Famous actors in video games - Our top picks

Mark recently returned to the big screen in the latest Star Wars movie, The Last Jedi, as an aged Luke Skywalker – but many fans will have followed his voice acting work, predominantly as Batman’s arch nemesis, the Joker.

Hamill began voicing the Joker back in 1992 in Batman: The Animated Series and features in several TV cartoons portraying the loony villain. In 2009, he was chosen to voice Joker in the Batman: Arkham Asylum video game.

Except for Arkham Origins, where Joker was voiced by Troy Baker, Hamill was part of Warner Bros’ entire Arkham franchise – finishing with Arkham Knight back in 2015. Looking ahead, Hamill will be appearing both in-game and voicing a character in Star Citizen’s single-player campaign, Squadron 42, alongside an all-star cast including Gary Oldman, Liam Cunningham, Andy Serkis and Sophie Wu.

Known for his medieval- type film and TV roles in the likes of The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, Sean also starred as Martin Septim, the last Emperor and member of the Septim Dynasty in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

In an interview with IGN, the British actor stated that the voice acting role came "out of the blue" and turned out to be a “good, stylish and successful piece of work” – he’s up for a sequel too, as most actors are… work is work after all!

Bean also provided his voice acting skills in Square Enix’s spin-off film Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV, where he played Regis Lucis Caelum.

Another famous actor who has appeared in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is Sir Patrick Stewart, famously known for his roles as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Professor X in X-men. Stewart, now 77 years young, played the role of Emperor Uriel Septim and also received the Spike TV Video Game Award for his voice acting in the game back in 2006.

He’s also produced voice acting work for the likes of Zobek in Castlevania: Lords of Shadow and a number of Star Trek-based games.

In Fallout 3, action hero and Jedi Master Liam Neeson was the voice of the Lonely Wanderer’s father, James. Due to Neeson’s character playing a main role within the story, the Irish-born actor had a considerable amount of dialogue to work through in the Bethesda game.

Fortunately, it doesn’t appear that anyone is ‘taken’ away from the character – Neeson has seen too much of that already!

Famous for his role as comic book good-guy-bad-attitude Hellboy, Ron Perlman also starred as a narrator in Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. Perlman, who also starred in the hit TV show Sons of Anarchy, voiced Butch Harris in the original Fallout game; owner of the Far Go Traders.

Perlman and fellow actor Dee Bradley Baker are the only voice actors who had worked on previous games in the franchise before Fallout 3, and Perlman also voiced the ‘newscaster’ in Fallout 4 back in 2015.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City had a host of well-known actors on board to offer their experienced services, but we thought we’d focus on protagonist Tommy Vercetti, voiced by American actor Ray Liotta. Liotta has starred in a number of high-profile films including Goodfellas, Hannibal and… Muppets from Space.

In GTA Vice City, his character is a former member of the Forelli Family and the current leader of the Vercetti crime family, distributing drugs and weapons. Other well-known actors in Vice City include Luis Guzmán, Danny Trejo, Burt Reynolds and William Fichtner - as well as porn star Jenna Jameson.

Heads up, there’s a substantial amount of naughty words in the YouTube video for Samuel L. Jackson’s character in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Frank Tenpenny, a Los Santos cop and member of the Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums (C.R.A.S.H.) unit.

The Pulp Fiction and Star Wars actor also lent his voice acting skills to Afro Samurai, both in the anime and 2009 released video game.

Life’s been good for Frodo after his adventures through Middle-earth, especially when it comes to voice acting in video games. Wood, who has previously voiced Spyro the Dragon, landed a role in Broken Age after tweeting and following the developers – who then followed back and approached Wood for the vacant position.

His character, Shay Volta, is a teenager dreaming of a life beyond the metallic walls of the spaceship he currently lives on (more like trapped). The game, which is the first graphic adventure by Tim Schafer in 16 years, also features actors Jack Black, Jennifer Hale and Wil Wheaton.

Tucked away in Ray's Oasis building in RAGE is none other than actor John Goodman, well, the voice of John Goodman anyway. Goodman, who has had voice acting roles in Monsters Inc, The Emperor's New Groove and The Simpsons, is the voice behind Dan Hagar - founder of the Hagar Settlement in the Northern Wasteland.

Goodman’s film and TV career spans over 35 years, with most recent appearances including Kong: Skull Island, 10 Cloverfield Lane and Transformers: The Last Knight.

Actor Kristin Bell became part of the ‘brotherhood’ when she appeared in Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed back in 2007 as Lucy Stillman – a genetic memory researcher for Abstergo Industries' Animus Project and member of the Assassin Order, who helps protagonist Desmond Miles escape the torture-like surroundings of the Abstergo labs.

Bell has performed voice acting roles in the likes of Princess Anna in the Frozen film (soon to be films) as well as voicing the character in the Disney Infinity games.

His booming voice can be heard bellowing in Flash Gordon and Star Wars Episode I, but Brian Blessed has also narrated in Rome: Total War – Alexander. His ever-familiar voice has also appeared in Viking: Battle for Asgard, Warhammer 40,000: Fire Warrior and Kingdom Hearts.

Blessed will also be voicing German military engineer Lord Konrad Kyeser in the upcoming open-world RPG, Kingdom Come: Deliverance.

Sin City actor Micky Rourke could do with rinsing his mouth out with soap in his voice acting for Rogue Warrior, the action game from Rebellion. Rourke, who has starred in the likes of The Wrestler, Iron Man 2 and The Expendables, voices protagonist Richard "Demo Dick" Marcinko — a real-life American badass.

As well as featuring an action-packed single-player campaign and intense multiplayer combat, gamers are treated to an explicit, and humorous, rap by Rourke during the post-credits.

Adventure Time and Rick and Morty voice actor Keith David played himself in the over-the-top-action-packed Saints Row IV, providing an entertaining portrayal of what he would be like as Vice President in an alien invasion. David’s character, comically, can’t hear the resemblance of his voice with that of Julius Little in Saints Row and Saints Row 2 – which he also voiced.

The actor has also appeared in blockbuster movies like Armageddon and The Chronicles of Riddick.

The late Gary Coleman, one of the most famous child actors of all time (what’chu talkin ‘bout, Willis) made a rather bizarre cameo back in 2003 when he appeared in Postal 2. The player finds Coleman at a book signing event, which then breaks into a made police raid where your character must try and help him escape – by shooting, punching or decapitating police officers with a spade, apparently.

Some obscene player even attempted to pee on Coleman during the book signing which, as expected, didn’t end well. This dark-humored first-person adventure sees gamers battle through open environments with hilarious consequences - popping out to buy milk will never be the same again.