On Wednesday, NetherRealm Studios debuted a trailer introducing new characters to its fighting game, Mortal Kombat 11 (currently the best-selling title of 2019). Of the new familiar faces coming to the title over the next few months was the Terminator T-800, as made famous by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator film franchise.
On Thursday, Mortal Kombat creator Ed Boon took to Twitter to share his own excitement over the announcement. “Part of me still can’t believe we got Arnold,” he tweeted. Many took Boon’s tweet to mean that Schwarzenegger would be voicing the role in the game. The problem: He’s not.
A knowledgable source tells The Hollywood Reporter that Mortal Kombat 11 will not feature Schwarzenegger voicing the role he made famous, though the version in the game does bare the actor’s likeness. Instead, a sound-alike voice actor was used. Warner Bros. Interactive, who produces the game, also confirmed that Schwarzenegger is not voicing the role.
Schwarzenegger’s voice has been used in video games before, in game-movie tie-in titles for Terminator 2 and Terminator 3 in 1991 and 2003, respectively.
The Mortal Kombat franchise, which first launched in 1992, has long been debated for its violent content. It was one of the major titles that led to the founding of the ESRB, the video game industry’s ratings board, in 1994.
During Schwarzenegger’s time as California’s governor, he signed and repeatedly backed a bill to restrict the sale and rental of violent video games to minors. In 2014, while promoting the film Sabotage, Schwarzenegger said, “The video games our children play are much, much more violent than anything in this movie.”
