David Harbour Says Alone In The Dark Was "Limited" In Scope, Wants To Do A "Full" Motion-Capture Game

Actor David Harbour has commented on his experience making the video game Alone in the Dark, saying it was "limited in scope" when it comes to performance capture. He also stated that he would love to be in a game with a more "full-born" performance capture setup, something like the kind of games that God of War designer Cory Barlog is known for.

Appearing on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Harbour started off by discussing his involvement with the new Alone in the Dark game. He stars in it alongside actress Jodie Comer. But they never met on the project. Asked if Harbour got to work with Comer on the game, Harbour said, "Not at all."

"It was so tragic that I didn't. I'm really curious to see how it turned out," he said, going on to say Alone in the Dark is a "wacky franchise." He said it's been through so many different iterations over the years, and some of the games have been "terrible."

"They were really weird games that didn't make any sense," he said.

For the new Alone in the Dark, Harbour said it was "really fun to reboot something weird and risky like that." But he said the motion-capture process wasn't a "full-born" experience. It was "just me and some dots on my face in a room," he said.

Harbour said the fact that his movements were not captured for Alone in the Dark "scares me a little bit," because he doesn't have any say in how his character will physically move.

"So if you're playing the game and you think the character is doing something stupid with their hands that wasn't my choice, that was some video game designer thinking that human beings move that way [laughs]," he said.

"This was limited in its scope. It was fun to be a part of that, but it wasn't quite full born," Harbour said.

Harbour plays Detective Edward Carnby and Comer portrays Emily Hartwood, with players being able to choose who they play as. Alone in the Dark, which comes from THQ Nordic, releases right in time for the spooky season on October 25.

Looking beyond Alone in the Dark, Harbour said he would jump at the chance to work on another video game project in the future where he gets to do more in the motion-capture process. He called out Barlog as an example, saying the designer is known for making games like God of War where actors move around in a scene and grab things as opposed to only having their faces scanned.

"If I can carve out a little time, i'd like to do one of those, that's more involved," he said.

Harbour previously discussed how he played so much World of Warcraft that it ruined his life for a period of time.