The voice of Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag's most treacherous pirate wishes 'more video game companies would use mocap, because I think the performance stuff in Black Flag is brilliant'

Ralph Ineson, voice actor of Galactus in Fantastic Four and Cid in Final Fantasy 16, reflects on his motion capture work as Black Flag's villain, Charles Vane, comparing it to voice-only performances and expressing his preference for motion capture due to its immersive nature. He believes the Assassin's Creed series has declined in quality since Black Flag, particularly in terms of motion capture technology, but remains a fan of the franchise.

The voice of Fantastic Four villain Galactus, Ralph Ineson – who also voices Cid in Final Fantasy 16 – took a trip down memory lane so we could peek behind the scenes of his role in Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag.

Seeing and hearing movie stars and TV regulars in video games is a lot more common than it used to be. These days we even have actors like Abubakar Salim – from Assassin's Creed Origins – creating their own games. But not every acting job within the industry is the same, say Ineson, who performed the role of Black Flag villain Charles Vane, in an conversation with Edge.

"Well, that was a straight-up acting job," Ineson says of his time spent portraying the infamous pirate Charles Vane in Black Flag. "Once every month, for about four months, I went out to Montreal with Mark Bonnar and a couple of other British actors and spent a week in their motion-capture studio."

Andy Serkis did full motion capture and voice over for protagonist Monkey in Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, but stars more often than not simply lend their voices to a character, like Patrick Stewart in Oblivion, Liam Neeson in Fallout 3, and Shohreh Aghdashloo in Mass Effect 2. 

Ineson – who is also known for starring in The Witch and the British version of The Office – prefers motion capture to stand-alone voice acting. "[Motion capture] is brilliant, a completely different acting experience." He says, "I wish that more video game companies would use mocap, because I think the performance stuff in Black Flag is brilliant."

Unfortunately, both Ineson and his son believe the series has taken a dip in quality the past few entries. "When you compare it to some of the later Assassin's Creeds, there may be a little bit of facial capture, but they haven't got the physical stuff, and I think you can notice that," Ineson explains. "My son – who is more of an expert than me – said, 'Dad, the one you did was by far the best one - they've gone downhill from there!'"

I myself am a fan of the most-recent offering, Mirage, especially Aghdashloo's performance as master assassin Roshan, but my favourites are definitely Assassin's Creed 2 and Black Flag – maybe because of how much I love pirates. You can check out our official ranking of the best Assassin's Creed games and see what place your favourite got.

The next entry, Assassin's Creed Shadows, has been delayed, with its new launch now happening February 14, 2025 so the developer can give it some more polish.

Meanwhile, have a look at some of the best adventure games you can play right now.