Teen and Elder Voices

[frankie]

I searched for "voice," but I didn't find exactly what I was looking for. So, I apologize if a thread like this already exists.

Does anyone else miss the teen voices from The Sims 2, which also carried over to young adults, as well as the elder voices? Or do you like how teens and older in The Sims 3 share the same voices?

I admit that I miss the voice distinction between life stages. I find it strange that my teen Sim can sound exactly the same as an elder. I don't know anyone who sounds exactly the same from teen to elder. When you are the phone with a stranger, you can sometimes identify their age group, give or take a few years. I'm not saying that teen and elder voices should be from the same voice actors from The Sims 2, just that a distinction would be nice. Maybe this can change in The Sims 4?

And does anyone even know why the voice actors were let go? I can understand the convenience on EA's part, but still. I was just curious about that, since they kept the same voice actress for the child stage.

[PunkyBreester]

The voices are the same? :blink:

[Sim mania]

In my game they don't sound the same.

[QuandaryOfJigsores]

Man, I get to overlook a ton of things by muting everything in my game.

[KiaraRawks]

They sound much alike in the different age ranges, but it seems the older the sim gets the voice becomes slightly "raspier." But yeah, not much difference.

[ViolettaVie]

They are definitely all the same. What's even freaky is when a teen has a voice that is very deep. So yeah, I definitely miss that teens and elders had different voices in TS2. But I am glad that young adults and adults share the same voice. I miss the gritty elder voices more. They sounded so old. It was nice.

[frankie]

Yes, PunkyBreester, they all share the same voices, as in, all males teen and older have the same, three CAS options, as well as the females with their CAS options. That was why I thought it was so odd that teens can have the same voice options as elders.

ViolettaVie, I know! I don't understand why EA got rid of those actors. They did a nice job with the elder voices. And the teens sounded so youthful. However, I, too, am glad that young adults and adults have the same voices.

[ViolettaVie]

And the teens sounded so youthful.
Funny thing is that was most notable to me when I last played TS2, a little over 2 months ago. It was cute.

[PunkyBreester]

Maybe its just a matter of expecting it or just a deceptive imagination, but I never noticed. I always thought that the voices were different, even if only slightly, as the sims aged.. *shrug*

[frankie]

ViolettaVie, I agree. They were so different, the first and only teen voices. :)

PunkyBreester, after triple-checking in CAS, they sound exactly the same to me. The voice actor for, say, one of the three teen male, voice options is the same one for all older, male stages of that same voice option. I'm not referring to the pitch, where the same voices can sound higher or deeper.

[PunkyBreester]

I wasn't referring to the pitch either, and not saying you're wrong :) Just that I never noticed, I kind of always assumed the voices got a bit deeper as adults and raspier as elders, but once again I suppose it was just a mix of expectations/imagination... Plus, I don't pay much attention to my elder sims :lol: I'll have to look for it next time I start my game up!

It doesn't seem like it'd be that hard, since they have the pitch scale already, to add some other kind of "distortion" to the voice as they age.

[frankie]

You're actually right, though. It's something that I don't think very many people even think about. I just thought it was interesting. I was looking at the credits, however, and noticed only nine names for voice actors. That would explain the shared voices. I guess it's just cheaper than hiring additional people for the voices of other life stages.

[MandyMarie87]

Personally, I liked the teen voices from TS2, but I can definitely do without the TS2 elder voices.

[Howabominable]

I noticed it and it bugs me. It's especially noticable when you get a teen with a really deep voice. My current teen sounds like a 40 year old.

[sofudgeaswell]

They are definitely all the same. What's even freaky is when a teen has a voice that is very deep. So yeah, I definitely miss that teens and elders had different voices in TS2. But I am glad that young adults and adults share the same voice. I miss the gritty elder voices more. They sounded so old. It was nice.

It reminds me of anime lol like how in the subbed versions of anime the voice actors of characters that are usually teen boys *like Ichigo from Bleach* have unusually deep voices. Or actually, American cartoons where guys are supposed to be 10, which normally boys have not gone through puberty yet, but they're clearly voiced by men who obviously have *like the South Park characters*

[MinghamSmith]

Of course, the counterargument to this is that not all teenagers do have noticeably higher voices than adults. I certainly didn't, I was probably roughly equivalent to the unsettlingly low-pitched sims mentioned earlier in the thread at that age. :p

I'm not arguing against separate voices for teenagers, though. What does sound noticeably different between teenagers and adults in most cases is diction and intonation, with the way in which speech flows and (in reality, anyway) the choice of words used conveying the different attitudes, emotions and thought processes of people of different ages and at different stages in their lives. Consequently, they could have the same voice actors record both regular Simlish dialogue and less worldly, more informal-sounding and possibly slightly awkward versions of the same interactions to differentiate between adults and teenagers and convey a character's maturation over time without needing to have them keep entirely switching voices.

Perhaps in TS4.