Earlier this week Eidos release the debut trailer for the upcoming reboot of Thief. Apart from the character and environment designs, it was revealed that the voice actor of Garrett has been replaced. This news has not been taken lightly by the fan community, but today developer Eidos Montreal released the reason why they have taken this decision.
The reason behind Stephen Russell not reprising his role was not because they were unsatisfied with his work, but because the game is being developed in a different way and requires skills which Russell cannot offer. Thief will be entirely rendered with full performance capture and face tracking for the best and most natural movements and sequences. The actor would have to perform his own stunts in order to perform these tasks, and casting a stunt man for the motion capture sequences with a separate voice actor to do the voice work, would feel unnatural. In fact Russell was even considered to reprise his role in the early stages of development, but full performance capture took precedence. Director Steven Gallagher said that bringing Russell back would be akin to Sean Connery reprising his role as James Bond in the next 007 movie.
