Since It "Needed" To Be Done The New Spider-Man and X-Men Games Are Receiving Hollywood Voice Talent
Since we all know that the results are always terrific, either in a good or bad sense, Activision has revealed that they’re employing the use of several notable actors for their upcoming crop of Marvel video games. Even though the two Marvel games Activision is releasing this year aren’t based on movies, that isn’t stopping Activision from hiring some fanboy faves and somewhat down-on-their luck actors to portray a few notable heroes and villains.
In addition to the fine vocal talents of actors Josh Keaton and Christopher Daniel Barnes who will be voicing the present and future versions of Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Edge of Time, none other than former Batman actor Val Kilmer is hopping aboard the project. An icon of sorts in the 1980s and 1990s, the dude was both Ice Man in Top Gun and he played a solid Batman in Batman Forever, Val Kilmer hasn’t exactly had the best career of late with a string of poor straight-to-DVD films and a somewhat ballooning size which has been documented by the press. Val won’t be going the hero route with his role in Spider-Man: Edge of Time as he’ll be playing Walker Sloan, the big baddie of the game who may be a simple yet brilliant scientist but ultimately managed to find a way to kill our beloved web slinging hero.
Joining Val in Spider-Man: Edge of Time will be perpetual sci-fi hotties Laura Vandervoort (Smallville, V) and Katee Sackhoff (Battlestar Galactica) who will respectively portray Mary Jane Watson and the Black Cat. Both Laura and Katee have done a few voice acting gigs in the past but this will mark Val Kilmer’s first foray into voice acting for a game. While Val has done a few voice over roles in the past for TV projects (he voiced KITT in the Knight Rider reboot), I don’t know if we’ll either get Val at his best or Val not really giving a crap and just wanting to cash an easy paycheck.
In addition to getting some familiar talent for Spider-Man: Edge of Time, Activision has enlisted the services of Milo Ventimiglia, Jamie Chung and Scott Porter (Speed Racer) for X-Men Destiny. Best known for his role on the TV show Heroes as the super powered Peter Petrelli, Milo will be portraying one of the three new mutants that gamers can choose to play as in X-Men Destiny. Jaimie Chung, who some of you may recognize if you were one of the fifty people who saw the film Sucker Punch or Dragon Ball: Evolution, will be voicing the mutant Aimi Yoshida. It may seem odd to have two TV actors and a former member of the Real World who is now acting (Jaimie) be in an X-Men game but I don’t think it’s too much of a biggie. Milo is a self-professed comic fan and Scott and Jaime are solid actors who ought to give decent performances based on the material that’s given to them.
I don’t know if this crop of Hollywood talent will do much to either boost the sales of both Spider-Man: Edge of Time and X-Men Destiny or if it’ll ultimately be meaningless or in the worst case scenario completely sink the game. In the past I’ve voiced my views on notable actors appearing in video games since in some cases we get excellent stuff like as was the case with Sam Witwer in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed or the extensive cast of L.A. Noire but then we get stuff that simply falls flat such as Michael Madsen’s performance in Driver 3. Since the crop of actors Activision has picked for the new Marvel games are talented I’m expecting for the best but I won’t be surprised if there may be one or two dull lines here and there.
Spider-Man: Edge of Time will be available for the PS3/Xbox 360 in early October and X-Men Destiny will be available on the PS3/Xbox 360 in late September.
[via Variety]
