For the voice overs, I don't have much confidence in my ability to judge. Regarding the art, I'm pretty impressed; I really like the set she's standing in (can we get some extras working in the background though?), and I love the uniform. Just maybe work on her face a bit more. Like RonPimpster said, try going for that Pixar look. Also, Hunam_'s input about immersion and the UI seems legit.

Encounter screen ideas/feedback got posted here, hence my post in this thread.

What I'm looking for out of these voice auditions is pretty specific.

From a personal stand point, if this person is the Human Commander, that says strong leader. Ironically only the last voice felt remotely close, and yet not quite good enough in my mind.

What I want out of the voice is someone with a memorable voice like Michelle Forbes, who played Admiral Helena Cain on Battlestar Galactica, Admiral of the Pegasus. I'm not looking for "HER" voice as it were. But a memorable yet commanding voice. It should be authoritative, strong, compelling, with a rich timbre. Another actor that fits this bill ironically from the same show was Katee Sackhoff, who played Kara Thrace aka Starbuck. Another voice that I think may fit the bill from a uniqueness perspective is Claudia Black who played Aeryn Sun from Farscape.

What each of those women bring is an interesting strong voice. I'm absolutely certain that there are talented voice actors out there who can meet these needs. The game is going to be fun. But it doesn't have to be campy or sexy or uninspired and average voice wise. 

I would go one step further though and say consider using someone with an accent that isn't just American. 

As far as the art for the Human commander.

I'm going to be openly honest here. I want diversity and would like to see someone other than a red headed white female as the commander. Earth is home to an incredibly diverse range of different peoples. I would like to see that somehow represented for the human commander. I'm happy to see that the commander is a female.

That's a great step, but let's also consider that there is an entire world of options, that can open up that door for real diversity.

^ Black transvestite female with purple mohawk and piercing all over her face perhaps? [/s]

I'm with you on that one.  I'm sick of ethnocentrism. This coming from a caucasian male.

This was considered very important by the makers of both Babylon 5 and the original Planet of the Apes movies.  The people who made both of these talk about how important it was that the people behind the makeup had unique voices.  That's why you see people like Karl Malden in Planet of the Apes and Peter Jurasic and Andres Katsulas in Babylon 5.  Unique personalities "show through" the makeup and make a big difference in that case.  This is a similar thing, and I agree with you that this can make the character seem a lot better.

Babylon 5 $800.000 per spisode

Farscape $1.500.000 per episode

Star Control 2 $50.000

Star Control $5.000.000

Mass Effect 3 $40.000.000

Batman Arkham City marketing campaign $10.000.000

Do you guys wanna chip in and bring Mark Hamill and Tricia Helfer to spice things up while we're at it?

Hey, the new Master of Orion got some famous voice acting on board, and it looks like an awesome part of that game...

...the only awesome part. The new Moo is shiny, and Mark Hamill's voice tells me it's great. Oh Mark, you Joker. Well, at least they can charge a justified 50$ for it now, right?

(HOW DO I DELETE THIS?)

Quoting ShadeDark, reply 36

Quoting prodigalmaster,

reply 34

Hey, the new Master of Orion got some famous voice acting on board, and it looks like an awesome part of that game...

...the only awesome part. The new Moo is shiny, and Mark Hamill's voice tells me it's great. Oh Mark, you Joker. Well, at least they can charge a justified 50$ for it now, right?

 

Brought it, and it's amazing!

well... but i always preferred Star Control so, i REALLY hope this reboot is as great as the Orion reboot is becoming!



 

 

 

 

- Shade A.I

We'll have to agree to disagree. I find it disappointing, especially the fleet battles. Funny when indie games like StarDrive 2 or the upcoming Polaris Sector offer more depth on the battlefield than the successor of Moo. Cute graphics and great voice acting are not at the core of what made the original a cult classic, but that's what seems to have been put at the forefront there. In terms of gameplay, the game borrows more from Civ, Galciv, and Endless Space than it does from Moo.

I haven't seen it, but I imagine like most games made like this the "space combat" consists of a line of RTS units sitting still 1 inch apart from each other trading shots until one side has no ships left.  This isn't even space combat in my book.  I think of these games as an unfathomably expensive Rube Goldberg Abacus.  It's the most expensive and complex possible way of counting to 100, it actually bears no resemblance what-so-ever to space combat.  All I see when I look at it is the most expensive and complex calculator anyone has ever concieved:-)

Their current commander is entirely qualified for the position, I don't see how gender and race come into the equation I'd like to keep my games and my politics separate, thank you very much.

Hi Volusianus,

Well not from a political perspective but a representative of racial ethnicities. By 2060 it's hypothesized that caucasians will be less than 10% of the world's population. With the largest group still being han chinese.

I was just saying, I would like to see a more global inclusive representation in our games, and this is the perfect time to present this suggestion now, instead of later. And I'm saying this as a caucasian male.

That being said, I do respect your opinion on it.

MoO doesn't have 10% of SC recorded audio time too. I can't find the exact hours number mentioned by SD couple of months ago, but I remember that it's gi-hugic.

+1

While MOO is still in early access, in fairness, I am not confident many of those aspects will change as it approaches completion. I don't MIND the voice acting, but I am a little concerned that they may have spent way too much of the budget on it by getting top tier sci-fi actors involved rather than just regular actors.

I find a lot of the dialog (and sound effects) incredibly repetitive and annoying. The characters say the same things over and over, and the constant sound effects indicating something happening get really irritating, with no option to turn them down or off so far. It made me realize how great MOO2's sound design was twenty years ago; the music was very ambient and all the interface sounds were very subtle and unintrusive.

The interface still needs some polish too. Another of the great aspects of MOO2 was that the interface had a common flow to it. The different screens usually had some kind of similar layout with controls along the bottom that were clear, intuitive and easy to navigate. The reboot, despite being overly simplified, doesn't even manage to have common control layouts or obvious keyboard shortcuts. I could quickly play through MOO2 using a lot of natural keyboard shortcut commands that are not at all clear in the reboot due to the dumbed down interface. I'd be willing to accept some dumbed down aspects of the game if the experience still had good flow to it.

The fleet battles don't bother me personally quite as much as others because I usually did non-tactical combat resolution anyway, but I think it's disappointing that it isn't currently in the game; I can appreciate why players would like to have control over the battle and it's part of the game's tradition. I recall hearing that they hope to add tactical combat eventually though...

Hi all!

For the commander sketches, please ditch A, E, and G.  Commanding a space ship and going out for a morning jog should call for two different outfits.

H, B, and D in that order are my favorite sketches!

I like the female face...and I don't mind the gray hair.  I started going gray at age 15, and now at 32, I'm about 40+% gray (thanks kids!).  It endears me to the character.

As for the lip syncing, I can't see anything...all I get is audio...no video.  :(  The other videos work just fine.

For the voice auditions...

Amanda - no energy.

Erika, strangely likeable, but she sounds like a cute college girl, and is hard to take seriously...?!

Laura P. 1 is very good. She has (almost too much) emotion and variation in her voice, which is great!

Laura P. 2 started off blah, but as I got near the end, I really QUITE liked it!

Lauren sounded almost like she had a nice accent at the start, but then she slowed down a lot...seemed forced.  Has hope, I'd like to hear her do that without the paper in front of her.   And she mispronounced the alien name partway through?

All the others not specifically named were forgettable, with all due respect.

^ Try Media Player Classic. It plays everything and anything.

https://mpc-hc.org/