Two major Starfield actors got their roles after Bethesda decided to axe voice protagonists: "Games never do this. Once you’re out you’re out"

gamesradar.com:

The voices behind Starfield's Andreja and Sam Coe were originally the voices for your character.

As any Starfield player will tell you, the spacefaring RPG's protagonist doesn't have an actual voice. This wasn't always the case though, as actor Elias Toufexis recently revealed on Twitter that himself and fellow actor Cissy Jones were originally cast as the male and female voice for the player character, respectively.

Developer Bethesda then chose to can the whole idea, effectively throwing away "months" of work when they kicked out the concept of the player character having a voice. Rather than being out of work though, Bethesda instead hooked up Toufexis and Jones with other roles in Starfield.

Yeah it’s true. @cissyspeaks and I were originally the player voices in #Starfield. We worked for months. When they decided the player should be voiceless they gave Cissy and me Andreja and Sam Coe. Games NEVER do this. Once you’re out you’re out. Good on Bethesda pic.twitter.com/QpGoC6YmWnNovember 8, 2023

The pair would go on to instead voice Andreja and Sam Coe. As it happens, both are actually members of The Constellation faction in Starfield, and both can even be romanced by the player character (see our Starfield romances guide for more on the matter).

Toufexis, for his part, gives major props to Bethesa for hooking the pair of actors up with new roles after the voiced protagonist feature was cut. "Games never do this. Once you're out you're out," the actor adds in a follow-up tweet.

Truth be told, it would've been pretty huge for Starfield's player character to be fully voiced. Bethesda-made RPGs seldom feature a voice for their protagonists, and the amount of work that would've gone into voicing every single dialog option