Bill Clinton in Fallout 3? Not so fast...

There's a lot of noise around the web today about former President Bill Clinton being Bethesda Softworks first choice to be the voice of President John Henry Eden in "Fallout 3". It's a great story - but it's not entirely accurate.

Sure, Lev Chapelsky, general manager of Blindlight, which secures Hollywood talent for voicework in games, told Edge that his company had approached Clinton for the role, but Bethesda says it wasn't at the developer's request.

“Before they would pitch us on someone like Clinton, they may first go ask if he would do something like that,” says Pete Hines, Bethesda's vice president of public relations and marketing. “In no way, shape or form, did we say is President Clinton is who we want for this role or [tell Blindlight to] go chase him.”

What likely happened is that as Bethesda described the character, it sparked an idea at Blindlight. The company reached out to the former President and was told ‘The former president will not participate in one of your videogame products, thank you very much’.

"We appreciated that frankness and candour – you don’t get that kind of candour from Creative Artists Agency, frankly," Chapelsky told Edge. "If the answer's no, they don’t return your call for six months."

Ultimately, Malcolm McDowell voiced the part for the game, which became one of the most critically acclaimed - and top selling - games of 2008.