Finding Your Voice, part I

A lil somethin somethin: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page here.

Greetings, Pathfinders!

We consider characters to be one of the most crucial components of any RPG. They are your allies and enemies, they may become your bitterest rivals or your most ardent friends, and sometimes a budding interest in a character may blossom into tender loving affection. A good, memorable character is a team effort that involves narrative designers, game designers, level designers, artists, sound designers, and, of course, voice actors. Today, we want to tell you how our characters find their voices.

How it Started
In December 2016, our team was finishing the vertical slice for Pathfinder: Kingmaker (a fully-playable portion of a game that shows the intended player experience), our first game. We decided that it was time to give the main characters voices, to see just how well we had managed to recreate the feel of classic CRPGs. On top of that, we needed to figure out how to work with the foreign actors remotely.

Sergey Eybog, our Audio Director, remembers: “By that time, I already had some experience [working with voice actors from all over the world]. Before I joined Owlcat Games, I spent five years at Strategic Music, a studio which offered various sound services, where occasionally I had the opportunity to work with various voice actors. That’s actually where I met some of the voice actors who later got the roles in our games: Lindsay Sheppard, Ray Chase, Kristin Lennox, and Jay Britton.


Sergey Eybog, Audio Director at Owlcat Games

“Pathfinder: Kingmaker was a very important project for us, and we decided right from the start that we would need an experienced director, one who grew up and lived in the USA and could organize the entire process or recording: find the actors, consult with us on cultural nuances, and overall ensure that the recorded material would sound natural to our American audience. At that moment, we had no idea where to start looking for such a person, so I asked the voice actors I previously worked with for recommendations.”

“One of the actors turned out to be the owner of a company that worked on localization for various movies and video games. They told us about an American studio that was handling the dubbing for them. It was through this connection that we got in contact with 3Beep and our partnership with them began.”

3Beep
In 3Beep, we work directly with Tom Wayland, one of the co-founders of the studio, our voice director, and the voice of Lann in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYBgZ6K4hg4

3Beep was founded in 2016 in New York City by three people, all of whom previously worked at DuArt Film and Video: Charles Darby, the Chief Operating Officer (COO), Tim Werenko, the VP of Production, and Tom Wayland, the head director for all the animation and games the studio was recording.

“We decided to strike out on our own and start our own company,” says Tom. “We focus mostly on audio production, but we can provide a wide range of technical and creative services for animation, video games, live-action programming, etc. Services range from casting, recording, direction, writing, mixing, sound design, score and music production, and so on.”

How the Magic Happens
What happens before an actor can bring a character to life?

Firstly, the narrative designers write a document, where they describe the character’s personality. Usually, it contains information regarding the said character’s background, gender, age, details, and nuances about their attitude and psyche. In some cases, the narrative designer also describes the character’s role in the story. If the character has a portrait, it also gets attached to the document. If not – the narrative designer looks for something similar in appearance.

After this step, we search for references to show to the voice actors such as videos from movies and games, where you can see a character with a similar attitude or a similar role, so the director and the actors can understand what kind of impression their character should create. More often than not, we provide multiple references: one serves as an example of acting, another – a desired timbre. The character’s author also writes a description for each reference to minimize the risk of misinterpretation.

Casting
For casting, the author writes a number of lines, which are supposed to demonstrate the character’s key traits. When reading the actor should attempt to mimic the character description as closely as possible.

We then send all this information to Tom Wayland, the voice director at 3Beep. He may ask for additional information or make some suggestions after reading through the character dossier. Once everything is clear, the search for the right actors begins.

Next is the audition phase, where we get recordings of the lines from several different actors and begin to discuss whose interpretation best suits our vision. This part is usually done by the narrative designers who authored the character in question and the creative lead of the game. In some cases, they may ask for additional opinions from other devs.

If none of the takes were perfect, we ask Tom to organize a new round of casting. Also, sometimes we like the voice but have issues with how the line was delivered. In that case, we may ask the actor to record another take with our comments in mind.

Having finally located the perfect voice, we rejoice (Huzzah!) and send the recordings to Paizo Inc. for approval. If they have any additional comments or requests, then we re-record the character’s lines according to their feedback.

Recording and Audio Post-Processing
After a voice has been chosen and approved, we can start recording for the game. 3Beep Studio usually organizes the recording sessions for us and then prepares the final voice recordings, selecting 2 or 3 of the best takes for each line. Since we often need to apply various effects to the voice, we require raw unprocessed recordings without any corrections or effects.

This is when the work of sound engineers at Owlcat Games begins. They check the voice recordings against the script, picking the most suitable take. After that, they need to post-process and correct the audio, segment it according to the game’s mechanics, and finally adjust them in the audio engine (Audiokinetic Wwise) and subsequently in Unity. And voila! A character gets their voice!.

Now you know how we make our characters talk. Next week Tom Wayland, the voice director of 3Beep, will tell you more about himself and his work.

Love, Owlcats