“The alternatives are limitless, actually,” Tim Curry once said about creating really interactive storytelling experiences inside gaming. Lengthy earlier than “status voice appearing” was a advertising line for sport studios, Curry appeared fascinated by the sort of work — and was treating a scrappy ‘90s journey sport with the identical aptitude he dropped at his bigger stage and display roles. Tim Curry died on Aug. 25, 2026, after a profession that handled no function as too small and no style as too disposable. In accordance with Moby Games, he performed greater than 30 roles in 22 interactive titles. Most of the video games he labored on aren’t straightforward to search out through digital storefronts anymore, however are completely price a watch on YouTube. A struggling novelist, a Kilrathi common, a heavy steel demon emperor — Curry made every of those really feel just like the function he was born to play.
9
Frankenstein: Via the Eyes of the Monster (1995)
Frankenstein: Via the Eyes of the Monster is a first-person point-and-click journey loosely primarily based on the Mary Shelley novel. In it, gamers management the reanimated creature as he explores the physician’s fort. Curry performed Dr. Frankenstein himself, at a second throughout the gaming business the place full-motion-video (FMV) titles have been a half-game, half B-movie novelty. As soon as the monster stirs to life within the first moments of the sport, Curry takes a second to check whether or not his creation can perceive him with some grim, sinister wordplay: “Are you able to hear me? Something? Maybe you’ll be able to learn lips. No, no, you have to be capable to hear. Maybe the cat’s obtained your tongue. You have no thought how near the reality that assertion is.”
8
Toonstruck (1996)
On this point-and-click journey, Christopher Lloyd stars as an animator who will get pulled into his personal cartoon world — leading to a sport with a blended aesthetic, mashing up live-action footage with hand-drawn animation. As Christopher Lloyd’s character, Drew Blanc, tries to search out his manner dwelling, he runs up in opposition to the villainous Depend Nefarious, performed by Curry. When Depend Nefarious first confronts Drew Blanc, he introduces himself with the form of mock-formal menace Curry dropped at stage villains for many years — a villain asserting his personal villainy as a result of he’s really relishing the sound of it: “Silence! That is COUNT Nefarious to you, little man. Grasp of the Malevolands, bane of Cutopia, and shortly, supreme ruler of the world! So, please, present a little bit respect.”
7
Wing Commander 3: Coronary heart of the Tiger (1994)
Wing Commander 3, an area fight sim from Origin Programs, was constructed round intensive FMV cutscenes starring Mark Hamill because the participant character. This sport was one of many largest FMV productions of its time, which is smart, given the star-studded solid. Curry performed the Kilrathi antagonist Melek, who obtained to ship an uncommon beat in the course of the sport…a concession as an alternative of a risk, one which Curry performed with weary resignation: “We’re surrendering to you, Coronary heart of the Tiger… It’s an motion not like any we’ve got ever taken, however it’s time the Kilrathi discover new methods.”
6
The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius: Jet Fusion (2003)
Primarily based on the Nickelodeon TV sequence, this platformer solid Jimmy Neutron in opposition to a villain who kidnapped a spy character from one in every of Jimmy’s ebook stories that had come to life. Since Curry voiced Professor Finbarr Calamitous within the present, he took the function within the sport as nicely — a part of a stretch of the early 2000s the place Tim Curry was tackling voice roles in youngsters’ animation and tie-in video games continually. Right here, Professor Calamitous taunts a captured hero whereas additionally being appropriately ridiculous in a line designed to please each youngsters and any mother and father who could be watching: “Oh, I am so scared. I’d moist my pants. Huge, tough and hard Jet Fusion is terrifying me… Who’s going to save lots of you? Somewhat boy with an outrageously massive head and puny arms?”
5
The Wild Thornberrys Rambler (2000) / The Wild Thornberrys Film (2002)
For an entire technology, this was their first expertise of Tim Curry — as eccentric, endlessly enthusiastic wildlife documentarian Nigel Thornberry. His catchphrase, a delighted “Smashing!” muttered at no matter chaos the Thornberry household had wandered into that week, confirmed up simply as typically in the course of the video games because it did within the present. These video games have been constructed round platforming ranges loosely following the household as they globe-trotted and obtained right into a wild predicament or two — together with rescuing a stolen cheetah cub from poachers. Nigel all the time appeared to take these moments in stride: “Certainly, we Thornberrys appear to be in a little bit of a jam in areas all in regards to the globe, no much less! I hope you are able to sally forth into the unknown, as a result of we’d like your assist.”
4
Gabriel Knight (1993-1999)
The trilogy of Gabriel Knight games options the eponymous Gabriel Knight, a struggling novelist and New Orleans bookstore proprietor, who will get pulled into investigating a string of formality killings tied to the occult — and, improbably sufficient, his circle of relatives historical past. As a substitute of taking part in a villain or popping into a bigger title in a quick cameo function, Curry is the title character. (Although should you go on the lookout for the primary sport, Sins of the Fathers, right this moment, know that the model at the moment bought on Steam is a 2014 remake with a completely new voice solid, not Curry’s efficiency.)
Via these three video games, the participant follows Knight as he uncovers his household’s centuries-old obligation as a Schattenjäger, or “shadow hunter,” investigates a string of werewolf assaults tied to that legacy in Bavaria, and travels to the south of France to chase down a thriller involving vampires, the Knights Templar, and the Holy Grail. Early on, Gabriel presses a priest for the actual that means of a phrase he’s heard linked to the killings — one which actually interprets to one thing like “goat with out horns” — and will get stonewalled with a joke:
Father Johnston: “It means ‘do not eat the chili.'”
Gabriel: “Hmph! Exhibits how a lot you recognize!”
3
Brütal Legend (2009)
Brütal Legend, an open-world motion sport from Double Positive, stars Jack Black as a roadie who’s been transported right into a fantasy world constructed from heavy steel album artwork. Doviculus, Emperor of the Tainted Coil, wasn’t initially written immediately for Tim Curry; the function was initially purported to go to heavy steel singer Ronnie James Dio. However as the sport (and the character) developed, the tone shifted a bit from a tribute to steel to extra of a camp vibe — which made Curry the right man for the job. Tim Schafer, Double Positive’s founder and the sport’s inventive director, had a simple explanation for the swap: Anybody who’d seen Curry’s efficiency because the Lord of Darkness within the 1985 movie Legend would perceive exactly why he was proper for Doviculus. Particularly when Curry delivers this taunting, over-the-top line: “You’ve your mom’s eyes. And I’ll too. On a necklace.”
2
Dragon Age: Origins (2009)
Dragon Age: Origins is the primary sport in BioWare’s dark-fantasy RPG sequence, whereby the participant character, as a Gray Warden, unites a fractured kingdom in opposition to an historic risk. The participant additionally has to cope with the machinations of 1 Arl Rendon Howe, a nobleman whose betrayal drives a lot of the sport’s early story. As Howe, Curry delivered one of many extra genuinely sinister villain performances in the whole Dragon Age franchise…at one level, explaining, with whole conviction, why his betrayal was crucial and the fallout logically owed to him: “Your loved ones squandered glory that was rightfully mine. How appropriate that their deaths ought to increase me to the ear of a king.”
1
Command and Conquer: Pink Alert 3 (2008)
Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3, a real-time technique sport set in an alternate-history World Conflict 3, featured Curry as Premier Anatoly Cherdenko, the Soviet chief driving the sport’s time-travel plot. Later within the marketing campaign, Cherdenko delivers an escape plan — however fails to take action with a straight face. A 2022 Vice oral history later revealed that this was the very first take of the road, filmed on the finish of an extended taking pictures day, and that Curry’s wrestle to not chuckle was his response to studying it for the primary time: “I am escaping to the one place that hasn’t been corrupted by capitalism… SPACE!”
Maybe it was inevitable, then, that within the days after Curry’s demise, that very same line turned a reference for followers to course of what occurred, saying in numerous social posts and feedback on videos paying tribute to Tim Curry’s career, “He didn’t die, he merely escaped to the one place that hasn’t been corrupted by capitalism.” Becoming, for an actor who spent 5 a long time making the absurd really feel precisely proper.