Ezio's Terrible Voice in Assassin's Creed: Chronicles Re-Dubbed by Original Actor

Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China was released earlier this spring, and it… exists. It didn’t really create a splash when it was released, it was just enjoyed by fans and was soon forgotten after Unity caused a world of controversy for having no female leads and generally being a buggy, unplayable mess. However, it wasn’t forgotten by all: namely, one fan, who goes by Loomer on the interwebs, was actually deeply bothered by the game.

Why?

Because of voice acting. Specifically, at the start of the game, your character is ‘trained’ by long-time Assassin’s Creed protagonist Ezio. Ezio only has a handful of lines, and they’re all just instructions, but what Loomer found inexcusable was how they replaced Ezio’s iconic voice actor, Roger Craig Smith, with a replacement who did a horrible job imitating his voice.

And instead of doing nothing, he contacted Roger himself, had him read over all of Ezio’s lines, got Ubisoft’s permission, then posted a video of Eizo’s proper voice actor performing all his lines on youtube. And explained in-universe why his voice is so bad in the game.

First, the video.


 

“I basically put together a list and video compilation of all of Ezio’s lines in AC: Chronicles China (about 33 lines total) and sent it to Roger. He then recorded his take on the lines (I assume from his home studio) and emailed me the sound files. We did a couple retakes on some of the lines (Ubisoft has changed how Shao Jun’s name is pronounced over the years) but other than that, that was pretty much it.

I threw in the Erudito aspect (which Ubisoft used in AC: Liberation to show you the “real” version of cutscenes) because I love the idea that this crappy fake Ezio voice is canon, it’s just Abstergo messing things up. After all, we know from Assassin-controlled Animi how Ezio’s voice really sounded. ;)“

The coolest part of all of this is that it’s officially Ubisoft-Sanctioned, and the company gave this little project a thumbs up—a surprisingly nice thing of them to do, all things considered. But hey, if someone’s going to go through this much effort for 33 tutorial lines, I’d almost be afraid to say no to them. On anything.

Still! Enjoy it, Assassin’s Creed fans! The Ezio lines you always wanted to hear. I’m sure you’ll sleep more peacefully now than you have in a long time.