Wayne June, the famed narrator of the Darkest Dungeon video games, has died. June’s passing was introduced on Bluesky by Darkest Dungeon inventive director Chris Bourassa, who described June as “ancestor, educational, artist, and good friend.”
“Twelve years in the past, Tyler [Red Hook co-founder Tyler Sigman] and I reached out to Wayne, humbly asking him to relate our indie recreation’s trailer,” Bourassa wrote. “Since these magical moments after we first paired his studying with the footage, it has been an unbelievable and fulfilling collaboration. Wayne’s singular baritone and masterful cadence elevated the whole lot he learn. He was a consummate skilled, and his love of his craft was an inspiration. His inimitable work is woven into the very cloth of our business in a approach that can not be forgotten.
“It is one in every of my best honors to have written for him this previous decade. Though I by no means bought to shake his hand, I knew him to be a good friend. Thank you, Wayne.”
Bourassa instructed PC Gamer that he first encountered June’s work via his readings of HP Lovecraft audiobooks, which he listened to recurrently within the years main as much as Red Hook’s founding. He as soon as emailed June to specific his appreciation, and June replied with a studying of Edgar Allen Poe.
“Chris lent me these CDs (yup, CDs) and I listened to them, actually discovering that Wayne’s studying of Lovecraft introduced the work to a complete new degree,” Sigman wrote in a message to the Red Hook staff, shared with PC Gamer. “The trailer referred to as for a narrator, and at some point it popped in Chris’ head to succeed in out to Wayne and see if he would not thoughts studying for a videogame trailer.
“I believe extra verbatim, it was, ‘We ought to get any individual like Wayne June to relate the trailer.’ Then we thought—wait, Wayne June reads stuff for a dwelling! Maybe he would do it! The work in fact was so good that we determined so as to add a narrator to the sport itself.”
June’s voice turned a central a part of Darkest Dungeon, and there was by no means any doubt that he’d return for Darkest Dungeon 2: Sigman and Bourassa mentioned in a 2020 interview that whereas they have been taking a look at methods to regulate the narration to suit the sequel’s modified construction, “the narrator is a part of Darkest Dungeon’s identification.”
Many of June’s strains in Darkest Dungeon turned repeated sayings inside the recreation’s neighborhood, with phrases showing in remark threads as honest or ironic replies to the given matter. “I typically discover myself randomly quoting the narrator’s strains all through my day, each whereas taking part in different video games and simply doing regular family actions and chores,” redditor nurse_uwu shared in response to the information. An intensive wiki web page catalogues all of the passages from the primary recreation, with linked sound recordsdata.
There on Reddit, fittingly, many supplied their tributes within the type of these passages:
“Up forward — a light-weight within the limitless expanse…”
“Ruin has come to our household. :(“
“Great adversity has a magnificence, it’s the fireplace that tempers the blade.”
Darkest Dungeon and Darkest Dungeon 2 are June’s solely listed videogame credit, though he will also be heard in a Dota 2 announcer pack. But his work was so impactful that we roped him into working for us because the announcer of the PC Gaming Show in 2017 and 2018. We additionally had him narrate the reveal of the Large Pixel Collider in 2016, and whereas that PC could also be dated, the video stays one in every of our favourite issues we created from that period:
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“Wayne was all the time, I imply all the time, straightforward to work with,” Bourassa instructed PC Gamer. “His deliveries would typically come tremendous late at night time, and I’d recurrently sneak off the bed to go and take heed to them. It was such a pleasure, listening to how he’d inject life and drama into the script – I’ll always remember the anticipation of opening his new recordings, hunched over my laptop at midnight with my headphones on. Better than Christmas. It bought in order that I may anticipate his supply, and would write together with his voice in my head. It was a particular collaboration, and one I shall be eternally grateful for. His work is nothing wanting iconic, and deserves to be acknowledged and celebrated on the highest ranges of our business.”
A reason for demise was not introduced.
