With games on current generation consoles blurring the lines between Hollywood-style epic narratives and conventional gameplay, the voice actors behind the lead characters in our favorite games can be crucial to the overall experience.
Even with the video game industry enjoying consistent growth while the movie industries try to re-invent themselves, the actors so crucial to the success of these games still don’t get the type of love Hollywood actors get.
There are obvious reasons voice actors for the most part aren’t elevated to mainstream celebrity status. On one hand, it’s understandable average players don’t associate the voice of their favorite character with the voice actor, given the fact that, unlike a movie, they’re not actually staring at the actor’s face for two hours. Of course, the “acting” isn’t the main entertaining aspect of a game; the gameplay is.
The question is, how important are these voice actors to the overall experience of a game?
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I like Nolan North, the guy is truly talented...his dubbing credits etc show just how versatile he is.
However more often than not he seems to just use his default voice. Maybe it's because he is now so famous..he doesn't have to work so hard.
But hearing the same voice in a different setting kind of ruins the experience a little for me.
He's a voice actor...he should be using different voices...the man has proved he can do it...so why doesn't he?
Do studio's think having the same voice as a popular franchise will give their own work more gravitas? It puts me off.
The same can be said for Claudia Black...love her work...was really excited to hear her in some games but that quickly became...oh it's Claudia again...i wonder if she's going to change her delivery in this game or is her character in this game just 'Claudia black'...again. In games at least she seems to have checked her acting skills at the door.
Voice actors should be more versatile than movie actors, movie actors can get away with using their own voices because there is so much more to their performance. Voice actors have to be 10 times better. And sadly that's not the case at the moment.
The main problem with video game dialogue is that actors are rarely together when recording takes place. 90% of acting is re-acting. They have nothing to react to. So it always sounds disjointed.
One actor might think a line is written angrily and react to that anger and shout his next line, but if the lead up line is delivered in a non-plussed way then that angry reaction is totally out of context.
Men and woman are equal so it doesn't matter what gender the lead is.
You gotta have a main character:
Man, Woman, Mutant, Alien, Droid, etc...