‘A’ list actors in games

The current trend is for games to use not only the voices, but also the accurate likeness of the actor as the main characters.  As with films, this fuels a race to sign the biggest celebs, and at great expense.

Is this the right direction? Is it increasing the cost of games unnecessarily just for the sake of ‘celeb’ status? Are games more immersive if the characters and voices are anonymous? Should the focus for a game be just a good game rather than a ‘star-studded’ cast?

  • I am OK with stars giving voice to the game characters, but I dislike it when game developers create characters that look like the movie stars. Not sure if they want to create the hype around their games like that, because the only thing I can tell about these games is, Oh, it's the game where XYZ starred. I don't find it as appealing as a well-developed background story of the fictional character.

  • Game industry is trying to do what movie industry has been doing for quite some time - they are trying to hype the game just because it has a certain actor, director or celebrity in it. It's like when you have a movie advertisement where the main thing it's trying to say is "starring Oscar best actor winner" or "Oscar winning director" without even telling what the movie is about or showing the movie merits. It's a bad trend, but like many things in marketing, it works so I don't think it'll end anytime soon.

  • Few actors in games are : Kit Harington in “Call of Duty”, Keanu Reeves in “Cyberpunk 2077” and  Kristen Bell in “Assassin’s Creed”.

  • I don't care personally and I am never going to buy or not buy a game based on who the characters look like but developers don't see it as increasing cost, they think it will increase sales of the game and make more money, otherwise they wouldn't do it, so they're betting on star power like movie studios.

  • I remember Mark Hamill starred in Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger way back in 1994 when movie style cut scenes were a brand new thing Blush