English · b. 1954 · 1990s – 2020s
For seven years and five games he was Kain, the vampire anti-hero of the Legacy of Kain series — a theatrical, sardonic performance that gave a PlayStation action series the voice of a classical villain.
Simon Templeman, an English actor born on 28 January 1954, has worked across television, film and voice acting since 1983. In games he is inseparable from one character. In 1996 Silicon Knights and Crystal Dynamics released Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, the story of a murdered nobleman resurrected as a vampire, and Templeman voiced its protagonist. His Kain was cold, articulate and grandly sardonic, delivering the game's ornate dialogue with the relish of a stage villain — a rare thing in mid-1990s games, where voice acting was usually an afterthought. He returned for Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver in 1999, in which he also voiced Dumah, and continued as Kain through Soul Reaver 2 (2001), Blood Omen 2 (2002) and Legacy of Kain: Defiance (2003). The series became known for the quality of its voice cast and writing, and the steady presence of Templeman as Kain was a large part of that. His later game work includes Loghain in Dragon Age, Gabriel Roman in the Uncharted series, and Admiral Han'Gerrel vas Neema and Gavin Archer in Mass Effect. He is married to the actress Rosalind Chao.