Voldo

Voldo
Soul character
Voldo in Soulcalibur IV
First game	Soul Edge
Designed by	Aya Takemura (Soulcalibur II-IV), Takuji Kawano (Soulcalibur II-IV)
Fictional profile
Birthplace	Palermo, Kingdom of Sicily
Nationality	Sicilian
Fighting style	Kalaripayattu
Weapon	Dual Jamadhar Katars

Voldo (ヴォルド, Vorudo) is a fictional character in the Soul series of video games. Created by Namco's Project Soul division, he first appeared in Soul Edge, and later in all games of the Soulcalibur series with the exception of Soulcalibur Legends. His likeness has been used for merchandise related to the series, ranging from plush toys to action figures. Voldo has no spoken dialogue in any title in the series, instead moaning or hissing deeply while fighting an opponent. The character is noted for his sexualization.

As a character introduced in Soul Edge, Voldo's weapons, dual hand katars designed to be unique amongst the other weapons in the game, were selected before other elements of the character. His design and concept were then built to revolve around it, starting with gender, then physical measurements, and lastly background details. During Voldo's development, several alternate designs were considered, ranging from a balding, long haired man with a goatee to a rich nobleman wielding a katar on his right hand and a sickle in his left. After his appearance and movement were fleshed out by a concept artist, his character was rendered as a 3D model by a design team that worked solely on him. During this phase the team additionally worked with the Soul Edge story creators, refining the character's own role in the plot as needed throughout development.

Unlike other characters in the series, a majority of Voldo's movements were created from Naotake Hirata's imagination and not motion capture. However the head of Team Soul's motion capture department, Kent Kojima, noticed one particular actor working with them was highly flexible and able to mimic Voldo. Impressed, Kojima utilized him in motion capture sessions for some of the character's animations for Soulcalibur III, stating in a later interview "I was astonished that a human being could actually move like that. It left quite an impression on me. You probably can't tell which part is motion capture and what was just animated by hand by our animator."

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Wikipedia