Was the intellivision the only console to have a Voice synthesizer

[Jim Pez]

Was the intellivision the only console in the 70's and 80's to have a voice synthesizer?

[Zap!]

The Odyssey II had "The Voice"

 

 

http://www.ozyr.com/o2/o2voice.html

Edited October 7, 2016 by Zap!

[+cmart604]

No, but it was the sexiest.

[Newsdee]

BEEEE SEVENTEEEEH BOM BAH

[Tales from the Game Room]

The Odyssey 2 had a voice synthesizer as well, just like Zap! is displaying. The difference was that the Intellivision voice was activated by the mechanism from programing in the special game cartridges, while the Odyssey voice was in the mechanism itself.

 

It was a strange, and turbulent time...lol

[Noah98]

Not a console really, but the TI 99/4a had a voice synthesizer.

[high voltage]

Not a console really, but the TI 99/4a had a voice synthesizer.

 

A8 and C64 too

[CatPix]

PC had the Covox Speech thing, too. But are we talking first-party support or third-party support?

Else, I think that only a few computer came with voice synthesis built-in, the only one I know being the Exelvision EXL100 (and the improved Exeltel).

 

 

https://youtu.be/zMaHOVeI_UI?t=1m40s

 

an excellent voice synthesis, in French.

 

Programmers happily used it to generate sounds effects that sounded much better than the build-in sound chip (that is probably close to the TI99, since the Exl100 was made by ex-engineers from Texas Instrument France, based on the TI99/A)

Edited October 7, 2016 by CatPix

[empsolo]

Weren't things like voice synthesizer modules kind of useless in the long run considering within a few short years cart sizes would prove to be be big enough to carry voice samples? Don't get me wrong, it was a neat idea but in the long run it seems rather useless.

Edited October 7, 2016 by empsolo

[CatPix]

Your sound chip must be able to output the voice samples. The simpler the chip is, the less likely it is to be able to output voice speech. And in the 8 bit era, especially early 8 bits, the size of voice files would simply fill a whole cartridge without any hope for the game to be there. It's why those add-on were more or less bulky, because they had their own bank of phonemes/sounds pre recorded.

 

It's hard to realize but voice recording, even simplified to 8 bits, take ALOT of space. And remember than early Atari carts held as little as 2Ko, for comparison, a 3 minute MIDI file is 15 Ko.

 

Plus remember that in the eyes of the industry of the era, the video games consoles were a fad. The Atari VCS was originally planned to be made only for 2 years. Mattel dropped the Intellivision as soon as the market started to crash (and yet INTV managed to sell Intelli system and games up to 1990).

So in thir regard, the important thing was to think short term, not long term. And selling accessories was a way to improve on your existing hardware rather than conceiving a whole new one, and ensure that msot people already owning your console woudl liek to have the new accessory.

Edited October 7, 2016 by CatPix

[Great Hierophant]

PC had the Covox Speech thing, too. But are we talking first-party support or third-party support?

Else, I think that only a few computer came with voice synthesis built-in, the only one I know being the Exelvision EXL100 (and the improved Exeltel).

 

 

https://youtu.be/zMaHOVeI_UI?t=1m40s

 

an excellent voice synthesis, in French.

 

Programmers happily used it to generate sounds effects that sounded much better than the build-in sound chip (that is probably close to the TI99, since the Exl100 was made by ex-engineers from Texas Instrument France, based on the TI99/A)

 

That game is, um, interesting. I do not know another game that used a voice synthesizer phonemes for sound effects!

[mr_me]

Weren't things like voice synthesizer modules kind of useless in the long run considering within a few short years cart sizes would prove to be be big enough to carry voice samples? Don't get me wrong, it was a neat idea but in the long run it seems rather useless.

Even with the Intellivision most of the voice data was on the cartridges. The Intellivoice was great but unfortunately hardware perpherals rarely sell well. Programmers didnt want to make games that required unpopular peripherals. Later the voice chip became cheap enough that it could be included on each cartridge but thats about when Mattel Electronics went out of business. The Intellivision III would have had voice built in. B17 Bomber, Bomb Squad, Space Spartans were great games.

[CatPix]

 

That game is, um, interesting. I do not know another game that used a voice synthesizer phonemes for sound effects!

Several EXL100 games use phonemes for sound effect since the vocal ship is built into the computer and allowed for richer sounds than the sound chip. Unfortunately not a lot used the voice synthesis because the chip was cryptic to use and the most straightfowrad solution was to send voice samples to Exelvision, which themselve sent them to Texas instrument France to be converted into a digital file. A tedious and long process that most programmers didn't bothered to do, especially given the poor sales of the EXL100.

[Kiwi]

Vtech Socrates had a cartridge you could buy to add voices into this unit. I had this system when I was a kid.

 

[CatPix]

If we go into educationnal toys, then the Speak'n'Spell is a clear winner in the early entry in the world of talking interactive device, having been released in 1978.

Sure it's not a console, but, it has input, a video display with characters, and programs on cartridges. It's closer to being a video game than early LED portable games Mattel released the previous year!