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Welcome , dear listener , to Desert Island Gamer

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. A quick fire interview podcast

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digging into those video games that shake

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us , into the wholesome , kind hearted

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people we are today . The entirely

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original premise one Desert Island

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, one guest , three games they adore

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, one game they abhor and

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a carefully selected gaming character

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with which to spend an eternity of

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moonlit walks along the beach . It

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could be weird , it could be unhinged

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and it could have crappy sound quality

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, but at least it will be short to

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the island . Welcome

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to Desert Island Gamer . The podcast

0:47

that thinks it's way cooler than it actually

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is . With me upon the island is voice

0:52

actor extraordinaire Gavin Hammond

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. Welcome , sir .

0:55

Hello , thank you for having me . How are you ?

0:57

Absolute pleasure . I am very well You're

1:00

self . I can't complain . You're in an incredible

1:02

room . I know people can't see this on the podcast , thank you

1:04

. I have to mention because it blew me away it

1:06

is an absolute myriad of

1:08

collectibles . It's

1:11

stunning .

1:12

Yeah , it's a lot of stuff . I'm old , so

1:14

I've been like hanging on to things for a long

1:16

time .

1:16

Before we go into the traditional icebreaker questions

1:18

, your resume is absolutely ridiculous

1:21

. In a few months I'll have

1:23

been married 20 years and I reckon

1:25

I've heard your voice in various

1:27

guises more than I've heard my own wife's

1:30

voice . She's sorry , it's no bad

1:32

thing , but you've been

1:34

Ninja Turtle . You're in Oxenfree , which

1:36

I absolutely adore , the Wolf Among Us , absolute

1:38

gem of a game , and Telltale's Walking

1:41

Dead . You play Kenny and , for me , the greatest

1:43

game ever made , and I've played

1:45

some games in my time . I know . Thank you and I just

1:47

wanted to say from the bottom of my heart

1:49

, I'm really , really jealous . The

1:53

Walking Dead I realise how emotional a

1:55

game can be .

1:56

Yeah , and I think that it was the first time

1:58

for a lot of us to be in a game that

2:00

had such pronounced

2:02

narrative , especially without MoCap

2:04

, and you know , when we started working on it it was

2:07

probably like 2010 . So

2:09

, you know , there was like Uncharted

2:11

and stuff like that and Mass Effect , and there were

2:13

games that definitely had narrative structure

2:15

like that , but that didn't necessarily

2:18

cover such a range of horror

2:20

like we did .

2:21

Oh yeah , it just felt so different , just so

2:23

heart wrenching .

2:25

Jake and Sean and all the writers

2:27

that worked on it and the directors and

2:29

Jory Proum and Julian Kwasniewski

2:31

, like , did such a great job getting

2:33

emotional performances and writing

2:36

emotional material and kind of putting it all

2:38

together that it was really a

2:40

huge honour to be a part of it and

2:42

to just be included , because we really didn't know what it was

2:44

going to be . We just kind of , you know , went in

2:46

there and it was like sure , telltale was doing

2:48

Sam and Max at the time and I think all

2:51

of us had worked on CSI

2:53

or Law and Order or something

2:55

like that for them . But once they really

2:57

started moving into that particular

2:59

licence , it really took off .

3:01

When you hold a script like that , can you immediately tell that

3:03

this is something special .

3:04

From the beginning it was clear that it was really

3:07

different . Dave talks a lot , Dave Fanoi talks

3:09

a lot about , you know , a video game script

3:11

has , like you know , great or

3:13

moving that way or all that sort of stuff

3:15

, and still do you know ? So you still see

3:17

a lot of those movement lines or lines that are associated

3:20

with actions in the game . Whereas this

3:22

was like , basically the first packet

3:24

was almost all of the scenes within

3:26

the first episode , you know . So it was like the introduction

3:29

of Kenny , at least in my packet , like

3:31

his introduction , maybe some of

3:33

the salt lick stuff , some of the high intensity

3:35

stuff with Larry , so things that kind of were sprinkled

3:38

throughout , you know , the first couple and things

3:40

that ended up getting tweaked and put

3:42

in later in the season . So it was a pretty

3:44

good range . Back then their

3:46

audition packets would be , you

3:49

know , eight or nine pages , not necessarily

3:51

of all material , but you know there would be at least two

3:53

pages worth of you know specs and

3:55

breakdown of the character , and then there would be the

3:57

sides , which are the lines , and we

3:59

go through the whole thing and you could just tell it was different

4:01

. Yeah , and it's still . I mean , it still

4:03

looks very different , not a lot of video games

4:05

, you know still auditions look

4:08

like that anymore .

4:08

That's carried through with Telltale in general . If you

4:10

were playing a Telltale game , you knew you were going to

4:13

get something special in terms of the narrative was

4:15

going to be really impressive and the performances

4:17

that were going to be there were just going to be absolutely stellar .

4:19

The thing to me that's the most exciting about

4:22

the wolf announcement that they kind of tease

4:24

. They announced in its ad hoc

4:26

studios who are working on it , who

4:28

are Dennis Lenard , who directed

4:31

the first season of the Walking Dead , Pierre

4:33

Chorrette , Nick Herman , who basically

4:35

wrote the first season , so

4:37

it's the people that created it are definitely

4:40

involved . I mean , I hope it comes to fruition

4:42

and absolutely because it would be amazing

4:45

, and those guys are phenomenal .

4:46

We definitely need to get lost in a few of the video

4:48

game narratives at the moment . The way things are going outside

4:51

the front door .

4:51

I'm playing a ghost of Sushi Mubba right now and

4:54

I mean , that's like a narrative goldmine . I'm

4:56

not sure if you like Samurai's at all .

4:57

One thing that I'm really curious about if you get a

5:00

film , a terrible film , but with great performance

5:02

in there , most people will sit and watch the film

5:04

to the end and appreciate a terrible film

5:07

, but that performance that was great . With a game

5:09

, a great performance or great

5:11

narrative can get lost or missed

5:13

because it's built on poor

5:15

gameplay . In your experience , have you ever known that

5:17

to be the case ?

5:18

I think so , because it's so dependent

5:21

upon the game . It's like I would say I'm

5:23

much more likely to finish a game with

5:26

bad VO in it because I enjoy

5:28

the game mechanics or the game

5:30

. I'm a lot less likely to

5:32

finish a bad game with great VO

5:34

just because it's like I'm not going to sit

5:37

here for another 60 hours and get through this thing

5:39

. It's not good . So definitely I think

5:41

that's the case . You're much more likely to

5:43

quit a game early despite

5:45

a performance . I've been playing games since the 70s

5:47

, so for me it's like voice and video games

5:50

are still kind of new and it's OK .

5:52

The other thing , voice acting massively intrigues me

5:54

. As a mid-40s adult with a taste for games

5:56

, audio books , cartoons , I

5:58

may sound like I need an intervention , but I've

6:01

probably been entertained more by voice

6:03

actors and off-screen acting than

6:05

I have on screen . Is there a community

6:07

within the voice acting world like a

6:09

family , or is it all buckstubbing

6:12

bitching like a family

6:14

as well ? Voice acting ?

6:16

they're beautiful . It's so different than

6:19

Because I also come from a music

6:21

background . I was in a band in the 1990s

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and toured all over the world and whatnot , and that's

6:25

more of like . There's definitely

6:28

your clicks and there's sort of your weird

6:30

relationships , but voice acting and VO

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in general . There's always exceptions , but

6:35

by and large everybody's super cool

6:37

and everybody gets along really well . I'm

6:39

very close to most of the cast

6:41

of the Walking Dead , especially

6:44

, you know , omid , katya

6:46

Clem . They're just

6:48

, they're good friends , you know , and it's like

6:51

, and people that you know record as well . It's

6:53

like we generally are kind of kindred

6:55

spirits . So it's nice and even

6:57

like in Los Angeles in like

6:59

an animation session which will be terrifying

7:01

because it'll be like you'll walk in and you know everybody

7:04

and nobody knows who you are because

7:06

you're not anybody , but you know and it's

7:08

still everybody's really nice and cool

7:10

and treats you well and everybody kind of

7:12

treats each other like peers , like equals

7:14

. We're all doing something weird and we're all

7:17

lucky to be here and we're all thrilled

7:19

to have the opportunity .

7:20

That's really disabye .

7:21

now , I was hoping to be all like why did he get that

7:23

role ? I could have done that role , but that

7:25

has a lot more to do with the people that hire us than

7:27

us . We're hardly ever

7:29

even like they say . It's super competitive

7:31

, but it's like I never know what you

7:33

might do with an audition . I don't know what anybody's

7:36

doing with an audition .

7:36

I'm only hearing myself and if I don't get it , then

7:39

I didn't get it . If somebody else did it .

7:40

I don't know what they did . I don't know if they

7:42

knew somebody or if

7:44

they bought somebody a burrito or something . I don't

7:47

know .

7:47

You can tell yourself that regardless , you

7:50

know they definitely paid someone up . That's

7:52

what I was hoping that there was kind of a community

7:54

of support and everyone knew each other from the various

7:56

games and obviously Paphsel Cross and so on . Let's

7:59

do something very important . Icebreaker questions

8:02

. I'm sure , as an actor , you'll appreciate

8:04

the drama just instilled into this segment via

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that subtle change in my voice . Thank

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you , I am available for work . Should anyone be casting

8:10

a slightly monotone Northern English character

8:13

? Question one what was the

8:15

worst style choice you ever made ?

8:17

Style choice . I would say

8:19

like bleaching the top of your hair

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but not the sides . Well

8:24

, that's not it . I guess it is a style choice . That's a

8:26

serious . I used to grease my hair back and

8:28

then I bleached the top and the top was

8:30

kind of like poofy and ratted

8:32

out , but this was in the 80s .

8:34

It sounds like you should be a member of the Lost Boys . Yeah

8:36

, is that inspiration ?

8:37

Yeah , huge influence .

8:39

I used to watch that movie every day .

8:41

I would come home from school and I would

8:43

watch the Lost Boys . But I didn't realize that

8:45

the time is , a lot of those dudes were really

8:48

old and had receding hair lines and

8:50

so I was kind of like , yeah , I want to look like that I

8:52

want it to be like way back up here , so

8:55

like you can see back up here .

8:57

You know that's what I want . Question

8:59

two best piece of advice you've ever

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been given .

9:02

You never know how hard something is

9:04

until you try it , and I found that to

9:06

be supremely true throughout my

9:08

life . If I try something , generally

9:10

it's much , much easier than I thought it was

9:12

going to be . You never know until you try it . Don't try

9:15

, and if you don't put effort into , you know

9:17

. Whatever it is you want to do , you'll never know .

9:19

You'll never have a tremendous collection of

9:21

incredible memorabilia and a drum kit . None

9:23

of this was a try .

9:24

This was all just from , like , you know being

9:26

in a place at a time , or you

9:28

know having access to the internet .

9:34

Last of the icebreaker questions one film

9:36

you would say that everybody should sit and

9:38

watch at some point during their life .

9:41

Just one Raising Arizona

9:43

. First 10 minutes of that movie

9:45

made me laugh , like most movies

9:47

all the way through . I just I adore that

9:49

film . That is so many actors

9:52

that I really , really love . That's

9:54

the one .

9:55

It's a good one . It's a very good one .

9:56

Thank you very much . You

9:59

game in history yeah yeah , so we

10:01

had Pong , we had Pong

10:03

which was prior to the Atari 2600

10:05

. My dad was always like a total

10:07

gamer head . Even though the things didn't

10:09

exist , he used to play that little Mattel

10:11

handheld football . It was just like

10:14

dashes that would go down the

10:16

screen . He used to play that thing until nine batteries

10:18

died . So , there were always gaming consoles

10:20

in my house from the time I was , you know , I was

10:22

a kid . He had a 2600 . And

10:25

then we had in television Coleco

10:27

, vision , beck tracks . He

10:29

was always wanting to

10:31

have gaming systems , so , and I still have most

10:33

of them . So , yeah , I've always been a console guy

10:35

. I played PC games for a little bit

10:38

and that was mostly World of

10:40

Warcraft , which I played for seven

10:43

years and

10:45

almost lost my wife .

10:47

I've always been scared to play it because I've

10:49

heard similar stories .

10:51

It was so bad like in the early 2000s

10:53

too because it was like you needed 60

10:55

people to mount a ray . So you had

10:57

60 people . You had like I

10:59

don't even remember what it was , maybe he wasn't

11:01

60 . Maybe it was 40 .

11:02

No , it was a 40 man ray .

11:04

See , I'm totally creating it because I'm like eight

11:06

groups of five , 60 . No

11:08

, so yeah , like 40 people , you would have to actually

11:10

have Alan at the same time with compatible

11:13

internet . I mean like a technological marvel

11:15

that it .

11:16

Yeah , yeah . Can you remember the sort of longest

11:18

session you put in on World of Warcraft ?

11:20

Oh yeah , I'm sure there

11:22

were days when I played probably

11:24

all day long . I probably 12

11:27

or so hours . Amazing Depends on where

11:29

I was and what I had to do and whether

11:31

or not I had kids .

11:33

But I have heard it is one of them games that does get cited

11:35

in divorce papers .

11:37

Yeah , I'm not surprised at all .

11:40

Game number one Gavin .

11:42

Number one and it's going to cover a lot of bases

11:44

for me is going to be Diablo three

11:46

, because I love a hack and slash

11:48

. I loved World

11:50

of Warcraft , which is not

11:52

dissimilar Same developer . Obviously I

11:55

love Blizzard , like my . They're probably

11:57

my very favorite developer ever and

11:59

I could replay that over and over , and over and over again

12:01

. So that would be my first game to

12:03

take to a desert island .

12:04

It's good game , I mean I played all of Diablo

12:06

.

12:06

I played the first one , I played all of

12:08

the second one , all of the expansions for them . I'm

12:11

a Diablo guy . Game

12:14

two , probably just

12:16

in order to satisfy my need for first

12:19

person shooters . I'm going to choose Destiny

12:21

, and I probably choose the first one rather

12:23

than Destiny 2 . I do love Destiny

12:25

2 and I still play it all the time , but

12:27

I'm going to go with the first one just for nostalgia's

12:30

sake . And it's a great bungee , I think

12:32

makes the best first person shooters around

12:34

. So I love that Sci-Fi and monsters

12:37

. I want to kill people . The raid mechanics

12:39

were super cool . You know , raids felt

12:41

like raids and only six people . Just

12:43

the problem I think they ran into with Destiny 2

12:45

was the activation factor . But I mean they

12:48

corrected a lot of things that you know

12:50

they had changed that were made it

12:52

less fun , and I think it's tremendously

12:54

fun to play . Maybe not right now

12:56

because like they have a new expansion coming

12:58

out in November , so it's like it's a little bit dead

13:00

right now because they had to push the current expansion

13:03

back to November , but still very playable

13:05

. Check it out , Good shooter . Game

13:08

free probably breath of the wild because

13:10

it'll satisfy like a long RPG

13:13

. I would choose like wind waker or something

13:15

, but I played through that so many times . Yeah

13:17

, I still feel like breath of the wild would have

13:20

things to offer , where I would find

13:22

whatever those little guys

13:24

you find under the rocks and stuff . I know I haven't

13:26

found all of the shrines . I could replay

13:29

shrines .

13:30

I feel like I need to begin to play

13:32

more Zelda games . I've

13:39

only ever played the Super Nintendo . Which

13:43

is yeah , and I told someone and

13:45

they made an audible gas that

13:47

I'd only played once . I

13:50

have played a little bit of Breath of the Wild and even

13:52

just visually play . Man

13:54

, I don't know if I'm playing it for anyone

13:56

. There was a game came out today on Game Pass

13:58

called Night in the Woods .

14:00

Game Pass . Is Xbox or is Game Pass ?

14:02

Game Pass is Xbox .

14:04

My kids play on the Xbox .

14:06

Are you trying to say I use a kids console when you're

14:08

on ? No , I'm not .

14:10

I'm saying I made a choice to play with

14:12

like three guys that I play with .

14:15

I understand Three

14:17

games , all good choices , but you do have to

14:19

pick one . It doesn't have to be terrible , but one

14:22

game to go on the fire .

14:23

I'm going to try to think of like the biggest time

14:26

suck of a game that you know would burn

14:28

for the longest . I would

14:30

wait , like the amount of hours that you would have to put

14:32

into the game . How ?

14:33

long it would burn . Get a collector's edition that will

14:35

burn for days .

14:37

I don't want to like offend anybody

14:39

just because this does not necessarily

14:42

mean that I don't enjoy the game . Yes

14:44

, I'm going to go with one of

14:46

the old , like forced third person

14:48

perspective fallout , like the

14:50

first fallout back on . You know it was

14:52

on PC or whatever .

14:54

Yeah , before fallout was the

14:56

fallout we know yeah .

14:57

Before it was the Bethesda thing .

14:59

Yeah .

14:59

I'm going to go with that because it was turn based , so

15:02

it was really a very slow plug in a long

15:04

kind of game .

15:05

It was fun .

15:05

Also came in a bigger box because it was like a PC

15:08

game .

15:09

So it will burn for a little bit longer . It will be

15:11

the one , and it's also pretty good

15:13

, so it's like I could play it for a while before

15:15

I needed to burn it .

15:16

I wouldn't have to burn it right away .

15:18

You can't burn the rules and

15:20

it's funny how I suppose that's where we

15:22

know fallout today , this massive

15:24

, ridiculous open world that's signed a jaw

15:27

dropping . So , yeah , it's a good choice Burning

15:29

the roots it came from .

15:32

I worked on some games that could use some burning

15:35

. I remember one that I worked on and

15:37

I could probably say what it was , but

15:39

when I went to record it they told me that it was like

15:41

this was the worst game we had ever seen . So

15:44

we're localizing it and it was called

15:47

escape from bug island .

15:48

Is this still available ?

15:50

I don't know . I'm sure it's on YouTube , but this was

15:52

, you know , mid , early 2000s

15:55

, 2006 or 2007 or something

15:57

. Not good .

15:58

And I was .

15:58

I was in it . There's some bad .

16:05

A gaming character companion .

16:07

I would take ghost from destiny

16:09

because he could resurrect me and

16:11

for a while he had the voice

16:13

of Peter Dinklage . Now he has the voice

16:16

of Nolan Norris and that's fine . But

16:18

I would take the Peter Dinklage ghost with

16:20

me just so I could listen to him talk about them and

16:23

he could resurrect me and then , like you know , help

16:25

me get to other planets and whatnot , open doors

16:27

for me . It would be very good .

16:29

I feel like you're bending the rules again . Peter Dinklage is a good car

16:31

, probably the best choice we've had so far

16:34

. To be honest , what a tremendous choice . Would

16:36

there any games you would say you would have almost taken

16:38

?

16:39

Like almost taken to the islands . Yeah

16:41

, there's like a million of them . I love

16:43

like twisted metal . I love like good

16:46

driving games . I love

16:48

like Ridge Racer Especially

16:50

. I think it was Ridge Racer on like the PSP

16:52

, daytona on the Sega . That

16:54

was really , really fun . That'd be a good one . Panzer

16:57

Dragon , that would totally be up there , just

16:59

because it was like the first 3D running

17:01

sort of game that I remember really being wowed

17:03

by . There's all kinds of games I would

17:05

bring .

17:06

There's so many , there's so many moments where I'm

17:08

sure both of us thought this is the peak , this

17:10

is the pinnacle of gaming . It can't get any better than this

17:12

. And then a year later , they just

17:14

like Wow . I don't even remember

17:17

where that game was called . Yeah , oh

17:19

, forget that game . We've moved on . That

17:22

brings your time on the island to an end . You

17:26

just made your leaving me on the island now

17:28

, exactly , exactly , but you've got the voice

17:30

of Peter Dinklage . You've got a retro

17:32

full out game burning , but no

17:34

, it's been honestly , a total , genuine

17:36

pleasure to talk to you from the desert island for myself

17:38

. Goodbye and thank you , gavin

17:41

, until next time .

17:42

Thanks for having me .