Ashly Burch is an American actress, voice actress, singer and writer. She is known for her roles as Aloy in Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West, Tiny Tina in Borderlands 2 and Borderlands 3, Miss Pauling in Team Fortress 2, the web seriesHey Ash, Whatcha Playin'?, Chloe Price in Life Is Strange, Mayuri Shiina from Steins;Gate, Sasha Blouse from Attack on Titan, Ray from Fortnite, Parvati Holcomb from The Outer Worlds, Enid from OK K.O.! Let’s Be Heroes, and Ash Graven from Final Space. Burch was a writer on Cartoon Network's Adventure Time, and her work in Life Is Strange and Horizon Zero Dawn won her the 2015 and 2017 Golden Joystick Awards for Best Performance. She was also the host of Geek & Sundry's Unplugged'' series.
Early life
Burch grew up in Phoenix, Arizona, and has an older brother named Anthony. Her mother is an immigrant from Thailand. She credits her career path as a voice actress to playing Metal Gear Solid at age 12. Upon seeing voice actor David Hayter's name alongside that of the main characters, she looked him up and realized that there were actual people who voiced the characters, as she realized that was what she wanted to do as a career. She graduated from Occidental College in Los Angeles in 2012.
Career
After starting Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin'?, Burch got her first voice acting role when her brother, Anthony Burch, was hired as a writer for Borderlands 2 and he suggested she try out for Tiny Tina. For Life Is Strange, she was cast in the role of Chloe Price, after having also auditioned for the roles of Max Caulfield, Victoria Chase and Kate Marsh.
Personal life
Burch dated Must Come Down co-star David Fetzer until his death by accidental overdose in 2012. She discussed this event as well as her own personal mental health issues during her appearance on Paul Gilmartin's The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast and on Brian W. Foster's show Between the Sheets on Critical Role's YouTube channel. She suffers from chronic anxiety and credits her love of video games to playing Harvest Moon as a child as it was the only thing able to calm her down. She has spoken several times about her anxiety and the positive impact video games had on it.
