Is this Dan's first time as a Voice Actor?

Well that was terrible. Either Dan is a hopeless VA or they needed to get more takes from him. Really, though, Dan's voice does not fit that character design at all. Maybe Drew or Austin would be better for that role (if we're sticking to bombers).

That doesn't sound great, sorry to say...

I only played a bit of ROM but it didn't have voice acting did it?

It did not, other than the intro.

Edit: Just watched it. Ryckert wasn't that bad... considering it's a pretty minor character he's playing.

I might have to check it out on vita. Just cause.

To be fair, expository dialog is very hard to make sound interesting and Read Only Memories was certainly not originally written with voice acting in mind, so it can be pretty long-winded.

Both Dan and Austin Creed's VO sounded very "I'm reading this off a piece of paper". Sometimes you hear VO and realize what a talent it is for the VO pros that sound like they are speaking naturally rather than just reading lines on a script - this is one of those times.

Not the end of the world, but I wish it had sounded more natural.

I'll be honest. There was about 2 or 3 good reads in that entire video and the rest really just sounded out of place and unsure/undirected. Surprising, Austin Creeds was probably one of the worst.

Er... why? Are they friends with the developer?

@yummylee: It's stunt casting, the main reason is so this thread exists.

Almost all of that voice acting sounds terrible.

Dan had a bit role in LA Noire, so it's not his first time.

I mean, the hope is that the audio is from some kind of quick audition tape they each provided, and that they'll actually briefly get those people in a recording studio with an actual voice director?

Perhaps that's a wildly unrealistic expectation given the budget of that game.

and Infamous Second Son

@alistercat: Did he actually say anything in that game? I thought that was just his face.

@mooseymcman: no, but he didn't say anything in LA Noire did he? I never heard him at least.

I've heard way, way worse from people voice acting in a way, way more professional capacity. That wasn't that bad, Dan.

Jim Sterling, Zoe Quinn, Terry McGovern, and Dan all sound out of place. Is Keith supposed to be an old guy? Austin was pretty good tbh.

I'll stick with the standard version.

They can't all be like the multi talented McElroy brothers.

He didn't perform voice over, though, he just had his face scanned in. To which was used as a human trafficker in First Light also ;P

Weird thing about this is that the original game lets effectively free-form the player's gender identity by allowing you to input your own pronouns ("He/She/etc."). I wonder how they're going to approach this from a VO perspective. Have Melissa Hutchinson read a tonne of pronouns and inject them as necessary like a Madden game?

Wowzers... That, uh, wasn't so hot. Though, to be fair, he wasn't the only one who stood out for.. You know what, to the wall with diplomacy, an effort that should have stood out enough for the voice "actor" to realize it was bad enough that they ought to give it another take or 50.

This is a cool game, and while I get that this might sell, it'll reduce the quality of the over-all experience. Seems ill-considered to ask someone who doesn't even have a decent microphone to act as a character for your game.

Very interesting response from Jeff over on his Tumblr about Dan's involvement in the project:

http://jeff.zone/post/146368916176/whats-up-with-dan-being-a-voice-actor-in-read

@pabba: Man, Jeff's the best.

This game's great. A re-release with voice acting? Sure, why not? Hopefully thee will be an option to turn it off though: part of the cool aesthetic of this game comes from it being text-based.

To be fair to Dan, some of the other voice acting in that trailer sounds a little stilted as well.

Just going by what I thought these characters would sound like I feel like they did a good job overall. Sure some of the bit parts like the one Dan was reading may be iffy but I expect he did it for free remotely. If they really brought everyone in to do VO sessions in a booth I would be impressed.

this just seemed like a fun thing for dan to do? like, you don't have to immediately shit all over it?

Jokes on you, all voices are actually done by Nolan North and Troy Baker. Troy certainly did a great Dan here.

From that post on the jeffzone it sounds like Jeff is okay with this, but kinda hates how they try to sell the game by pointing at all those 'internetcelebs you might know'.

Still not as weird as hearing Chloe from Life is Strange as the lead in Horizon: ZD.

She is? Never noticed. Ashley Burch is a pretty accomplished voice actress at this point though, so that's a far cry from these amateurs.

I mean, it sounds like Dan haha. The biggest issue I have with it is his voice does not match that character at all. Maybe if they chose someone else for him to be, but I haven't made it very var in ROM so I don't know all the characters. Xavier Woods sounds a bit like the dude who voiced Prince Alexander in King's Quest VI when I hear his VO.

Definitely not a regular guy haircut on that character.

That wasn't the greatest but I've heard much worse, I remember playing a bunch of games on the N64/Playstation in the 90's that had some terrible voice acting and this doesn't even approach that.

I remember hearing about this game last year and always wanting to try it out, if that Xbox One version is still going to materialize then I'll definitely check it out for sure. I could go for some cyberpunk adventure.

She also does a voice for Fallout 4 as a charcter in Vault 81. The sister of the kid that does drugs. As soon as I heard it I was like, "Chloe, is that you!?"

As for Dan's voice acting, I think we all already knew Dan doesn't have the skills for a career outside of playing video games.

Oh boy, maybe I should have known better than to read the YouTube comments

As an audio engineer, I'm not a fan of the mixing of the VOs.

@audiobusting: oh holy Jesus. I should have known. YT really attracts the dick heads doesn't it?

@planetfunksquad: It does, but there is also a bunch of fucking yahoos who frequent the Playstation Blog for whatever reason and I imagine from the context a decent amount of people came from there.

It's the same people who you see bash all the free games that come to PS Plus and want AAA titles, then when they get AAA titles they still aren't happy.

Also it's sort of amusing to watch the top comment back and forth about this being a "PS4 Exclusive" when it will also be a free upgrade to the current Steam game.

Its weird that they got all these different gaming personalities to do voice overs, but I'm sure it was in for good fun.

Never read the YouTube comments.

He did. I'm playing through LA Noire now and I think that the line was "What did I miss?".

Here you go:

Too bad the audio quality sucks in this video.

@szlifier: Dan Ryckert can't be killed.

Dan bought too many Amiibo's.

Now Dan is Broke.

Maybe if the character would be a nerdy scientist instead of a male/female(?) Hulk look-a-like, it could be better.

Well thats a way to get me to not play your game, not Dan in specific, but getting "personalities" to do voice acting is just always shitty. I prefer people that are professional at it.

I thought this was a joke.. this.. is not a joke? Is this like a real thing that is happening and isn't a YouTube animated short or something?