With the release of Team Sonic Racing, the Sonic voice cast appears to have gotten its first major shakeup since 2010. Six characters have been recast with new voice actors, including Zavok, Omega, Blaze, Omachao, Silver, and most notably, Knuckles.
SEGA never made a formal announcement regarding the recasting, and it is only known now thanks to early copies of Team Sonic Racing popping up in the wild (or in the hands of reviewers). Ryan Bloom of TSSZ posted a screenshot of the credits, confirming the change in voice actors:
TSSZ was later able to confirm the following casting changes:
Silver, who had been voiced by Quintin Flynn, is now voiced by Bryce Papenbrook. E-123 Omega, who had been voiced by Vic Mignogna, is now voiced by Aaron LaPlante. Omachao and Blaze, both of whom had been voiced by Laura Bailey, are now both played by Erica Lindbeck. Finally, Travis Willingham, who was the voice of both Knuckles and Zavok, will be replaced by Dave Mitchell and Patrick Seitz respectively. Seitz has done work in the Sonic franchise before, voicing both Sonic Boom’s Lyric and Sonic Lost World’s Zomon.
It’s not exactly known what led to this recasting. It is notable that Vic Mignogna has been the subject of much controversy in recent months, with his alleged behavior around women and girls spawning a “Kick Vic” campaign on social media. This campaign caused one of his major employers, Funimation, to investigate the accusations, which soon led to them parting ways with him. Whether this had anything to do with Omega’s recasting is pure speculation, however.
It has been speculated that Travis Willingham and Laura Bailey’s departures are temporary, as they had a baby last year.
Whether these replacements are temporary or permanent, we will hopefully know more soon. In the mean time, you’ll have an opportunity to get used to the new voice cast when Team Sonic Racing releases on Nintendo Switch, Playstation 4, Xbox One and PC next week. Stay tuned to The Sonic Stadium from more coverage!
Source: TSSZ
WAIT, they got Kyle Hebert for Big?? This hurts, out of all the characters who are in desperate need of having the old voice actors back why BIG?
Dude, he voiced Big before
Kyle has been voicing Big since Colors. He’s ok.
Did OP honestly thought Duke Nukem has been voicing him since SA1?
It was a trash comment, I was thinking it was Jon St. John, I had forgotten it was the dragon ball guy since Colors. The name just sounded familiar.
Eren Yeager is now Silver, haha. I just did a quick research on Vic Mignogna…the rumors about him and all, what a real shame. Now, I won’t be able to look at Edward Elric the same anymore.
Nooooo Travis Willingham was so good in Sonic Boom, he did a brilliant job with all the roles he took on and made Knuckles a more lovable character with the way he portrayed him. I really hope he returns to Sonic world, I still have Hope’s for a season 3 lol.
Travis just stepped out cuz he and wife just had a baby.
….Yes. The voice of Guile stopped voice acting for a while to go home and be a family man.
Are there any news about non-english speaking voice actors? (Spanish, German, French, etc.) Will there also be changes?
Travis as Knuckles is an absolute blessing on this franchise, so i really hope this is temporary.
On the one hand, some of them are pretty fitting. I didn’t even know Blaze had been recasted until I saw this article, she sounds practically identical to Baily’s voice. And while I love Quintin Flynn a lot and am sad to not hear Axel’s voice coming out of Silver’s mouth anymore, the recast still suits him pretty well, I must say. Plus some part of me is getting a sick kick from hearing Cat Noir’s voice coming from Silver’s mouth, it fits a little too well. Haven’t heard Knuckles yet, but again, I’ve already gotten used to Travis’ Knuckles so it’s going to be pretty odd not hearing his distinct voice anymore. And again, the KH fan in me is sad that I can’t make any more Acced jokes (if you got that, you’re one of my people, lol).
What’s really weird is how this is only a partial recasting, instead of the usual whole-cast overhalls that we’re more used to. I’m not saying that I want to see the current cast go, per say, I’m just a little perplexed as to why we’ve recasted these characters in particular when their voices have been pretty decent so far.
Look, I’ve got nothing to really say or add to the whole Vic Micnogna thing, that’s just a big old mess I’d rather stay out of, but at least I can understand that being a reason for Omega to get recast. But why the others? Blaze/Omochao and Knuckles/Zavok I guess make sense if you take that baby speculation into account…but what about Silver? Quintin Flynn doesn’t really have any outstanding reasons to not be involved, unless they either just lost interest in him as Silver (again, I don’t see why) or they had to record all the lines last year and Flynn was probably unavailable due to needing to voice Axel in KH3. Those are like the only real possibilities I can think of.
Well, whatever the case, the choices don’t seem to be TOO jarring, although I have yet to hear everyone else’s voices yet, so I guess I’ll see how much or little my opinion changes.
Please, tell me the Japanese voices are still available, please!!…
The Japanese voices are usually consistent and have lasted longer.
So Erica Lindbeck has finally got into a Sonic game. Not surprised considering how she’s been popping up in tons of games, cartoons and anime dubs over the years ranging from the niche ( I.E: Uzume from Neptunia) to the mainstream (I.E: Roll from Mega Man) and in between (I.E: Celica from Fire Emblem).
i like the new voice for Omochao but they’ve never really had a consistant actor so every Omochao is different. I think for the most part – Omega is the best he’s been since Heroes, its an improvement over Forces which was also an improvement over 06.
The Knuckles is a good temporary voice match, it doesnt have the Travis feel to it but its passable.
Fun Fact: Aaron LaPlante was the voice of Mr. Kido (Joe’s father), Dr. Mochizuki (Meiko’s father) and Hackmon in the English dub of Digimon Adventure tri.
I enjoyed Patrick Seitz as the voice of MailBirdramon in Digimon Fusion.
Kinda ironic since Omega’s previous voice actor, Vic Mignogna voices Matt (replacing Michael Reisz) in “Digimon Adventure tri.
So… Silver is Komaeda now, huh? Why does that make too much sense?
I agree that Travis and Laura were probably taking time off during this game’s recording to be parents. I’d love to see them again of course, but having a baby is probably a little more important than being in a Sonic game. And Vic… yeah. Even then, I think Aaron LaPante is a HUGE improvement. I hope he gets to stick around.
Great to see Erica Lindbeck as well! Always loved her stuff. And it’s always great to see Kyle Hebert’s Big.
And… Zavok is DIO? That makes even more sense that Silver being Komaeda.
I hope knuckles is just temporary. all the other voice actors sound pretty good but Knuckles there’s just something off about him he does this sound like Knuckles to me.