Celebrity Voice Actors

[Leftnt Sharpe]

While she's not a celebrity I'd also like to mention Jennifer Hale while I'm here. She's lent her voice to dozens of games (Metal Gear Solid, Mass Effect, Metroid Prime, Syphon Filter, Killer7, KOTOR etc) and I've yet to hear a bad performance from her.

Jen Hale is the Queen of voice acting. An honourable mention goes to Grey Delisle, who played Viconia and Nalia in the Baldur's Gate series and a half dozen other characters to! She also played the Handmaiden in KOTOR 2 and has done a lot of 'additional voices' in video games.

 

[lava_lamp]

morgan freeman needs to narrate a game

 

[plastic_window]

John DiMaggio's done a few things in Final Fantasy and (as has already been said) the Gears of War series - but he's not really all that famous outside of voice-acting itself. He's noted for doing the voice of Bender in Futurama - and speaking of Futurama, the voice for Hermes is Phil LaMarr who does the voice for Vamp in the MGS series.

Patrick Stewart and Robert Carlisle are down as voice actors for the new Castlevannia game. Robert Carlisle's been in Trainspotting, 28 Weeks Later and a bunch of other things.

 

[sln333]

No, celebrity actors are not needed to boost game sales. I'm sure most people buying games don't know who's doing the voices until they start playing. If a celebrity actor does the voice well I'm all for it. Samuel Jackson was great as Tenpenny in San Andreas. Michael Hollick was great as Niko in GTA IV, yet I'd never heard of him. The time you should watch out for a game is if celebrities are used as a selling point. That's when you know the game wouldn't sell well on its own because it's bad, so the developers bring in known people.
What matters is not if the voice actors are famous, but if they do their job well. Look at all the GTA games. Whether or not the person is famous, they are good at their job.

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

Ben Stiller should do Master Chief's voice.

It would make me laugh.

But he has to remove the helmet and do Blue Steel.

morgan freeman needs to narrate a game

No, he should narrate penis enlargement spam ads. That would be hilarious.

 

[Diablini]

Ben Stiller should do Master Chief's voice.

It would make me laugh.

That would be absolutely hillarious!

 

[quack35]

I don't think they actually boost sales of a game, but celebrity voice actors can be quite awesome, if they do a good job.

 

[EzraPound]

You don't need celebrities, but professional voice actors help.

 

[quack35]

While she's not a celebrity I'd also like to mention Jennifer Hale while I'm here. She's lent her voice to dozens of games (Metal Gear Solid, Mass Effect, Metroid Prime, Syphon Filter, Killer7, KOTOR etc) and I've yet to hear a bad performance from her.

She voiced Shepard in Mass Effect, right? She was awesome.

 

[Lono Shrugged]

No, he should narrate penis enlargement spam ads. That would be hilarious.

"Sometimes a man doesn't quite feel like a man and he needs a little hope dahnstairs"

If we all chip in ten bucks I'm sure we can make this happen.

 

[Torque669]

I didnt even know Patrick Stewart was in Oblivion for ages. Neither did I know Liam Nielson was in Fallout 3 for the most part. So for me they dont radically change anything.

However good voice actors in a game are definatly needed. LOTR Conquest comes to mind for bad voice acting. Frodo just sounds horrible in that game.

 

[Skreeee]

I've actually have never cared who was acting in a video game. I didn't even realize that until I saw this thread. It's importance has just never crossed my mind before.

 

[SimuLord]

Celebrities are all well and good but too many of them just plain aren't voice actors. Patrick Stewart stuck a stamp on his performance in Oblivion and you could hear his disinterest in the character. Granted, it was better than, say, having Wes Johnson handle Uriel Septim (who was, after all, an Imperial male), but I wanted to reach through the screen and say "Once more, with feeling."

 

[minoes]

I think "Devil may Cry" and "Heavenly Sword" are really interesting, because the characters are actually being played by actors. Reuben Langdon (Dante in DMC3 and 4) and Ana Torv (Nariko in Heavenly Sword) do not only lend their voices to these caracters, but also their manerisms and facial expressions.

 

[Lord Thodin]

CAPTAIN PICARD......


apologies for cruise control

 

[vonne]

the girl from verinoca mars, kristen bell, was good in assassin's creed

 

[Kiytan]

the only games i can recall that did have celebrities doing voices, have all been excellently casted and performed (all really, all been good games)

Patrick stewart in oblivion
Liam Neeson in f3
Mark Hamill in Arkham Asylum, and as ripburger in Full Throttle (also, i am so glad they picked the best voices from all the batman series to be in the games, i.e the ones from batman TAS)
Seth green in Mass Effect
Gary Oldman in the couple of games he's been in
Ron glass/zoe wannamaker/Stephen Fry (and the other few games he's been in)in fable 2

so in my opinion, it was money well spent, however i doubt it does a huge amount to increase sales of the game.

 

[Scrythe]

Jennifer Hale. That woman has been in pretty much everthing. Pick any cartoon or video game, and chances are she's in it. Just look at her IMDb [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0354937/] page.