Isn’t that like every movie cast with A-listers, though? Clear and Present danger exists in a weird world where Harrison Ford doesn’t exist, Mission Impossible in a weird world where Tom Cruise doesn’t exist, etc.
ShivaX
1830
To some extent. I think it video games making the character look like the real person is just off putting to me for some reason.
Like Reedus in Death Stranding is just Norman Reedus to me. I can’t separate him from the character. It feels like a vanity project or something if that makes sense? Like… Keanu could look like literally anything. He could be a 15’ foot tall battle mech or something. But no, he looks exactly like himself. It feels lazy.
Here is Dexter in CP2077:
Here is his voice actor:
The same is true for… basically every single other character in the game.
Except Keanu (and Cohh/Cox, but they’re likely one-off characters).
Movies get away with it because people aren’t shapeshifters in the real world so Jack Nicholson is going to look like Jack in any part he plays. It’s part of the challenge of acting, which many would argue actors often fail at.
In games everyone IS a shapeshifter and they just chose to make Keanu look like Keanu because it was easier, stroked his ego and they got to play the “famous person you recognize” game. Death Stranding was definitely a vanity thing for Reedus imo.
Often times real actors aren’t great voice actors on top of it. I’d rather have a hundred Jennifer Hales and Doug Cockles than a Norman Reedus at the end of the day (though he did fine iirc). Hopefully Keanu will do well, but I’m going to spend every second he’s on screen dreading him dropping fucking “Woah” on me, even if it never happens.
LOL
The whole point of paying Keanu for the role is to use his likeness…
Is it though? Charles Dance doesn’t look anything like the emperor of Nilfgaard in Witcher 3, and that worked just fine, even though I’m 100% sure that Charles Dance convincingly looks like the emperor of wherever without much effort. If they had made the emperor look like him, which would have been a reasonable thing for them to have done considering his acting career, I think it would probably be a little off-putting to people like ShivaX and I.
It’s not a deal breaker or anything, I’m just not sure celebrities need to look like themselves in video games, even if they are actors, when they could look exactly how the writer pictured the character in their mind. Maybe Keanu Reeves is exactly who the guy who designed Cyberpunk had in mind for all I know, and maybe the whole thing will turn out to be totally inspired.
In generality though, I’m not sure I really want real world celebrities or more specifically their likenesses in my otherwise completely fantasy AAA RPGs.
There’s also the fact that famous actors get cast in animated movies all the time and very rarely look like themselves, or are even human. But sure, they don’t get paid as much. And I’m pretty sure CDPR hired Keanu to be Keanu, not because he’s a good voice actor.
There’s also Lance Reddick in both Horizon Zero Dawn and Quantum Break, reprising his most famous role as “Lance Reddick”.
morlac
1835
Keanu was in A Scanner Darkly so he does have a precedence of breaking the mold. I have no issue with it personally.
He kinda ruined that movie, to be honest. It was great until the final act when he was required to, well, act.
The second two might be true (well, the last one surely is) but it is definitely NOT easier. Replicating a real-world person in a game is more difficult and more time consuming than just making somebody up. It’s not like you can just point a camera at him and then, look, we have a Keanu model!
That’s a good point, seems odd they went to the effort to get Charles Dance for the role and then didn’t bother to use his likeness. Especially since I’m pretty sure the Venn diagram of Witcher fans and Game of Thrones fans probably looks like a circle.
morlac
1839
Besides the point but I hear ya. How about Newman in Toy Story 2? Or Tom Hanks in Polar Express, or Steve Buscimi in Home on the Range, old guy from Home, Robin William’s in Aladdin. The Cars movies went out of their way to match all the actors even with their names. Well as close a car can look to a person anyhow. Point being it’s really not all that unprecedented to model animated characters after actors voicing them, in fact it’s fairly common.
She’s an Aussie, mate! Ex-IGN. Though I detect a tiny bit of US accent creeping in there.
Oh really? I actually thought English until I listened a bit longer.
Dystopian future where streamers are giving quests? I dunno, seems a little too spot on to actually complain about. I’d have issues if this was being done to eke good reviews out of them, but it doesn’t seem to be the case.
I wouldn’t read/watch her review anyway, so nothing is lost, I suppose.
KevinC
1846
Is that reaction from watching the video or just the title? Because her point was “I wasn’t going to review it because I don’t review games.”
I don’t care much about video reviews, except from some very few reviewers. I watched some of her stuff before and it didn’t resonate with me, so I’m not really interested in whatever she makes. I have no ill will against her, mind you. I just don’t see any reason to hear what she has to say over other sources I appreciate and trust far more.
I have never been able to play a Ghost Recon game because of Michael Ironside. When I was a kid I went to the theater to see Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden zone at least a dozen times. Then I religiously watched V the Series. I just cannot hear that voice and not think “one dimensional bad guy.”
I have similar problems when I hear Clancy Brown in a game.
