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It takes a lot of work to design a character, especially a character with as much history as Castlevania's Dracula. Actor Robert Carlyle helped put his stamp on the iconic villain, and even altered his design for Konami's Lords of Shadow series.
During a sit down interview with actor Robert Carlyle and producer Dave Cox, the two talked about the evolution of the design of Dracula throughout the series.
"I didn't get to see any character designs or art for the game before the performance," said Carlyle, "I think that Dave and the team brought me on board to actually give something of myself to the project rather than just, 'okay, say the lines this way, and try to get them within 2.4 seconds.' It was never like that. It was quite an organic process. They were really open to interpretation, and they gave me a lot of leeway to give this performance a lot of gravitas and emotional weight that we thought it needed."
Left, Robert Carlyle, A.K.A. Dracula, middle, Ben Reeves, and right, Dave Cox, Lords of Shadow 2 producer.
"The character actually changed a lot once Robert was on board," said Cox. "There is actually a little bit of Robert in the character. When we originally designed Gabriel, he was much more of a big muscly, Conan-type character. When Robert came on board we realized that we needed to make him a bit more of an everyman and a more realistic character. Once Robert did his performance then we started to tweak him even more. In fact, we're still tweaking the character pretty much on a daily basis to try and get him to fit the performance that Robert has done."
"But as you can see, physically we look almost the same." added Carlyle.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 comes out this winter, check out our recent preview of the game here.
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CANT WAIT!
Are they ever going to give it a release date??
Robert Carlyle is an awesome actor and definitely fits Gabriel. He's one of my favorites!
ive liked robert ever since I first saw Trainspotting
I have never played an Castlevania game I guess I've been missing out for quite a while. Who better to influence Dracula then Robert Carlyle
He makes an awesome zombie. Let's see how he handles vampirism.
Robert Carlyle?? aka Begby?? aka Dr. Rush??? i hate you, Ben Reeves.. that should have been me! ME!!!!! lol
Just so long as Dracula keeps his clothes on and does not pull a Full Monty. Wonder if they will throw any movie references into the game? Haven't finished the first one yet, but I haven't noticed any yet. Sure there's a way to slip a little dark humor from one of his movies in.
Love Robert Carlyle, especially his films and TV work. I didn't know he was doing the voice work for Gabriel until I played LOS and immediately knew it was him. I cannot freaking wait for LOS:2 at year end.
Whatever he's doing keep doing it man. He completely nailed Gabriel & this is in my top 5 of most anticipated games coming out right now.
Had no idea Robert Caryle is the voice of Dracula! These games have always looked interesting, but now I think I'll definitely have to give them a shot--Caryle is awesome as Rumplestiltskin on Once Upon a Time.