This is a major pet peeve of mine. And this game isn't the only culprit either.
I understand why voice acting wasn't a thing in the early days, storage limitations of the medium or just technical limitations. But in 2019 i really struggle with games that still use gibberish, or silent text scrolling, or canned sound bites followed by text (as is Octopath Traveler) I don't want to be reading a book. It makes the game feel like a relic, like it's not taking advantage of the developments of the medium. and what i actually find worse are games that aren't consistent with it. Octopath Traveler opens with fully voice acted dialogue, something i was pleasantly surprised to hear given it's retro-ish visuals. "oh, it is a modern game after all" i muttered, and yet, after that brief introduction to the backstory, everyone resorts to annoying, repetitive soundbites followed by text that i then have to read. Breath of the Wild had this problem too (and Nintendo games as a whole). It means those traditionally relaxed moments where you just want to kick back and absorb some story ends up requiring active participation from the player. like QTE's but more annoying. You're not being told a story, you have to read it.
It's also incredibly anti-accessibility too. My partner is partially sighted and generally loves the slower paced turn based nature of games like this, but he would be at a loss regarding it's story since it requires so much reading. it's why he loved Divinity and Fallout 3/4 (V.A.T.S) so much and why things like Wasteland 2 or Pillars of Eternity were inaccessible to him.
Does this annoy or affect anyone else given the fact we're in 2019 and there's really no reason for characters not be to be voice acted? I mean if something like Divinity : Original Sin can do it across all it's characters in such a large world, i don't see why Octopath couldn't...especially since it's partially there in the first place.
is it just a case of devs/pubs being a bit cheap regarding localisation? Because that is honestly the only reason i can come up with that makes sense, but in my view it doesn't exactly excuse it.
I understand why voice acting wasn't a thing in the early days, storage limitations of the medium or just technical limitations. But in 2019 i really struggle with games that still use gibberish, or silent text scrolling, or canned sound bites followed by text (as is Octopath Traveler) I don't want to be reading a book. It makes the game feel like a relic, like it's not taking advantage of the developments of the medium. and what i actually find worse are games that aren't consistent with it. Octopath Traveler opens with fully voice acted dialogue, something i was pleasantly surprised to hear given it's retro-ish visuals. "oh, it is a modern game after all" i muttered, and yet, after that brief introduction to the backstory, everyone resorts to annoying, repetitive soundbites followed by text that i then have to read. Breath of the Wild had this problem too (and Nintendo games as a whole). It means those traditionally relaxed moments where you just want to kick back and absorb some story ends up requiring active participation from the player. like QTE's but more annoying. You're not being told a story, you have to read it.
It's also incredibly anti-accessibility too. My partner is partially sighted and generally loves the slower paced turn based nature of games like this, but he would be at a loss regarding it's story since it requires so much reading. it's why he loved Divinity and Fallout 3/4 (V.A.T.S) so much and why things like Wasteland 2 or Pillars of Eternity were inaccessible to him.
Does this annoy or affect anyone else given the fact we're in 2019 and there's really no reason for characters not be to be voice acted? I mean if something like Divinity : Original Sin can do it across all it's characters in such a large world, i don't see why Octopath couldn't...especially since it's partially there in the first place.
is it just a case of devs/pubs being a bit cheap regarding localisation? Because that is honestly the only reason i can come up with that makes sense, but in my view it doesn't exactly excuse it.
