Amicia and Hugo’s journey in A Plague Tale: Requiem is full of conflict and defined by grief. As the Rat Game’s protagonist begins to crumble under the weight of a hostile world, her mental state plummets and she descends into PTSD. – Game News caught up with BAFTA-nominated voice actress Charlotte McBurney at WASD to discuss how she and her character evolved during Requiem.
McBurney is a suave, soft-spoken Englishwoman, whose nervous excitement matches the hum of WASD. It’s been a turbulent time for Plague Tale: Requiem, which has been nominated for multiple BAFTA Games Awards after last year’s disappointing Game of the Year Awards. McBurney is nominated for Best Performer in a Leading Role; something that has more than won.
As noted in our Plague Tale: Requiem review, McBurney’s Amicia is no longer the innocent young woman from the first Asobo game. Instead, she’s hardened, battle-ready, and ruthless in her search for a cure for Hugo. He kills without fear and punishes without regret, but the violence weighed on his state of mind. Stricken with PTSD, the game’s story focuses as much on sanity as rats, and McBurney admits playing the role of a broken teenager was no picnic.
“When I was reading the script at home, I was crying,” he told – Game News. “I definitely tapped into things that I’ve been through, things that people I know have been through, real things. (things). I was definitely channeling a lot of my own experiences.
“It was great fun to explore in a very weird and macabre way, because it’s not often someone says ‘let go here’. We did a section where they said ‘can we stand in front of the microphone and you can cry?’ So I got up and cried for five minutes. It’s probably the most cathartic thing I’ve ever done, not that it hurts, but it’s a good thing. We all should to try !
Amicia’s emotions are what make her so endearing, it’s one of the reasons I fell so in love with her as a character. With a smile he said, “I sort of thought of (the recording booth) as a trash can, you know those places where you go in and smash plates and stuff, that’s how it was to work on Requiem; It’s like going in there but with my emotions and just letting go.”
“When I first read the script, I was like, ‘My God (the writer) saw right through me, this is terrifying! Why did you write me as a character? and then when I (him) spoke about it (he) said to me ‘oh, I wrote to myself’”.
Trauma, anxiety, and mental health transcend time boundaries, and that’s one of the things that makes Requiem, and the Plague Tale series as a whole, so powerful. If you haven’t played yet, I really suggest you give the game a try; Just make sure you have tissues nearby and possibly a tub of ice cream.
If so, we’ve got a rundown of the system requirements for Plague Tale: Requiem to make sure your rig can withstand the power of taint, or if you’ve played the game before and had heartbroken, we have a list of the best stealth games. Games to entertain you.
Interview by Nat Smith at WASD 2023.