When we think of playing video games, our thoughts often refer to the gameplay: the visuals, the movement mechanics, the audible experience, the reward system(s), and interactivity with the world of the game, among many other things.
But recalling our favorite games, we remember our characters and the journey we take along with them. All the ups and downs, the upgrades, the dialogue, every interaction and emotion we feel is through our characters.
These performances of these characters by the actors (voice and motion capture) are what fuel this relationship between the game, story and all, and the player(s).
At the end of the day, video game performances are so impactful and so worthy of recognition that they deserve Academy Award (Oscar) nominations. There are rumblings of change in the film award industry, considering the use of motion capture in film and game, and the acknowledgement of acting in video games.
To begin, The Academy Awards is by far the most viewed award show for TV and movies in the U.S.
With that being said, there’s a standard that comes from being the most popular night of recognition in film. Part of that standard is determining who is allowed to the party. Voice acting as a category is not currently considered by the Academy.
Think of the great performances of voice acting in film and TV: James Earl Jones as Darth Vader, Robin Williams as Genie, Seth MacFarlane as many characters on Family Guy.
These are very well-established and some of the most iconic characters in entertainment history. This begs the question of how an acting performance is determined to be Oscar-worthy or not.
Thankfully, the Academy Awards are not the only award show. There are award shows with categories for character voice-over performances, but when it’s seemingly delegated to a “lesser” show, is it really the same award?
Although that’s an entire topic for another day, there is some truth to it.
Take a look at the 2001 British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA) best supporting actor race. This year saw something truly extraordinary as Shrek received the first-ever Best Animated Feature Oscar, while the BAFTA’s gave the film a nomination for Best Picture.
But the category of Best Support Actor is where we witnessed a miracle as Eddie Murphy received the nomination for his performance as Donkey. The significance of this nomination is that a different type of performance was recognized, not for being a comedy, a drama, or whatever genre of film, but for being a voice acting performance.
Another area of change comes from video games with real eligibility for an Academy Award.
Everything (David OReilly)
Everything is an interactive simulation game where literally everything in the universe is a playable character and the world of the game is yours to craft. The game has a very interesting concept, but the eligibility of course does not come from the gameplay.
In 2017, Everything received the Jury Prize at the Vienna Independent Shorts film festival, which granted the game eligibility for the Animated Short Film Oscar.
Medal of Honor (Steven Spielberg)
Speaking of the Oscars, let's look at a win that comes from the Medal of Honor video game franchise.
As part of Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond, a virtual-reality game, the short documentary film “Colette,” brought home the very first Oscar win for best documentary short.
“Colette” was ironically not part of the gameplay, but part of the historical footage for the game as a way to remember those from the time and events the game takes place during (WWII).
Grand Theft Auto V (Rockstar Games)
My second contention on the use of motion capture in both film and game is to illustrate the real performance it is regardless of the form of entertainment.
In an interview with BuzzFeed, Steven Ogg, who plays the character of Trevor Philips in GTA V, says, “The entire performance was motion captured…Take any performance you see on television or in the movies — motion capture it — and that is essentially what Rockstar did with us actors.”
So, the characters of GTA V really did have to act in the way seen in TV and film. Pairing the performance with the cinematics of video games, there is a strong case to be made about classifying the genre video games as interactive films.
Films such as Black Mirror: Bandersnatch meet this classification and bring in awards, yet remain excluded from the Academy Awards.
This begs the same question as before about what is considered Oscar-worthy. After all, GTA V is a very interactive game, which means lots of dialogue, which we’ll look at later on.
According to HowLongToBeat, the game takes roughly 31 and a half hours to reach the end if you are solely focusing on the main story objectives. There are multiple cutscenes and player movement mechanics such as running, walking, and climbing that are also considered for the use of motion capture.
Using this lens of motion capture with film, we can see this with one of the highest grossing films of all-time, Avengers: Endgame.
Of course, you cannot have actual green and purple giants walking around the set who shake the ground with every step. Motion capture was used to bring multiple characters to life, such as Spider-Man, The Hulk, and War Machine. Yet, these performances would qualify for an Academy Award before Ogg’s would because it’s part of a film.
Furthermore, these motion capture performances would likely find themselves in the “Best Visual Effects” category before categories such as “Best Actor.”
It’s not like there's a shortage of these performances. We see Andy Serkis and his roles as Caesar in the Planet of the Apes franchise and as Gollum from Lord of the Rings. Speaking of the highest grossing films of all-time, the top movie is Avatar, where we can see a motion capture performance given by Zoe Saldaña steal the show.
These are quite literally some of the biggest releases and franchises of all-time, yet the performances from these films don’t often get their deserved recognition.
It’s clear that this is an uphill battle against an industry idea of what “film” and “cinema” is. These are obstacles that arguably need to be addressed before reaching the “what is Oscar-worthy acting” discussion.
Speaking of “Oscar-worthy acting,” we’ll lastly look at the acknowledgement of acting in video games.
As mentioned before, there are many lines of dialogue in video games and their usage can do any number of things.
They can tell you more about the character, their feelings, their motivations, they can drive the story forward, they can be a hint to help players know what to do next, they can be a joke or acknowledgement of something anyone would make to help humanize these characters, and so much more.
Depending on the game, there can be scripts that pass 100 pages, and some that could even be over 1000 pages.
Open-world games especially can hit the mark due to the sheer amount of world there is for the characters to acknowledge and learn about. These actors have an obligation to deliver these lines and act out these cutscenes earnestly for the players and studios.
One significant acknowledgement of the acting chops video game performances need comes from The 2022 Game Awards, where Christopher Judge won Best Performance as Kratos for God of War.
The award itself is very prestigious, but it is who presented him with this award that makes this such a special award: Al Pacino. An A-lister like Al Pacino at an award show for video games?
Although this could probably be chalked up to a paid appearance, The Game Awards got an actor of Al Pacino’s caliber (there are definitely not many) to present the award for Best Performance.
Essentially, this was “the best of the best” sharing the stage for this crowning moment of the gaming year. It added to the prestige of the award, the show itself, and the genre.
This acknowledgement of what these actors in video games are from us and now from Hollywood is also why, as part of the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike, members voted in favor of a strike authorization on the Interactive Media Agreement that covers members’ work on video games.
Among actors, video game performances IS acting. This vote is proof of that, but to reaffirm this position, the SAG-AFTRA president also spoke up.
In a statement from SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher, she says, “The result of this vote shows our membership understands the existential nature of these negotiations, and that the time is now for these companies… to give our performers an agreement that keeps performing in video games as a viable career.”
This moment reminds not just these companies, but for everyone to put some respect on the video game industry’s name.
To wrap up, it’s no secret that the viewership for the Oscars has decreased while the viewership has skyrocketed for the Game Awards. Video games and its characteristics of animation, voice acting, and the interactive experience are popular, without a doubt.
The culture of gaming is what we can attribute to this success in viewership.
Change is in the air, the lines of technique and execution are blurring the lines between acting in film and acting in game, and there is real acknowledgement of the place video games have in the acting space and in culture.
For all the gamers and actors that see video games as a legitimate form of art and entertainment, let’s keep going. The impact of video games and the value they have to us is worthy of the recognition we are seeing now and the recognition we will see in the future.
For the Academy Awards and the rest of Hollywood, the video game industry is not playing around.