The Lay D Denton Project, created by a group of modders collectively know as Lay D Dev, dds a feature cut early in the development of Ion Storm’s influential immersive sim: the ability to select the protagonist’s gender. The mod is a significant effort. All of JC Denton’s 1700 lines of dialogue have been re-recorded by voice actress Karen Rohan, under the vocal direction of Chris Rohan. “The performance strives to faithfully preserve the character of JC,” reads the mod description. “Every single line was performed directly after listening to the original Male JC’s read. While not blatantly copying every single line, the original performance was used as the primary anchor point for the line reads. Variations were only made after careful consideration. “In addition, we have strived to preserve the more beloved community one-liners as accurately as possible.” Elsewhere, all gender pronouns and references have been edited to reflect the female protagonist. “Because of the natural cadence of human speech and the ear’s natural sensitivity to abnormalities in speech, this was by far the most challenging effort in the project,” the modders said. The modders also added several small additional characters throughout the game who were designed to subtly acknowledge JC’s gender using a pronoun. A select few characters were problematic enough that the modders felt they had to be recast. “We just couldn’t get the pronouns to work no matter how hard we tried with Harold (the mechanic near the 747) and the OwO secretary during the UNATCO escape,” one of the modders who goes by the name Xriborg explained in the comments. “Morpheus was recast simply so we could make him more intelligible. And finally the VersaLife spy in the canal bar had his dialogue reworked because he originally mistakes JC for Paul. Makes sense for Male JC but it was a stretch for the Female JC. Those are the only recasts.” And then there’s the female JC model, which has been restored (it’s also slightly shorter than male Denton). “In addition to the skin, all player sounds such as jumping, running, getting hit, dying, etc. have been re-recorded,” the modders said. “The first-person model has been altered to match JC’s selected skin tone and tweaked in an effort to look more feminine.” The video below, released by the modders alongside the mod itself, showcases the impressive work done to Deus Ex.
