RIP Matthew Perry

Most people probably know Matthew Perry as the ever-popular Chandler Bing in the more ever-popular Friends. And yet gamers know him as a fan of Fallout and as the voice of Benny in New Vegas.

Benny is one of the most memorable characters in the most memorable of Fallouts, and a huge part of that is Perry’s performance. A side character in a video game might seem like it pales in comparison to being a main character in the biggest sit-com of all time, sure. But for many, he was a huge part of one of their favourite games.

And as those people wake up this morning and find out Perry has died, reportedly from drowning in his hot tub, it’ll take their thoughts back to that classic game and the happy memories they have with it.

Benny is the first character you meet in New Vegas. He sets everything in motion by unceremoniously shooting you in the face. But it’s the clever casting that helps cement the feel of New Vegas straight from the get-go. You know what kind of character he is, and you know what the stakes are. It’s a testament to the writers, to the designers and to Perry’s performance.

New Vegas and Matthew Perry

There’s going to be a lot of starry-eyed tributes to him today. It’s a shame they never came while he was alive. Those who read his autobiography will know how honest and difficult to read it was at times. It was not a celebrity memoir, filled with name-dropping and self-congratulations. It was bare and it was honest. And it is telling that the biggest splash it made was that it had some unflattering jokes about Keanu Reeves. Reaction culture at its finest.

An actor is not his character. Perry was a deeply troubled guy. And as I recall, he didn’t mention New Vegas in his autobiography at all. Given its heavy subject, it’s not as sad to me as Eric Idle not mentioning Discworld (and that’s not as egregious as all that, considering I’m pretty sure I’m the only person who remembers those games). But it’s worth remembering he got that role because of his reaction to Fallout 3.

So at some point it was important to his. And reaction from developers and fans to his performance was extremely positive.

On top of New Vegas, Perry appeared in 234 episodes of Friends. He was 54-years-old.