Pippin Actor Billy Boyd Voices Hotel Ghost Hunter in There Are No Ghosts at the Grand, Revealed at Gamescom 2026
Billy Boyd, best known as Peregrin "Pippin" Took in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, has taken on an unexpected new role: voicing a character called Robert C. MacBrushy in the upcoming video game There Are No Ghosts at the Grand. The casting was announced as part of Gamescom 2026, the annual games industry showcase held in Cologne. GameSpot
Boyd is no stranger to music. He fronts the Glasgow-based band Beecake, and the role taps into that background. There Are No Ghosts at the Grand is a musical mystery game — a genre-blending title where songs and story carry equal weight. Its soundtrack spans spooky ska, wartime jazz, and skater punk, and each mysterious character the player meets has their own story and song. Players can even duet with them to uncover deeper layers of the narrative.
He is not the only stage-savvy performer in the cast. Alex Brightman, twice Tony-nominated for his lead performances in the Broadway musicals Beetlejuice and School of Rock, is also featured in the game. For a title built around music and character, the casting pulls from talent with serious vocal credentials.
Developed by Friday Sundae, There Are No Ghosts at the Grand puts players in the shoes of Chris David, who unexpectedly inherits a crumbling English hotel and has 30 days and 30 nights to restore it. By day, the work is renovation: players wield friendly, talking power tools — a sandblaster, a paint sprayer, a furniture cannon, and a daisy-chain gun — to bring the Grand Hotel back to life. The surrounding village offers more to fix up, including a fish and chip shop, a florist, and a bookshop. Steam Store
By night, the tone shifts. The same tools become weapons against the supernatural. A vacuum sucks up vengeful spirits; the paint sprayer exposes invisible assailants. Light environmental puzzles thread through the hotel's dark history — its former owners, its buried secrets, and the player's own forgotten past. Gematsu
The game was first announced in June 2025 for Xbox Series X|S and PC. It is now set to launch in Early Access — a release model where players buy and play a game still in active development, with updates continuing after launch — for PC via Steam and the Microsoft Store in December 2026. A free demo is already available on Steam. Xbox Series X|S owners will have to wait for a full release date. Gematsu
For Boyd, the role bridges two worlds he knows well — screen acting and music. For players, it adds a familiar voice to a game that already sounds unlike anything else on the release calendar.
