NPC accents

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Recently I got involved in a bizarre conversation regarding the accents that the characters in BG2 have, and we were trying to place them within the world. Now we didn't have a lot of success, so I thought I'd post what we thought, and see if anyone else could help...

• Aerie - North east USA
• Anomen - USA, but with put-on British
• Cernd - ?
• Edwin - Southern spain
• HaerDalis' - ?
• Imoen - California, USA
• Jaheira - Hungarian
• Jan - North east USA
• Keldorn - USA, but with put-on British
• Korgan - North west Scotland
• Mazzy - Home counties, England
• Minsc - Russia
• Nalia - California USA
• Valygar - ?
• Viconia - ?
• Yoshimo - Polynesia

So, if you can fill in the gaps, or improve/correct any of our guesses, then let me know (I'll edit the post, to keep it up to date).

[ June 30, 2003, 13:50: Message edited by: Trydan ]

 

Minsc and Jahiera sound more Romanian that Russian, IMO. Slight difference.

Edwin sounds like a Spaniard.

Keldorn is Scottish, but a more refined dialect (think Sean Connery).

Anomen's accent is American, but overly proper and aristocratic, with a British hint to it.

Yoshimo sounds Polynesian to me, not so much mainland Asian.

Everyone else seems to be pegged just fine.

 

Jaheira's one isn't Russian. I doubt it's even Slavic. A bit Arabic sometimes, but not really it either. I suppose it's been invented especially for her. For my ears it's something intended to be Eastern but not truly identifiable. Perhaps it's just her Tethyrian and half-elven legacy.

 

Saemon Havarian has an Australian accent, of that I am pretty sure..."Oh Bloody Hell!"

I think that Jaheira is meant to be Middle Eastern, at least that would match her name...

 

I believe that Thay is the FR equivalent of Egypt, so maybe Edwin's accent is like that of an Egyptian's accent (whatever that sounds like, or even if there is one).

 

@Oaz: My dad's Egyptian. I lived in Egypt for 3 years. If Edwin's accent is Egyptian I'll eat my camel. (Well, he spits too much anyway-the camel, although perhaps Edwin as well.)

Jaheira and Khalid's names are definitively Arabian, but her accent sounds Eastern European to me.

In the process of downloading new voice sets, I came across some new ones that Margot, the voice actress for Jaheira, created. Under a voice for a "Natasha"- she describes it as another attempt at a Hungarian accent.

http://www.merrymeet.com/voxpopuli

 

While Margot is indeed a most prolific _mod_ voice actress, she is not the voice of Jaheira. That's an actress by the name of Hidi Shannon.

If you like the sound of Margot's voice, though, she plays a starring role in the recently-released "Getting Rid of Anomen" mod (which is an add-on for Kelsey romance players.)
Getting Rid of Anomen can be downloaded here.

 

What I'm regretting the most about making MODs is that you have to do soundsets. What is even worse is if you need to record some dialogues between existing NPCs as well.

As to existing NPCs I think a couple of them don't actually have Accents. Though most of them are American, because the game is.

I'm trying to place Irenicus though. because sometimes he sounds British and sometimes he sounds American. Perhaps he's swimming inbetween?

 

Yeah, like the Red Hot Chili Peppers song Emmit Remus:

"An English girl, an American man."

 

Mazzy's accent is a bit ok yah for the home counties.
(ps, ok yah is brit slang for snobby)
She must be aristocracy. Apologys to any aristocrats here. I am sorry my Lady/Lord.

 

She's high on the ladder, but she appears to be a citizen rather than noble. But Amn being a typically merchant republic, sort of Venice, so it's still possible she does have some nobilliary rank.

I honestly see no reason why you should apologise for your comment. Accents are what they are and you didn't mean anything offensive, did you?