# Voice

Ren'Py includes support for playing back voice in conjunction with dialogue. This is done through the voice statement, which gives the voice filename to play:

    voice "line0001.ogg"
    "Welcome to Ren'Py"

Normally, a playing voice is stopped at the start of the next interaction. The voice sustain statement can sustain voice playback through an interaction.

    voice "line0001.ogg"
    "Welcome to Ren'Py..."

    voice sustain
    "... your digital storytelling engine."

The `config.voice_filename_format` variable allows you to customize the voice filename, making it possible to omit directories and extensions.

## Voice Tags

Ren'Py includes a voice tag system that makes it possible to selectively mute or unmute a character's voice. To take advantage of this system, supply a voice_tag argument to each `Character()`, and use the `SetVoiceMute()` or `ToggleVoiceMute()` actions to allow the player to toggle the voice.

For example:

    define e = Character("Eileen", voice_tag="eileen")
    define l = Character("Lucy", voice_tag="lucy")

    screen voice_toggle:
        vbox:
            textbutton "Mute Eileen" action ToggleVoiceMute("eileen")
            textbutton "Mute Lucy" action ToggleVoiceMute("lucy")

    label start:
        show screen voice_toggle

        voice "e01.ogg"
        e "You can turn a character's voice on and off."

        voice "l01.ogg"
        l "Yeah! Now I can finally shut you up!"

        voice "l02.ogg"
        l "Wait... that means they can mute me as well! Really?"

## Automatic Voice

Ren'Py includes support for automatically determining the voice file to play, making it possible to play back voice without having to put voice statements before each line of dialogue.

This is done by creating voice files that match the identifier for each line of dialogue. To determine the identifiers to use , first export the dialogue to a spreadsheet by choosing from the launcher "Extract Dialogue", "Tab-delimited Spreadsheet (dialogue.tab)", and "Continue". This will produce a file, dialogue.tab, that can be loaded in a spreadsheet program.

The first column of the spreadsheet is the identifier to use, with other columns giving more information about the dialogue.

To make Ren'Py automatically play voices, set `config.auto_voice` to a string containing {id}. When dialogue occurs, {id} is replaced with the dialogue identifier, forming a filename. If the filename exists, it is played.

For example, if we have:

    config.auto_voice = "voice/{id}.ogg"

And the dialogue identifier is `demo_minigame_03fc91ef`, then when the corresponding line is shown, Ren'Py will look for the file `voice/demo_minigame_03fc91ef.ogg`. If the file exists, Ren'Py will play it.

## Voice Functions

## Voice Actions