Voice Pitch Bug

[Claus]

Have they fixed the voice pitch bug yet or do we still have to use the default pitch?

By now, most people know that adjusting the voice pitch lower or higher in this game makes the main protagonist's voice sound a bit "robotic." I'm not sure if this is really why, but I remember reading that it happens because the voice files overlap twice... or something like that. I don't mind using the default voice pitch, but I definitely would've used a different pitch for my character if it sounded better. Though, at this point, I'm wondering if it's even a bug at all and this is just how the voice pitch was intended to work all along.

Does anyone know if there's been an official statement on the matter recently?

[ProestUnicorn]

Mods seem to fix it, but I haven't tested it personally. I am very doubtful that devs will do anything with it, while they cannot even fix other things.

[Claus]

Originally posted by ThraxxMedia:

If you've ever worked with audio software in any capacity, you'd know that altering the pitch of a person's voice is almost certainly bound to result in artifacting (i.e. introducing "noise" that would be perceived as robotic, tinny or otherwise unnatural).

Depending on how well you implement this, the results can sound better or worse. The Sims 4 does it very well (imho); while Hogwarts Legacy seems to fall short. The thing is: if it turns out that the original voice recordings are not really compatible with pitch changes (meaning: whatever you do, the quality will always get worse) then the only solution would be to re-record the entire game's audio... and that's just not feasible at all, thus will never happen.

Thanks for the input. Even though it's basically gibberish, The Sims 4 definitely does do voice pitch well. It sounds perfectly natural in comparison to Hogwarts Legacy, It might be odd, but any time I think of voice pitch in a character creation menu, I think of Phantasy Star Online 2 and the voice pitch slider option in that game. It wasn't super great, but it definitely got the job done decently well and I think that's exactly what any playerbase would want; for things to at least work well. One would think game development under Warner Bros. Games would be better than this.

[Claus]

Originally posted by ProestUnicorn:

Mods seem to fix it, but I haven't tested it personally. I am very doubtful that devs will do anything with it, while they cannot even fix other things.

Yeah, I agree. I remember reading that a spokesperson or something said in a game preview that they are aware of the voice pitch being bugged and that it will be fixed by launch. Ehh, it's been about a month already now. Still ain't fixed.

But, um... you say there's mods to fix the voice pitch?
I've only checked out Nexus Mods and haven't noticed.
Where they at? I wouldn't mind trying them out some time.

[john fortnite]

Yeah it's still not fixed. Really annoying.
I've also looked on Nexus for fixes for this, but I've found nothing.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

I thought I was imagining things, thank god I went with the default in the end. It seems as if the game was released in a kinda unfinished state (aside from all the stuff they cut at the last second ofc) as far as the technical side of things goes.

[zero.calvin]

so it wasnt fixed? i dont hear it anymore in my game, so I thought it was fixed... seems like my brain has filter out the distortion... =D

[Raven😂1407]

Since you can change it in the settings menu, there's no reason not to test it out from time to time.

[gzd]

I haven't followed any of the news about this game, before or after launch.

But the voice pitch bug was one of the very first things I noticed about this game. I created my character and selected a voice pitch one notch up, made it through the opening cinematic, then immediately deleted that save file and made a new character.

To me, it doesn't sound so much like the voice lines are overlapping but what I heard was that all of the breath noises and sibilance before and after the main consonant sounds in the words are pronounced are also pitched up or down, so in effect you hear that very noticeable, very unnatural sounding pitch change. Someone else mentioned Sims 4 and I agree - they offer the same voice pitch feature but the quality sounds far better.

As an amateur sound engineer, I'd suggest that they only pitch change certain frequencies of the sound files rather than blanket pitching the entire thing.

But what do I know, I'm just a rando on the Steam forum.

[rafihknoll]

Originally posted by ProestUnicorn:

Mods seem to fix it, but I haven't tested it personally. I am very doubtful that devs will do anything with it, while they cannot even fix other things.

Can you link to some mod that fixes the player's pitch? Googling didn't give me anything...

[john fortnite]

Originally posted by rafihknoll:

Originally posted by ProestUnicorn:

Mods seem to fix it, but I haven't tested it personally. I am very doubtful that devs will do anything with it, while they cannot even fix other things.

Can you link to some mod that fixes the player's pitch? Googling didn't give me anything...

Yeah I don't think there is any. I suspect that the other poster is just talking out of their ass. I've looked through Nexus, reddit, and 4chan, and I've asked people about a mod that fixes this, but I've found nothing still.

Although, if by some weird miracle you happen upon one, please post it.