voice-actor
Latest
Lego Batman 3 trailer casts Arrow's Amell, Conan O'Brien
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment issued a new trailer for Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham today, which shows a few of the big-name voice actors talking about their involvement in the Lego superhero game. As previously announced, Conan O'Brien will be a playable character in the game, joining the likes of film director Kevin Smith and Arrow's Stephen Amell, the latter reprising his role as Green Arrow. Lego Batman 3 will launch on November 11 for a whole mess of platforms: PS4, PS3, Vita, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PC, Wii U and 3DS. Players will be able to pick up the game's $14.99 season pass that guarantees access to six DLC add-ons. It will also be packed in to its own $270 PS3 bundle at launch. Head past the break to see the game's new trailer and check out the new heroic screens in the gallery below. [Image: WBIE]
WoW's voice actors alongside their characters
As much time as we spend inside World of Warcraft listening to character dialog, we don't always stop to think about the actors who are lending their voices to the pixels. It takes a lot of actors -- no, not just Chris Metzen -- to bring the world of Azeroth to life, and some of them may surprise you. Did you realize that the voice of Lorewalker Cho was also the voice of Winnie the Pooh? Or that a certain fictional president voiced Nozdormu in Cataclysm? The voice actors behind some of our favorite characters are full of surprises... even though, yes, a surprising number of characters are still voiced by Chris Metzen. To get an idea of who's playing what, check out this series of videos from TeddyKGaming, which pairs images of the actors with the characters they voice -- and has a ton of WoW's most memorable lines, to boot.
Dark Souls 2 invaded by Shaun of the Dead actor
Actor and comedian Peter Serafinowicz, known for his dubbed vocal performance as Darth Maul in Star Wars Episode 1 and the ever-grumpy Pete in Shaun of the Dead, will voice a new character in Dark Souls 2, publisher Namco Bandai announced this week. As part of the announcement, Serafinowicz revealed that he's a hardcore game player and a big fan of the original Dark Souls, calling it "the most engrossing game I've ever played," and "the best game of all time." Serafinowicz is a veteran voice actor within the industry, previously playing roles in games like Star Wars: Battlefront II and Lego City Undercover. In Dark Souls 2 Serafinowicz will voice Mild-mannered Pate, a mysterious treasure hunter who "may teach players a few tricks of his own in order to survive during their quest." Little else has been revealed regarding Pate's role in the story, but if we may suggest a minor change to the Dark Souls formula, Pate could serve as an ever-present companion character -- à la Navi, or Omochao -- chiding players for their missteps and offering helpful hints like "Hey! Blighttown is dangerous!"
A legendary chat with Wrathion VA Aaron Phillips
One of the more intriguing new characters to come out of Cataclysm was Wrathion, who took a curious journey through the Badlands as an egg and emerged with dubious intentions during the rogue legendary quest chain. Since then, Wrathion has led many a player of every class on a merry chase across the wilds of Pandaria in a legendary quest meant not just for rogues, but for all. Wrathion's motives have always been a little unclear, and whether he's working on the side of good, or with slightly more evil intentions, has been up for debate since his first appearance. But Wrathion simply wouldn't be Wrathion without the voice that brought him to life as a sometimes petulant, sometimes angry, and sometimes touchingly desperate whelp with an apparent plan to save the world. Whether casually ordering Fahrad to break a pair of legs, pleading with Chi-Ji, or throwing the temper tantrum to end all temper tantrums in his temporary home, the voice of Wrathion has been just as distinctive as the character itself. So how does one bring life to such a strange character? We were lucky enough to have the opportunity to ask Wrathion's voice actor himself. Aaron Phillips may be immediately recognizable for Wrathion, but his works far exceed the vocal stylings of one angsty dragon -- and you may be surprised to note that you've likely heard him in a variety of places.
Voiceover actor Matt Mercer on working in games and comics, plus the "Vezax voice"
Halion the Twilight Destroyer. General Vezax. Ka'roz the Locust. You know Matt Mercer already -- he's the voice booming in your head in Ulduar, during the Siege Orgrimmar, in the nooks and crannies of Azeroth. The phenomenally popular video game and anime voiceover actor is known for -- well, let me just slide you a link to his Wikipedia page and let you delight in discovering his stamp on one of your own favorite comics, anime or video games from Sinbad to Resident Evil 6. Behind that panoply of voices is a WoW player and fan whose GM, actress Michele Morrow, describes as a wonderfully down-to-earth and nice guy. "Every now and then, we'll have his boss [that he voiced in game] come along, and so we yell at him ... to do the voices," she recounted last week here at WoW Insider. "He's fantastic; you'll love him."
Bastion narrator lending his voice to Codename Cygnus radio drama
Logan Cunningham, known as the voice behind Bastion narrator Rucks, is lending his pipes to an interactive radio drama for iOS, Codename Cygnus. Developed by Reactive Studios, the project is seeking $11,000 on Kickstarter by August 11 to fund more episodes in its story arc. Cunningham's role in the story is that of the "first spy nemesis," and will deliver a "villainous speech" in the first episode, slated to launch this month. Each episode is expected to run between 15 and 20 minutes, "although the total playable content will be a lot more," the project page notes. Sarah Elmaleh (Skulls of the Shogun, Gone Home, Resonance) and Chris Ciulla (Fallout: New Vegas) are two of the 25+ voice actors that are also involved in the project. Codename Cygnus offers a simple UI and voice recognition for listeners to audibly direct how each episode plays out. The project is currently sitting at $7,388 in funding with nine days left in the campaign.
Actor teases new Kingdom Hearts voice work
Jesse McCartney is a voice actor for the Kingdom Hearts series; he's played Roxas for a few different games now. Earlier today, McCartney tweeted that he was "recording the next chapter" of the series, along with a picture of Roxas on a monitor, which you can see above. Unfortunately, the tweet and picture featuring the game have been removed; however, an earlier update confirmed McCartney is currently "behind the mic" working on something.The question remains: what game in the Kingdom Hearts series is McCartney working on? The likely answer is it's the North American release of Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD Remix, which features Final Mix, Chain of Memories, and 358/2 Days. Time will tell.
A lot of actors are lending their pipes to Sleeping Dogs
Sleeping Dogs has a lot of talent behind its themes of Chinese thug life and a (more western-oriented)Yakuza-inspired storyline. Voice actors for Sleeping Dogs include Lucy Liu, Edison Chen, Chin Han, Lindsay Price and... is that... Emma Stone? Huh.
The MMO Report: Shut up about Mass Effect edition
This week on The MMO Report, Casey tells everyone to stop whining about Mass Effect 3's ending, laments the loss of the "online" part of Warhammer 40K: Dark Millennium Online, touches on the World of Darkness keynote, and outlines The Secret World's preorder plans. He also reveals the identity of one of TERA's key voice actors: Michael Hogan (of Battlestar Galactica fame), who will play Samael in the final game. Finally, he pulls one measly letter from the mailbag and debates which class he represents in TERA. Enjoy the full MMO Report after the cut!
Resident Evil 6 listed in voice actor's résumé
Here's your first sign that production has actually started on a Resident Evil 6 -- besides, you know, all those Capcom producers saying it's going to be a long, long wait. Voice actor Joe Cappelletti (whose voice you might not know but have probably heard anyway) lists the unannounced game as one of his recent voice credits, as you can see on the page with the distracting background above. Cappelletti also has Combat Wings listed as a Capcom title, however, and there is currently no game that Capcom makes with that name. There is a Combat Wings: Battle of Britain by City Interactive, but nothing Capcom has announced. Maybe Cappelletti is just confused -- he also lists Steel Battalion on there, but presumably that is the Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor title coming to Kinect. Not that he wouldn't know what he worked on, but clearly he's been busy. At any rate, if Resident Evil 6 production is underway, that's good to know -- hopefully we've got one or two of the eight years it's expected to take out of the way already.
Agent 47 voice actor pleads the 5th on Hitman 5
In an interview with The Liberty Gaming.com, David Bateson, the ice cold voice of Agent 47 in the Hitman games, was reluctant to say much about the mysterious next sequel in the series. "As recently as this year, I even had someone call me up from IO Interactive to ask me to remove the fact that I was set to record the next installment in the franchise," Bateson told the site, "which I had written up as upcoming news on my website. I respect that of course, a comment like that can create all sorts of headaches to people with development deadlines to meet." "I have to plead the 5th Amendment on this one," Bateson said, before admitting that the new project has undergone "delays" -- despite the process being "a well oiled machine on recording day." That's not to say he just waltzed into the gig. "It seems that with company buy outs and global power shifts in the world of computer gaming and the Hitman franchise, there is now an LA-based caster on board, who is responsible for voice casting, and I had to audition along with the rest of the planet for the right to play Agent 47," Bateson recounted. "However, I have been informed by IO Interactive that I still have the part. I won't even bother to describe how gutted I would have been if they went for a sound-a-like."
Breakfast Topic: I am the lucid dream
Recently, I was talking to Matticus and Kinaesthesia on one of our podcasts about Ruby Sanctum. Toward the end of the discussion, Kina mentioned how much he loved Halion's voice actor, Matthew Mercer (granted, we didn't know that was his name at the time.) We agreed his voice acting was excellent, and Kina suggested Blizzard ought to keep bringing him back for more parts. To date, Mercer also has done the voice of General Vezax in Ulduar and Overthane Balargarde in Icecrown. Anyway, some days later while we priests were tossing the PoM around, the subject came up again, and Kina quoted the line Halion says when you enter phase 2: "You will find only suffering in the realm of twilight. Enter if you dare." He gushed at the inflection on the word "suffering," while I stated my preference for the way he taunts you with, "Enter if you dare." Our talk led to other memorable lines from Wrath. I immediately brought up Sara from Ulduar and quoted her haunting, "I am the lucid dream." Plus, who could forget a first visit to Ulduar? I remember my sleepy raid's wandering into the Antechamber around 1 a.m. the first night that patch 3.1 went live. After accidentally completing Crazy Cat Lady and distributing loot, we stood around deciding where to go next. Vent had gone quiet while we all tabbed out to read up on Hodir until a deafening scream cut through the silence of the Observation Ring. Everyone on Vent promptly freaked out: "What the hell was that!?!" I loved it.
DC Universe Online promises "all-star voice cast"
Just a few days after the preorder bonuses were released and beta signups began for DC Universe Online, Sony Online Entertainment unveiled the central lineup of voice actors for the game. Some of the names are familiar and unsurprising, but still nice to have confirmed. Mark Hamill will be voicing The Joker once again, and Kevin Conroy returns as Batman. SOE highlighted the two returning actors with a short video on the DCUO site entitled "The Voices of the Game." Fans of Joss Whedon's work were interested to see several familiar names in the list: Gina Torres as Wonder Woman, James Marsters as Lex Luthor, and Adam Baldwin as the voice of Superman. Michelle Forbes rounds out the cast list list as the voice of Circe. John Blakely, SOE's Vice President of Development, says "We're excited that not only will Mark and Kevin bring their talent back to the DC Universe as part of DC Universe Online, but we've hit the jackpot with a full cast that are veterans of movies, TV shows and games that our fans are crazy about."
Police suspect suicide in death of Japanese voice actor
Japanese voice actor Daisuke Gōri (real name: Yoshio Nagahori) passed away under somewhat bizarre circumstances in Tokyo this weekend -- he was found lying on his stomach in the streets of Nakano ward, bleeding from the wrist, with both a sharp weapon and his will lying nearby. Police are investigating the death as a suicide, though they haven't confirmed that ruling yet. Gōri had an extensive resume as a voice actor in both animation and video games, and is probably known best as the Japanese voices for both Tekken's Heihachi Mishima and Dead or Alive's Bass Armstrong. In Japan, he was renowned for doing voices for the Dragon Ball Z and Kinnikuman series. He was 57. [Via Kotaku]
Mark Hamill talks about game voice acting, Batman role
Mark Hamill has made a name for himself over the years with his game work, with high-profile roles in games like Full Throttle and Wing Commander 3. Not to mention his legendary performance as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series, which he reprised for Arkham Asylum. But Mark Hamill already had a name, and it was "Luke Skywalker." An interview with CVG suggests that the move was intentional. Hamill described the attitudes he faced when he started working in games. "I'm sure there's a range of opinions, from 'You're slumming it', or 'Can't you get more legitimate work?'," he said. "But that snobbishness comes with the business." He relished the opportunity to merge his animation and game careers with a return to Joker's smarmy mania. "I thought this will be one last chance to play Joker. And it was so much fun to play a character who is clearly insane." Here's a surprise: the reason Hamill hasn't performed Luke Skywalker's voice in one of about a million Star Wars games isn't because he's not interested in reprising the role (though he isn't): nobody ever asked him to. How has that never happened? So many games have been made based on the three movies that an established video game voice actor starred in, and it just never came up?
WoW Moviewatch: Jesse Cox Voice Actor Video Demo
Tipster Kerri clued me in to the Jesse Cox Voice Actor Video Demo on YouTube. This is definitely not the sort of movie we'd regularly feature on Moviewatch, of course, but it points out an interesting facet of machinima that we don't usually talk about. Namely, this video shows off the skills of the voice actors.Many times, a video can be visually impressive, but less-than-stellar voice acting can detract from the overall experience. Jesse Cox has worked with Myndflame in several videos, as well as starring in Divided Soul. By watching this demo reel, you can very clearly see how much character and technique he brings to his roles. I think it can't be understated how important it is to a machinima to have actors who can speak their lines fluidly, believably, and without awkward moments.Like I said, the video demo itself is pretty straight-forward. I hope it brings the results to Jesse that he wants. But, I wanted to feature it to help highlight the often unsung hero of machinima: the voice actor. Interested in the wide world of machinima? We have new movies every weekday here on WoW Moviewatch! Have suggestions for machinima we ought to feature? Toss us an e-mail at machinima AT wow DOT com.
Oh my! Stephen Fry to narrate the Littler-BigPlanet
American TV audiences know Stephen Fry as Dr. Gordon Wyatt on Bones. However, gamers are most familiar with Fry for his role as LittleBigPlanet's omnipotent narrator, his soothing voice carrying gamers through all of LBP's complex level-building tutorials. It looks like he's making a return to guide portable gamers, as his Twitter confirms his involvement in the upcoming PSP version of LittleBigPlanet.A large majority of Fry's narration was featured exclusively in the PS3 game's "Create" mode. How much time Fry spent in the studio may give us some insight into how complex the creation tools will be in the PSP version. Quick, someone shoot him a tweet![Thanks, damookman]
Voice of Dom takes Pacino part in Godfather II
Hey, we just got an email from our close personal friend Carlos Ferro -- oh, you know, the voice of Dom in the Gears of War series? He wanted to drop a line to let us know he'll be filling some very big shoes as Michael Corleone in the Godfather II game, which just got delayed to sometime between April and June of this year.The role of Michael – as even film neophytes among you likely know – brought Al Pacino the first and third of his eight Academy Award nominations. But hey, no pressure, Carlos.
The best thing you'll see today: Metal Gear voice cast improv
A mere five days into the new year and our sanity is being brought into question. Is this video after the break really what it seems to be? The principal voice cast of Metal Gear Solid 4 improvising a group therapy session during which the lines between their real selves and the characters they portray break down with high-larious results? Yep, it is.UltraNeko, host of the YouTube series Sadie's Gaming Infection, somehow managed to get David Hayter (Solid Snake), Jennifer Hale (Naomi Hunter), Paul Eiding (Col. Campbell), Christopher Randolph (Otacon), and Quinton Flynn (Raiden) into one room for one of the most bizarre -- yet entertaining -- gaming-related videos we've ever seen.Things we learned from watching the video: David Hayter likes to CQC random people on the street; Christopher Randolph thinks his cat is a real Metal Gear Mk. II; oh, and Quinton Flynn seems to really want to be the star of the next MGS. Raiden starring in MGS5 -- surely a joke, right? What's next? Area 51 is actually a secret stronghold of The Patriots? Sure. Hit the break and prepare to leave reality behind.
Interview with a Gnome Death Knight
We still have no idea who did the voice of the Headless Horseman, but if you're playing a male Gnome Death Knight lately, we know whose voice you've been listening to: Dino Andrade, recently interviewed by Geeks of Doom, a voice actor who's probably most heard as "Pop" of the Kellogg's Rice Crispies mascots. You can hear his reels and demos on his website, and sure enough, that's our Gnome.Andrade says the Blizzard recording was "the most secretive thing I have ever done" -- they didn't show him anything visually about what the character was or did, and apparently he wasn't even allowed to take the script out of the recording room. Andrade also says that Blizzard is keen to let voice actors do their thing -- rather than giving direction, they let the actor come up with lots of their own reads, and then chose the one they wanted to use. It's almost hard to believe that Blizzard's voice acting is so good, given how hands-off they are (you'd think they'd aim to connect it with the art or animation in some way), but Blizzard fans know how well it works -- the voice characterisation in Blizzard games has always been terrific.Very interesting -- while Blizzard's voices are one of the things that have really made their games successful, it's strange that they've never let us into the process more. Their sites are full of concept art and model designs, but it would be cool to hear an uncut recording session or find out exactly how voice recordings are integrated with the game. Maybe we'll see more on that in the future.
