By a happy accident, an anime fan and theater kid became aware of the career that eventually led him to success. That it was merely a stepping stone to his current fame was something he could never have dreamed of as a child. Thus, Matt Mercer became the D&D legend we know today.
Who is Matt Mercer? Matthew Mercer is a professional voice actor, game designer, and dungeon master of one of the most well-known groups playing Dungeons & Dragons, Critical Role – even though he is participating as a player for the first time in the current campaign.
For a full 10 years, the game master has streamed their campaigns with his D&D crew, allowing many viewers to partake in their adventures, resulting in the formation of a huge and steadily growing fan base. Critical Role is so successful that they have been conducting live performances outside the studio for several years, filling massive arenas. In July 2026, they will be seen for the first time in Germany during their “Echoes of Exandria Tour” at the Uber Arena in Berlin.
Apart from his role in Critical Role, some of you may know Matt’s work, particularly his voice, from other projects. The voice actor is heard in many games, including Overwatch, Baldur’s Gate 3, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and Resident Evil 6, as well as in many anime and cartoons. This is the career that serendipitously allowed the young adult to combine his greatest hobbies and passions into a single profession.
Here you can see the trailer for the fourth campaign of Critical Role, where Matt passes the role of the dungeon master for the first time to Brennan Lee Mulligan:
By a coincidence for the first time in a recording booth
In a conversation with Verité Entertainment on YouTube, the voice actor recounts how he got the opportunity to use his voice in an animation project for the first time.
It was the year 2000, and Matt had just graduated high school when his father was working as an audio engineer for various film and television projects. As an audio engineer, he took care of sound effects and background noise, working with people in related fields.
This led to a client of Matt’s father doing voiceovers for Japanese animations, which intrigued the recent graduate. According to Matt, he had been a big anime fan even before his work in the animation industry.
The audio engineer and his client got along very well and eventually became friends, which allowed Matt to watch a recording one day. He was personally introduced to the director, who spontaneously suggested during a break that he record some background voices for $50.
Young Matt did quite well and realized that this type of career offered a unique opportunity to blend his love for theater and performance with his second loves for video games, anime, and cartoons.
From small steps to a career
In the first 4 to 5 years, his work as a voice actor mostly consisted of small gigs. Matt reported that he might lend his voice to projects once a year, which was far from sufficient to support himself, let alone call it a career. However, during this time, he was still working towards something specific:
With his regular day job, he managed to save enough money after years of patient preparation and cutting back on his daily expenses to take a big step. In 2007, he decided to pursue a real career as a voice actor.
If it hadn’t worked out, I would at least have known that I tried and could have turned to the next adventure.
– Matt Mercer in a conversation with Verité Entertainment on YouTube
Some of Matt Mercer’s most well-known roles in video games include Cassidy from Overwatch, Leon from Resident Evil 6, Ganondorf from The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and Vincent Valentine from Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.
In anime, he voices Levi Ackermann from Attack on Titan, Jotaro Kujo from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Trafalgar Law from One Piece, and Leorio from Hunter x Hunter.
From voice actor to arguably the most famous dungeon master of Dungeons & Dragons
Critical Role, as we know it today, did not start as a planned production with regular livestreams, animated series, and sold-out shows, but as a regular group of friends playing Dungeons & Dragons – with Matt as the dungeon master.
While some of the participants met for the first time during the initial session, some of them already knew each other, as they all – just like Matt – were voice actors for video games and cartoons.
When the owners of the YouTube and Twitch channel “Geek & Sundry” found out that a group full of talented and well-known voice actors was playing Dungeons & Dragons together without publishing this entertainment potential, they reached out to the friend group – and the private game became a streamed experience in 2015.
At that time, they had already been in the midst of their first campaign, known today as Vox Machina, for 2 years, but that didn’t hinder their path to success.
Until 2019, Critical Role was hosted by Geek and Sundry, until they eventually transitioned to their own production company and primarily released their show on their own platforms.
“We all knew each other,” explains Travis Willingham in the cast interview with WIRED on YouTube when asked how Critical Role got acquainted, “I think that’s why [Critical Role] is so popular, because we are just ourselves. We weren’t cast or assembled. We are just friends. And I believe when you watch us, you can see that we have fun, but also that we mess up all the time.”
Critical Role has such a loyal and strong fan base that their expectations for a launched Kickstarter campaign for a 22-minute animation project were directly exceeded. What was planned as a special became an entire season with 10 episodes, from which even more seasons were born.
Now, Critical Role is about to release their second animated series on Amazon Prime, the first episode of which you can already watch on YouTube. It is completely free and you don’t need a subscription, but it will only be available this weekend: After their first Amazon hit, Critical Role brings the next series, delivering episode 1 directly for everyone in advance on YouTube
