My Life with Roger Clark: I'm a real-life video game character

Video games have followed me my whole life. These days, I’m best known for playing Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 2

Roger Clark who plays the character of Arthur Morgan in the video game Red Dead Redemption 2.

As a kid who was among the first generation to grow up with consoles, I never imagined I would someday play a leading role in one of the world’s most popular video games.

Back in the day, I enjoyed nothing more than whiling away the hours in the company of friends like Donkey Kong and Pac-Man. I even played the less popular classics such as E.T., which is infamous for being one of the most unsuccessful video games of all time.

Video games have followed me my whole life. I’ve been lucky enough to work in the industry, bearing witness to how technology has changed and improved.

These days, I’m best known for playing Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 2, a 2018 action-adventure game developed by Rockstar Games. Set in 1899, at the end of the Wild West era, the game is a prequel to the 2010 game Red Dead Redemption. It follows the exploits of outlaw Arthur Morgan, a member of the Van der Linde gang.

While I hugely admire the video game actors of today, the performers who first inspired me were a little bit closer to home. As a New Jersey native born to an Irish mother and Irish-American father, moving to Ireland as a child came as a culture shock to say the least. Fortunately, I found my calling as part of the Christmas pantomime chorus for the Coolera Dramatic Society in Kilmacowen, Sligo.

There was a handful of kids who were really into it, myself included. I was transfixed by how characters like the baddy and the dame held the audience in the palms of their hands. The odd time they would slip me a line or two, which was wonderful. As a young adult, I cast my acting dreams aside to study computers in Wales. It was a disillusioning time, which made me realise that you only get one life.

The beginning of my acting career was tough. I dabbled in countless survival jobs for the first 13 years of my career. I did everything from stage to voiceovers before finally relocating from the UK to the US, where I was born.

Red Dead Redemption 2

My first introduction to the video game world was in 2008. People think it’s just voice acting, but a lot of it is done via performance capture. If you have ever watched behind-the-scenes footage of Avatar or Andy Serkis doing The Lord of the Rings as Gollum, you will see the actors wearing spandex dotted with tiny spheres.

That’s exactly what I did on Red Dead Redemption 2 and many other video games. I will never forget my audition for RDR2. They asked me to don boots for the audition, which struck me as bizarre. Now I know it was because they wanted to see my gait and determine if I could truly embody the character. 

It was so top secret at the time that I wasn’t even aware of what I was auditioning for.

Even when they handed me the sides, it occurred to me that this was just like the video game Red Dead Redemption I had been playing earlier.

However, even at that stage, I was still uncertain. The scene I played is one that still sticks in my mind. I was walking into a war and chewing the fat with the bartender when, at the end, I tell him that somebody has a hit on him and “I have to kill you”. That’s basically the crux of the scene.

I was lucky enough to land the gig, and it became my full-time job for five years before the game was finally released in 2018. Even though the game is now seven years old, it continues to be a rewarding experience.

For most people, Red Dead Redemption 2 takes 50 or 60 hours to finish. People are still finding new things in the game they never saw before. It’s not just the main story. There are loads of side missions and so much attention to detail and quality. The hours we all spent working on this game are the equivalent of five or six seasons of a television show. Arthur Morgan is the main playable character, so players are responsible for his actions, which is a unique thing for many actors.

The game has introduced me to a wonderful community of fans whose level of appreciation and commitment has been deeply touching. Some people I met through conventions told me that they never got on with their father or grandfather until the game brought them together.

This was the best feedback I could ever have received, considering that my own father was always screaming at me to get off the damn thing. The fact that Red Dead Redemption 2 is a Western means that it appeals to the older generation too.

On a personal note, the game has changed my career and my trajectory in so many ways. I’m so grateful for how it has enriched my life.

More importantly, I am grateful for the work of thousands of other people whose combined efforts made this beautiful game that has brought joy to so many people around the world.