Phantom Blade Zero quietly recast Soul with Roger Craig Smith at launch
The actor heard as Soul in months of trailers is gone from the English dub, and S-GAME has given no reason for the late change to its wuxia hero.
S-GAME replaced the English voice of Soul, the hero of Phantom Blade Zero, shortly before the game's October 28, 2026 launch. The final credits list Roger Craig Smith, the voice of Sonic the Hedgehog, in the role, while the actor who voiced Soul throughout the pre-release trailers no longer appears. GameSpot and TheGamer both reported the swap; S-GAME has not explained it.
How it came out
TheGamer senior reporter Sam Woods spotted Smith's name while rolling credits for review. Woods played with the Chinese voice track, so he only learned it was a recast when S-GAME notified him that Smith was taking over Soul, with no further detail. The previous actor had been listed for the part on IMDb and had posted about landing it on Reddit, a post that has since been deleted. TheGamer said it had asked both S-GAME and the original actor for comment.
Who is voicing Soul now
Smith is one of the most credited voices in games. Beyond Sonic, he has played Chris Redfield in Resident Evil, Batman in the Arkham series, Ezio in Assassin's Creed and Daigo Dojima in the English Yakuza releases. He is joined by Maggie Robertson, best known as Lady Dimitrescu in Resident Evil Village, who voices Mu Xiaokui.
Why players care
Soul carries the whole story: framed for his master's murder and left with 66 days to live, he is on screen for nearly every cutscene. Fans who followed the trailers had months to get used to one voice, and the change only became clear once the game was out. The old performance survives in the marketing, not in the shipped game.
The recast has not dented the launch. Phantom Blade Zero holds a Very Positive Steam rating, with 88% of 40,617 reviews positive as of November 1, and TheGamer gave it a perfect score.
Picking a voice track
Anyone who prefers to skip the debate can do what Woods did and play with Chinese audio and subtitles. On Steam, the game supports 15 languages including Thai and Vietnamese, which gives players in Southeast Asia native-language text whichever voices they choose.
Until S-GAME or the original actor comments, the reason for the change remains unknown.
Source: GameSpot; TheGamer; S-GAME (Steam).
