It goes without saying that one year later, Baldur’s Gate III is undeniably the most successful game of 2023. And if there was one person who saw a strong rise in popularity after the game’s release, it was Neil Newbon, the voice actor for Astarion.
Not only was Astarion one of the most popular companions in the game, leading a lot of people to pal around with him and almost certainly romance him, but Newbon’s performance as the character earned him a win at The Game Awards for Best Performance. Needless to say, 2023 was a busy year for him. Now, one year later, I sat down with Newbon while at New York Comic Con to go over the past year, how the success of Baldur’s Gate III has impacted his life, his thoughts on the state of the industry, and, of course, just to talk about games.
Regarding his recent success, Newbon talked about how most of his performances before Astarion were for supporting roles, saying, “For most of my career I’ve always been the bridesmaid and not the bride.” He compared the success he found with Baldur’s Gate III as not dissimilar from the success that Maggie Robertson saw for playing Lady Dimitrescu in Resident Evil Village. In that game, Newbon played Karl Heisenberg, yet despite being a part of a large supporting cast, most of the marketing and fan attention was focused on everyone’s favorite 9-foot-tall vampire mom. He viewed Astarion’s rise to fame in a similar light, pointing out that he’s only as good as he is in that game because of the performances of the other supporting characters in the game working together.
Neil went on to say that one of the best elements of Baldur’s Gate III in retrospect was how the players were able to connect with the cast and develop a real sense of community. “I think the most thrilling part of it is that so many people felt seen in all of these different stories. They felt connected, they met other people through the community through their shared love of Astarion, or Karlach, or whichever character they like, and they got brought together as real friends in real life.” He then went on to say that he’s actually met people that got into romantic relationships thanks to the Baldur’s Gate III fan communities who bonded over their love of characters like Astarion.
This led to Newbom talking about trying to maintain the balance between his private life and his public life given the newfound fame he received thanks to the role. He rightfully said that it’s very healthy to set these types of boundaries and that “it’s not harder [to set boundaries], it’s just bigger in a way where I have to maintain them on a more regular basis.” By doing so, though, it allows him to step back a bit and see the impact his performance has had on people and how grateful he is in those moments. “I believe in generosity. I believe in kindness. I believe in being nice. My number one rule in life is ‘Don’t be a dick’… I’ve always tried to live this life of humility and gratitude because the opportunities I’ve received are so immense and so huge I’m so very lucky to be in this position.”
While he was happy to discuss how he used his new position to help support other voice actors in the industry, one thing that he was especially proud of was the numerous charity runs that he’s been able to do thanks to his success. Neil said that between donation runs for charities Medecins Sans Frontiers, The Outside Project, and the Red Cross, he’s been able to raise over $120,000 for them. He went on to say, “It’s great to be in a position, whether I’m qualified or not, to be able to do that. I enjoy the fact that I get to help… I’m just trying to add to the work of just helping people. This world is a good place at times. It can be a hellish place at times too and it’s a constant fight for everybody to be positive.”
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Speaking of the world being a hellish place, our conversation then shifted to the difficulties that have cropped up within the gaming industry over the past year. Many companies have shut down, thousands of video game developers have been laid off, critically successful games have been declared unsuccessful, AI has crept even more into the gaming space, and video game voice actors are currently on strike. I asked if Neil thought the game industry was in a positive or negative place at the moment, and he countered by saying that there will always be natural ebbs and flows within any industry where some years will be harder or better than others. He specifically mentioned on the topic of AI that while it can have its uses in formats such as blending and non-creative outlets, its use as a creative tool is more of a hassle and delivers suboptimal experiences.
This also led the Baldur’s Gate III star to sadly say that people that he’s friends with have lost their jobs in part due to this tumultuous year, but he does believe it is possible to create a positive environment in the video game industry that won’t result in layoffs. “There have been a lot of layoffs. There have been a lot of profit margins maintained at the cost of people’s lives, which is really s**t, but then you have companies like Larian. They didn’t lose anybody through redundancy. They didn’t fire anybody and they made a lot of money, but they didn’t sacrifice people’s livelihoods and the support of their families to do so… You don’t need to sacrifice people to maintain a profit margin. You can take a slight hit as a company, I feel, have a shit ton of profit, and look after people.”
He was relatively optimistic, though, that strong effort can result in significant and long-lasting positive changes within the video game industry. One of the more positive changes that Neil has seen is how actors are becoming more prominent voices in making that positive change, which is a relatively recent phenomenon. He observed this wasn’t a thing even five years ago, noting people weren’t super aware of which actors appeared in which games, but now people are more cognizant of that and may buy a game to support an actor. Neil was quick to mention though that “the game is that star” and that “games aren’t made or broken by their [voice actors]” because “if the game isn’t good, who cares who’s in it?” He cited Baldur’s Gate III as the perfect example of that since even with different voice actors, the game would still be considered a masterpiece just from mechanics alone.
I asked him if he thought the rise in voice actor recognition had something to do video game adaptations in film and television like Fallout, The Last of Us, the Sonic the Hedgehog film series, and The Super Mario Bros. Movie, but he believed that it was because the standards of stories and experiences in games have increased over the past several years, which led to the need for better performances, and in turn more attention put on said performances and the actors behind them. “The Last of Us was a pivotal moment in gaming because it suddenly revealed how deep you could go into character and how meaningful or impactful the story could be.” He then went on to cite other games like Detroit: Become Human, the Mass Effect trilogy, The Stanley Parable, and No Time To Explain as games where the connection to the story is just as important as the gameplay. “People want the narrative side to be equal to the gameplay now,” in his opinion, but he still said that the gameplay remains the most important part of the equation.
When I asked him if there was any franchise or company that Neil would want to work with now that he’s done voicing Astarion, he said that he’s open to working with anyone as long as they have a good idea and a good game. He mentioned how he worked on the Fallout: London mod as a volunteer solely because it looked fun. “I just want to work with good people and good stories and people who give a crap about the narrative.” He went on to say how he’d be open to working with companies like Marvel, Bethesda, and Naughty Dog but he rarely gets to choose, which he chuckled about. He did say how he was a fanboy of Insomniac games, so maybe we’ll see him appear in one of their games in the future if the fates are kind to him.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is available now on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC. For more information about the game, check out our full coverage.
Published: Oct 28, 2024 07:46 am