Any era, doesnt matter. I just want to know of games where the actors knocked it out of the park.
Alan wake is damn good
Death from Darksiders. But that’s cheating.
I remember most of the super giant and double fine games having good voice acting. Jennifer Hale Femshepard from mass effect is a classic, and Matt Mercer does some great work with Edér and Aloth in pillars of eternity. Anything Keith David does is gold.
How has Baldur’s Gate 3 not been mentioned in this thread yet? Huge cast and everyone is going for it. Even the narrator. Especially the narrator.
I want a mod that makes Ron Howard the narrator in bg3
I want a mod for everything that just makes Morgan Freeman narrate it all.
Hell, that’s kinda the only voice I want to hear if we ever have Ai speaking to us.
All I really want is BG3 mechanics in a Discworld setting.
GTA San Andreas has a few good ones my Favorite Being AXL Rose as the DJ from KDST.
But many suprising actors in there : Samuel Jackson, James Woods, Peter Fonda and Ice T:
https://www.behindthevoiceactors.com/video-games/Grand-Theft-Auto-San-Andreas/
Disco Elysium
Stephen Merchant and JK Simmons do a great job in Portal 2
I think Hades is the best overall, which has been mentioned here. Everything from Supergiant Games is great. I’ve seen Disco Elysium mentioned too, which is also great.
But I think one game that is underappreciated and not mentioned here is Horizon: Zero Dawn. Ashley Burch won several awards for her performance as Aloy. I think part of the reason it gets forgotten is that the facial animations in cutscenes are bad, at least in the main game, which led to people just not liking the cutscenes very much. The DLC’s animations are pretty good though.
One of the best villains I can remember from a game, Handsome Jack in Borderlands 2. Maybe he was just written so well, but he was amazing.
Troy Baker & Ashley Johnson in Last of Us will stay with me for life.
The narrator in The Stanley Parable made me lose it so many times.
Cave Johnson… Love J.K Simmons work overall but Cave was perfect.
All the Portal characters, really. Cave, GLaDOS, Wheatly, Chell…
Agreed, didn’t mean to leave anyone out. Brilliant writing with excellent voice acting in both games.
Some of my favorites:
- GLaDOS from Portal 1+2: Ellen McClain did such a fantastic job balancing a monotonous robotic tone with human emotions and adding subtle glitches to show not everything was 100% alright. She defined what a female robot voice should sound like for that decade. I saw that Stephen Merchant was mentioned and while his performance was good and Wheatley’s character was hilarious, I think McLain’s performance as GLaDOS was more original and memorable.
- Narrator from The Stanley Parable: Kevan Brighting was arguably the protagonist of the game and the player was the annoying mob to him. As the only chacter with dialogue in the entire walking sim game, he had to carry almost the entire game’s story, personality, and charm all through his voice. And it’s honestly so fun how disappointed, annoyed, and exasperated he gets when the player refuses to listen.
- The Joker from Batman Arkham Asylum: This one is cheating cause Mark Hamill has played The Joker in almost every modern animated medium available. Still, there’s a reason his version is so iconic. It’s just so bittersweet that he refuses to ever voice The Joker again since Kevin Conroy, the VA for his Batman passed away.
Edit: After reviewing my list, it seems like I like offscreen narrators who insult the player. How funny
Getting the animated series actors to voice the Arkham games was a stroke of genius, though.
Narrator in Bastion. Just glorious.
Recency bias because I’m currently playing it, but Cherami Leigh, Keanu Reeves, and Idris Elba — and a ton of others — in Cyberpunk 2077. If you like sci-fi and fantasy, you’re covered. Asuna from Sword Art Online. Neo from The Matrix. And Roland from The Dark Tower. The fact that the latter two actors have their characters modeled after them make it more than just voice acting, though. Johnny Silverhand moves like Keanu Reeves in addition to looking like him. And Solomon Reed moves like Idris Elba. That hulking walk he did in Luther? It’s all over the Reed character. As for Cherami Leigh, well, you can make V look like whatever you want. You can even make her male, in whole or in part (trans/non-binary characters are possible, they even have a male voice actor).
I’m seeing a ton of great answers in the comments though. Shout-out to the person who said Portal. Ellen McLain has a role in Cyberpunk as well. Early on, in your garage, your car is struck by a robotaxi. The robotaxi’s AI owner invites you to come to their facility for a tour as well as repayment as a way of apology, and he also has a mission for you. This AI has “children” that have been acting crazy (and, one of them hit your car) and he wants you to bring them back in. One of them is voiced by Ellen McLain. In her GLaDOS voice and with lines from Portal. It’s amazing. They had to have gotten permission from Valve for that little stunt. If you like Portal, it’s probably gonna be one of your favorite parts of Cyberpunk.
I love Keanu but his voice acting in CP2077 felt forced and unnatural










