words they say?

As for the rest of you, I'm glad my efforts are getting supported. If I need help with anything (and here I am thinking of the Spathi dialogue), I may host auditions.

Do you mean that you intend to do the majority of the voices yourself?

Hmm... I can't remember hearing anything that was voice-acted by one person. Just how flexible is your voice (and your voice acting abilities)?

By the way, I tried doing both the utwig and the spathi, and I was a bit dissapointed with what I was able to muster. Then I tried the slylandro...  now them, I think I could pull off. And I'm talking about the excitable gas bags, not the robotic probes.  ;)

I guess if you want to do most of it yourself, it won't be neccessary. Still, if you're interested, I can send a sample to you. Of the one take I actually like, I produced two versions (one unprocessed, and one with a GVerb filter.)

The Orz as they are just sound like a really annoying woman. I'd want to make them creepy instead. While I haven't heard them, people say that the voiceovers for the Orz in SC3 are pretty good and creepy, with a deep computer voice stepping in for words that are impossible to translate. I'm not sure if that's the right direction to go though.

A deep voice might be nice, something that sounds like it's spoken through water, yet remains audible. I dunno, I'm just rambling here... :)

Hmm I tried the Shofixti for a 3d movie I was making, jesus spent like a couple hours and still got crap :(

And I was confused when the computer talks about the language anomolies it sounds REALLY weird...

*listens*

Whoa, that's great stuff indeed.. Much better than the noisy .ogg! :P

Well, go for it! I say.. Unfortunately, I can't help you with the voice stuff.. Eerie Dutch accent and all... :P

Pretty good.. I haven't heard the original Talking Pet dubbing yet, but this one was pretty good, and better than some of my least favourite dubs that I've yet encountered.

I second that Orz are not too well done in the 3DO version. One reason is - along with not really being scary enough -, that like few other dubs, the dialogue is spoken quite slowwwly. Well, one reason for "slow" speech is that it makes it much easier to understand. Although your Talking Pet dub was quite fast and a speed I'd prefer, I couldn't make out everything that was said (English is not my first language though).

Ok.. The orz need to be creepy, but they shouldnt be creepy for shock value. I think what was tried in the 3d0 was perfect but failed, and what was tried in sc3 was just stupid.

What the orz actually sound like is up to you. Under water is a good idea, that would be a very nice effect to make, seeing that they are underwater. You could make them sound aggresive and masculin because of their nature.

The words that the computor says is different. You know the computors voice in star trek TNG?? Thats what they were trying to do in 3d0 me thinks. So, what you should do for that, is record those words seperately, and then splice them in so that they show non of the emotion of what the orz are saying. It doenst have to be a womans voice, but I would think of a stereotypical computor as a lady myself. But, male or female, doesnt matter to me, just make them very perfectly spoken, with no emotion. Sorta like the computor in star trek TNG.

And, my own idea, if you gave the orz voice a lot of reverb, then when you splice in the computor voice that would get cut out, and cut back in, and that could be a really neat effect..

Actually I wouldnt mind doing that for you, I dont have any access to recording equipment, but I can do some post production for you if you like, or just share these ideas.

But, btw, the talking pet was amazing, I loved, it was very very well spocken, and had a lot of expression and personality. I wouldnt EQ it cus that would take out the scratchyness... Maybe just make it a tad deeper. And add a squishy noise in the background.

Sounds good. What other voices can you do?

I can do the VUX and Druuge very well, I can do the Mycon decently, I can do the Thraddash and Ilwrath pretty well, and could probably do the simpler voices like Commander Hayes and the Slylandro too. The rest I haven't tried.

As for the Talking Pet, I consider myself good enough at that voice to release the first part of the new voiceover add-on! All of the Talking Pet speech has been replaced, and I've done something special for his mental compulsion commands.

That said, there are two (2) problems:

1: Most of the subtitles sync up great, and the new voices integrate seamlessly. However, some aren't so good, and it gets to the point where I'm gong faster than the subtitles are or vice-versa. Is there a way to alter this timing for my add-on only (so it doesn't screw with people who want to play vanilla UQM)?

2: Hosting: If I want to distribute this, I need someone to host it. My website does not transmit files at a very quick speed, and a zip file with 75 .ogg files in it gets pretty hefty. For now, I'm going to have it TEMPORARILY hosted on Medieval Future (if I can find a way to get the file to TiLT).

You guys know how to use add-ons, right?

The subtitle timings are located in the .ts files in the same dir as the .oggs. You can include them in the addon package with the .ogg files. To create them you can use the synch tool from the 'tools' package in cvs.


I can host it on uqm.stack.nl if you want.

Get a hold of me on AIM or ICQ or MSN or Yahoo! 'cause my e-mail can't handle files of this size.

Also, I'll be working on the sub timing. Thanks for the tip. Now, where's this tools package?

GMail, maybe? (2GB, 10MB max e-mail messages)

Wait, let me send you an invite..
...
there.. Done..  :P

See here (http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=59452) for instructions. The modulename in the instructions should be "tools" for the tools and "sc2" for UQM itself.

I don't do those things. You can catch me on IRC though (#sc2 on irc.freenode.org).

Very cool. Can't wait to hear it.

And yes, I imagine you are quite capable of voicing the 'coarser' races yourself.

What do you say to my previous offer to voice the slylandro for this project? I can send you samples upon request.

I might also be able to do other races, but I haven't thought of any yet. I could have another go at the utwig, I suppose...

AAARGH! SOURCEFORGE SLOWLY DYING!

I may have to leave this as is for the time being. In the meantime, I'll start recording stuff for other races.

Here's a preview of the Ilwrath (which just happens to be one of my favorite lines of theirs): http://www.freewebs.com/aquilaeancodex/ilwra006.ogg

While your screaming is waaay superior to the original's, the voice of the Ilwrath itself.. lacks somewhat..
It sounds to english (read: Yehat-y) at some points, and it lacks the "question"-y voice the Ilwrath have (they almost never go "down" with their voice at the end of a sentence)...

Not that I could do better, but... :P
Just try it again... Keep up the good work and the effort, though! You'll make it through it, definitively.. :P

I agree. It isn't Shakespeare. I like the way the original emphasises every single word. Perhaps you should keep that.

I love the screaming and tearing of limbs, but the rest is kind of mixed. And stop breathing into the microphone, man! :)

I also agree with the above posters. One of the funny things about the old voiceovers for the Ilwrath was how they sounded more like wannabe-evil than real evil, which fits them well.

Agreed.

I'll ask you a third time: do you want my help on the slylandro?

EDIT: Finally found the dialogue duration times. TRT is around eleven and a half hours.

if you had a soundblaster live! soundcard, and live!ware installed you would have an easier time changing your voice.
i use my software to make myself sound like satan just for the hell of it, and it scares the shit out of the people i live with.
especially if i do it in the dead of night, i'd send you a sample of me trying(keyword: trying) to do the kohr-ah voice but i'm too shy.


put edit here----> i was just fooling around with some frequencies, actualling i was just screwing around, i was just making noises into my mic and if i got really close to my mic while i had my software make my voice a little deeper and kind of did a high pitched voice i got something that sounded like a spathi if it were a big black dude.i'll keep screwing with the "frequencies" for a little bit to see if i could get a "spathi" like voice.

If you need any additional voiceovers, I wouldn't mind helping out.

Kohr-Ah - Cold emotionless voice with bass boost

Probe - Robot Filter

Druuge - Slimy salesman

Orz should sound WEIRD more than creepy.

Alright, then, anyone who thinks they've got a decent voice for a race can send me a sample on AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo!, or my e-mail.

As for the Ilwrath, can anyone do better on that one? If you can do better than me then you get the job, but for now I'm wracking my brain trying to think of how I can make what I've got more accurate.

I've got the Ur-Quan and Kohr-Ah down, I think, but I need filters to make them sound... less like me with a deep English accent.

For the Ilwrath I think you just need to speak each word as if it were seperate. Dont focus on the phrase, just each word, over inunciated and maybe a bit higher.. And yes, less english..

I think EQing the higher frequencies would help.