The surprisingly robust careers of Star Trek stars who became video game voice actors

 

It would be hard to overstate the impact that Star Trek has had on geek culture. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that when folks who spent years watching the shows pursue careers in game development, they seek out the actors from one of their favorite TV shows to bring their creations to life. From TOS to VOY, many Star Trek actors followed up their star-making screen performances with voiceover work in video games.

 

Of course, many of the cast members reprised their roles for licensed Star Trek games or reappearances of their Starfleet personas over the years; studios understandably don’t want to recast iconic parts if they can avoid it.

 

But games have also provided many of these talented actors with a chance to create new characters and explore new genres beyond the ones that made them household names. If they’re not so versatile, working in games at least meant a chance for a paycheck after the series finale aired.

 

A dive into the dense history of games starring Trek alumni reveals some unexpected superstars and influential roles.

 

The Original Series

You may recall that William Shatner’s post-Trek career included getting his name on a series of ghostwritten science fiction books dubbed TekWar. In addition to spawning a TV series and TV movies, the novels were turned into a first-person shooter in 1995. He voiced the character Walter Bascom in all of these projects. TekWar’s game incarnation is notoriously bad, though, and the Walter Bascom performance is exactly what you’d imagine it to be: 100 percent pure Shatner.

 

Outside of his own IP, Shatner is also one of many Trek actors to have a role in the space sim Elite: Dangerous.

 

Leonard Nimoy’s video game work was limited, but it covered a lot of genre ground. Let’s get the obvious one out of the way first: Many people know him as the narrator for Sid Meier’s Civilization IV, a perfect match for the audience who loved him as the matter-of-fact Spock.

 

Nimoy reads quotes for every discovered tech in Civilization IV.

 

In a very different direction, Nimoy also narrated a strange pet-caring game called Seaman, initially released for the Sega Dreamcast in 1999. If you know, you know. For the sake of those who don’t, let’s move on.

 

Rounding out his eclectic video game credits is the role of Master Xehanort in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance and Kingdom Hearts 3D: Birth by Sleep. (Let’s not hold him accountable for the naming conventions in those games.)

 

The most prolific TOS cast member when it comes to video game credits is George Takei, and his work has run the gamut from serious to silly.

 

Takei's many cutscenes in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3.

 

His first role was in the Treyarch hack-and-slash game Draconus: Cult of the Wyrm in 2000, followed by playing Lord Hakkera in space trading sim Freelancer in 2003. You might notice a theme here: game studios like casting Star Trek actors in space sims. Who knew!

 

Takei is also one of the actors doing a lot of grunting and groaning for Pain, a wacky, lesser-known PlayStation 3 exclusive from 2007 (think Goat Simulator, but with celebrities like Takei, Flava Flav, and Elvira instead of the goat.

 

Fans of FMV and RTS games will definitely remember Takei’s campy turn as Emperor Yoshiro, chewing scenery alongside Tim Curry, J.K. Simmons, and Ivana Milicevic in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3. He’s still being sought out by devs, with his most recent role as Masumi Arakawa’s English voice in the 2020 title Yakuza: Like a Dragon.

 

It’s also worth noting that Walter Koenig (also a Babylon 5 alum, of course) played the villain Drexel in an FMV game called Maximum Surge in 1996. The project was canceled, and from the snippets of trailer footage that have survived, that may have been a good thing. Or maybe it would have gone the way of "so bad it’s good." Sadly, we’ll never know.

The Next Generation

The iconic baritone of Patrick Stewart has appeared in several video games, and not just when he’s donning the mantle of Picard in Star Trek franchise titles or of Professor X in X-Men games.

 

Probably his most widely known video game role was Emperor Uriel Septim in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, a perfect regal role for the Shakespearean actor—though I felt he was underutilized, given that his character infamously perished in the first 10 minutes. At least Sean Bean was still there (and uncharacteristically alive) to keep the gravitas train rolling.

 

Patrick Stewart voices the intro to The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

 

Stewart has also been a part of the storied Castlevania series, playing Zobek in Castlevania: Lords of Shadow in 2010 and its sequel in 2014. But it’s not all AAA titles in the former captain’s resume. Most recently, he took on narrator parts for two artistic and macabre puzzle games: My Memory of Us in 2018 and Felix the Reaper in 2019.

 

Most of the other faces from the Enterprise bridge have made surprisingly few game appearances, but a couple of big science fiction games showed an interest in the cast from this series. Jonathan Frakes, Marina Sirtis, Michael Dorn, Denise Crosby, John de Lancie, and Dwight Schultz all voiced characters in the XCOM 2: War of the Chosen expansion.

 

Elite: Dangerous also drew on the talents of Sirtis, Dorn, de Lancie, and Brent Spiner. And fans of the Mass Effect trilogy will remember Sirtis for her turn as the Asari villain Matriarch Benezia in the first game.

 

When he’s out of the prosthetics and cosmetics that transform him into Worf, Michael Dorn has embarked on an active career in video game voice work. Fans of Sierra Entertainment’s point-and-click adventure games may have noticed him as Dr. John in Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers, which released in 1993. From there, his first big-name credit was in Fallout 2, playing Marcus and Frank Horrigan; he later revisited his part as Marcus in Fallout: New Vegas.

 

BioWare devs were clearly fans of both Star Trek and of Dorn because they hired him to play Bhaal in Baldur’s Gate 2 (a classic if there ever was one) as well as Gatatog Uvenk and Verf in Mass Effect 2 (ditto). Blizzard Entertainment fans have heard his dulcet tones voicing Tauren and human NPCs across Azeroth in World of Warcraft, as well as various characters in StarCraft 2 expansions. He also acted as the narrator for the 2016 reboot of Master of Orion. (It seems that being the serious one on an Enterprise bridge sets you up well to voice a 4X game!)

 

Too young, too smart, and too lacking in social skills, poor Wesley was always a bit of an outsider on TNG. (And more than an outsider among the fandom.) While many of his costars worked with the same game studios and science fiction projects over the years, Wil Wheaton has mostly also struck out on his own in the geekdom.

 

He played several characters in the MMORPG EverQuest II, which launched in 2004. Wheaton was then connected to the Tom Clancy games, with voice work in several Ghost Recon titles as well as in Rainbow 6: Lockdown. He has also built a long relationship with Rockstar, appearing in minor parts for multiple Grand Theft Auto projects, as well as working with Double Fine in 2014 to play Curtis the Lumberjack in Broken Age.

 

But it seems like every Star Trek actor to do video game work winds up appearing in a game made by Bethesda, BioWare, or Blizzard at some point, and Wheaton did show up to voice the robobrains and Super-Ego in Fallout: New Vegas.

 

John de Lancie may not have been a core cast member, but those infrequent spots as Q in TNG and beyond still cemented him as an icon for Trekkies. And with such a distinctive timbre to his voice—he's possibly the Star Trek actor whom you'll most immediately recognize within three words—it’s perhaps unsurprising that he has done a huge amount of voiceover work. If a game (or even a children's cartoon) needs someone to sound like chaos personified, de Lancie is the one you call.

 

But it's not all wackiness and ponies on his CV. De Lancie took on the role of William Miles in the modern-day sections of Assassin’s Creed: Revelations and Assassin’s Creed III. Even though the character does appear in later installments, it sounds like a different voice actor who hasn't been credited. (Maybe de Lancie despised that parkour-through-burning-buildings finale as much as I did.)

 

De Lancie's character in Assassin's Creed III had questionable parenting skills.

 

De Lancie played Trias the Betrayer in the dense narrative game Planescape: Torment back in 1999. In 2012, he appeared as the delightfully named Professor Fitz Quadwrangle in Quantum Conundrum, a puzzle game developed by Airtight Games and directed by Kim Swift of Portal fame. The man may have a signature sound, but he's clearly been willing to apply it across the genre gamut.

 

Back in the realm of science fiction, de Lancie was the Human Emperor in Master of Orion: Conquer the Stars. And like so many of his co-stars, he took a turn working with Blizzard. His character Alarak began in the StarCraft universe but was also a part of the studio’s now-unsupported MOBA Heroes of the Storm. His latest adventure in games is another MOBA, voicing the upcoming hero joining the ranks in Dota 2, The Ringmaster.

Deep Space Nine

Despite taking a few roles in official Star Trek games, Avery Brooks hasn’t done any other work in video games. Heads-up to the game developers out there because it seems like a real missed opportunity, assuming he would ever be interested.

 

Ditto Alexander Siddig. He's still active in film and had a role in a little show called Game of Thrones, but nary a video game credit outside Trek titles.

 

The same goes for Nana Visitor, whose only non-Trek game credit is the player character’s mom in Starfield—and for Terry Farrell, who voiced the Spiritual Guide in the 1996 puzzle game Treasure Quest.

 

Andrew Robinson also only has one video game role, in a short-lived sci-fi MMORPG called Earth & Beyond. Seriously, who wouldn't want Garak in their game?

 

It's hard to say why this talented crew hasn't crossed over into video games. Maybe the Elite: Dangerous devs weren't into the whole Dominion War storyline. Or maybe these actors just aren't super interested in the medium. Whatever the case, it's our loss not to have more chances to hear more of them.

 

René Auberjonois, who died in 2019, made a few more video game appearances than his castmates. His most notable game role for sci-fi fans was Robert House, the reclusive and powerful leader of the former casino town in Fallout: New Vegas.

 

Auberjonois as the elusive Mr. House.

 

You might also have heard him as Karl Schafer, giving advice to Nathan Drake in both Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception. And while he wasn’t a part of the camp-fest of Red Alert alongside George Takei, he did play the part of Dr. Ignatio Mobius in Command & Conquer: Renegade.

 

And while it's not a video game, I would be remiss not to mention that Auberjonois won the hearts of '90s kids everywhere in his role as Chef Louie in Disney's The Little Mermaid. It's the most ridiculous singing French chef imaginable, and I never would have guessed Odo had it in him.

 

Quark had a nose for business in the show, and actor Armin Shimerman seems to have the same knack, with the most video game credits to date of any core Star Trek cast member in any series. He's also proven himself to be a vocal chameleon, with the largest percentage of parts where I found myself saying, "Wait, that was him?"

 

A large number of those credits are from the charming Ratchet & Clank games, where he has voiced every appearance of hilariously evil Dr. Nefarious. That same unhinged glee also shows up in his take on Raz’s father in Psychonauts. He went a different direction for the iconic villain Andrew Ryan throughout the BioShock games, really embodying the sinister grandeur of a 1920s radio play performer.

Shimerman has also been a go-to for BioWare. He was responsible for several roles in the studio’s 2005 title Jade Empire before voicing the salarian councilor in the Mass Effect trilogy, plus playing Fai Den, the leader of the Zhu’s Hope colony in game one. For the Hideo Kojima fans out there, you can hear Shimerman as The Elder in Death Stranding.

 

Once you hear Quark's voice in Andrew Ryan, you can't unhear it.

 

And of course, Shimerman’s latest role is possibly the most Quark-like character on his lengthy, illustrious resume. You've probably already heard him in Starfield, playing Constellation member and financier Walter Stroud.

Voyager

After stepping down from the Captain’s chair, Kate Mulgrew’s most notable video game work was with BioWare. She voiced Flemeth, the shapeshifting mage from the Dragon Age franchise. The character had appearances in the Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age II, and Dragon Age: Inquisition games. Besides this role, you can hear Kate Mulgrew in the RTS Lords of EverQuest and in the VR title Augmented Empire.

 

Kate Mulgrew discusses playing Flemeth in Dragon Age.

 

Ethan Phillips is one of the rare actors who crossed the divide between Trek and Wars, with almost all of his game work taking place in a galaxy far, far away. While Trekkies know him as Neelix, you can hear him in several spots while playing Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, including Sith Academy members Galon Lor and Tamlen. Phillips also performed multiple minor roles in Star Wars: Force Commander and Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds.

 

Robert Picardo won a lot of fans as the Doctor, but he went a very different direction in his gaming career. His longest-standing tie is with the Call of Duty: Black Ops series, specifically the Zombies content.

 

Picardo voiced two recurring characters for the shooters. First up was Robert McNamara, the secretary of defense during the Cold War. The second character is Shadowman, the main antagonist for Black Ops’ Zombies campaign. Both characters make appearances in cutscenes and can be heard in different Zombies maps across the franchise’s history. Sadly, he didn’t make a return in the Cold War entry released in 2020. But there's always another CoD game in the works (always), so maybe we'll hear him back in zombie-fighting mode in the future.

 

In addition to his work on the Black Ops games, Picardo also joined the ranks of Star Trek actors hired by Bethesda for a game appearance. He plays Institute member Alan Binet and one of the Vault-Tec scientists in Fallout 4, an interesting counterpoint to his famous role as the Emergency Medical Hologram.

 

Many gamers have heard Tuvok actor Tim Russ’ voice in the course of their play, and a big chunk of his voiceover has kept him working in sci-fi. He's also a standout in the Trek world for working with the hat trick of B-named game studios that have so often recruited performers from the show: Bethesda, BioWare, and Blizzard.

 

Most recently, he has multiple parts in Starfield, including playing Dad opposite Nana Visitor’s Mom. He also worked on Fallout 4 as Lancer Captain Kells. Russ’ other recent sci-fi credits include the Desert Clan’s spiritual leader Jetakka in Horizon Forbidden West, the football-playing freedom fighter Joseph Stallion in Wolfenstein II’s Freedom Chronicles, and the pigeon-loving Birdman in Mirror’s Edge Catalyst. Now that's range!

 

Encountering Nana Visitor (Kira) and Tim Russ (Tuvok) as the player character's parents in Starfield.

 

On the fantasy side of the coin, Russ played Thenios in World of Warcraft’s Shadowlands expansion as well as Zathrian the Keeper in Dragon Age: Origins. He’s also one of the heroic performers who tackle the vague but essential “Additional Voices” work that makes a game feel fully grounded and alive. Russ did this type of voice acting in Final Fantasy XIII-2: Lightning Returns, The Elder Scrolls Online, Mafia III, and The Last of Us: Part II.

Enterprise

Yes, this coda to the main era of Star Trek television is… let's keep it polite and say "not popular" with the fans. But there was some talent within the cast, and Dominic Keating in particular has had an active career in video games since Enterprise wrapped. He was Mouse in Dragon Age: Origins as well as a few vendors in Destiny 2. He then spent a lot of time working on Blizzard games, doing voice work across multiple World of Warcraft expansions. You’ve also heard him as ‘Additional Voices’ in several Diablo titles, and he most notably voiced Templar companion Kormac in Diablo III.

“Nothing reveals humanity so well as the games it plays”

Casting a celebrity in a video game is a risky move. Just because you have a famous cast doesn't mean your game will be a success—I've omitted some big flops and some truly forgettable creations from this piece. But that gamble is what makes the voice-acting successes all the more interesting.

 

When it comes to Star Trek, the actors' performances in games also do fall along a clear divide between casting where an actor was sought out to be exactly who they were on the show, and casting for a powerful yet versatile voice. Yes, it's easy to giggle about William Shatner's lack of range, but nobody is casting Patrick Stewart to be anyone other than Patrick Stewart. And if everything comes together, I love their video game performances because I know I'm going to get exactly what I loved about them in Star Trek.

 

But that's a big "if." When the actor is only providing a voice, they're relying on the studio's artists, animators, writers, and designers to bring their character to life, and to create a world and game mechanics where a player can fall in love (or hate) with them. I'm even more impressed when all the pieces come together with Star Trek's character actors, because they didn't have a role developed for their particular sound or presence.

 

Star Trek's success had a whiff of magic about it. The right cast, the right crew, and the right time all aligned for each series to become legendary. Maybe working on the show did give some of these actors a gut feeling for when the magic might strike again when they read a video game pitch. Or maybe the Star Trek experience gave them the courage to explore new career realms and to take risks.

 

May we all go so boldly, in our work and in our play.