Would you play a game with only Spanish voice acting?
Hi there!
I introduced myself here recently, but I'm Widijou, and I'm developing Thumps & Blows, a chaotic stickman fighting game. I'd like to ask for your opinion about the game's voice acting.
As an indie developer from Spain with a limited budget, I can't afford full English voice acting. Instead, I recorded the Spanish voices myself with the help of some friends.
In the Spanish version, you can hear all of the voicelines, but in every other language, characters only use neutral voice lines, such as yells, screams, and the original names of certain attacks.
I made this decision because, from my perspective, players around the world are already used to hearing full English or Japanese voice acting in videogames, but voice acting in other languages is much less common and is usually reserved for local audiences.
There are cases, like in the Tekken series, for example, where most characters speak English or Japanese, while others also use lines in their native language. There are also games that are heavily inspired by a specific country or culture, so using that language feels natural.
Thumps & Blows doesn't really fit either of those situations, so I decided to keep the Spanish dialogue exclusive to the Spanish version. Lately, though, I've started wondering if that was the right decision. Keeping the original Spanish voices in every language could give the game more personality, but I'm worried that some players might reject the game because of it.
What do you think?
I've included two versions of the same character video introduction below: one with neutral voice lines and one with the original Spanish voice acting, so you can compare them.
Thank you!
Character presentation with neutral voice lines:
https://youtu.be/Xsi-_KQCUB8?si=8UkxKrloovDBPTD6
The same video with Spanish voice lines:
https://youtu.be/RkJpp245J2w?si=Ciq9TTW5dmGpbzpy