It's Going To Be Harder To Add Quests Naturally, since every NPC has 100% voiced dialog Options

[RobRendell]

A lot of mods that added quests to Morrowind would add additional dialog options to existing NPCs in the game, providing hooks into the new content.

It just struck me: with every line of dialog voiced by voice-actors, we're going to find it hard to put any additional works into existing NPCs' mouths. It'll be a bit jarring if your extra dialog is not voiced, but not as jarring as it'll be when the NPC's voice changes when they say your lines...

Is there any software out there that allows you to readily synthesise new speech for a given voice, if you can feed it enough samples of the voice you want mimiced?

[RobRendell]

Actually, my understanding is that yes, every line is voiced by, err, hand

In other words, they've got voice acting for every line in the game. Even some random insignificant NPC abusing you for blocking their way home. All done by real live human voice actors, not by some in-game voice synthesis. 50 hours of voice samples, filling half the DVD.

The "whisper" idea is cute, Neela. It could only be used a few times before it became repetitive, though. You'll have to get your mod out quickly, to reserve the idea ;)

Momaw, Brood, I presume that having "unvoiced" dialog works, but the lip-synching is apparently driven by the audio, so that would mean the NPCs mouth won't move with a slient audio file. It will still be be odd when an otherwise-fully voiced NPC suddenly stops talking and starts just staring at you while text appears on the screen... telepathy, perhaps?

Oh well, we can always insert all-new NPCs into existing locations to link in mods. No problem with fully voicing a new NPC. It will just be a problem if it would make logical sense for someone already in the world should be saying something new (like as I said, the arch-mage, or some regular point of contact in one of the guilds, or similar).