Erik Schäffler, born in 1961 in Schwäbisch Gmünd, is a German actor, voice actor, dialogue director, and theater author. His career spans several decades and includes significant work on stage, in film and television, and extensively in the fields of voice-over for live-action and animation, as well as video games and audio dramas.

In the realm of anime and animation, Schäffler is a prolific voice actor. He is perhaps best known for his long-standing role as the villainous Orochimaru in the German adaptations of the Naruto series, including Naruto, Naruto Shippūden, and Boruto: Naruto Next Generations. His distinctive voice has also been featured in numerous other productions. He voices the antagonist Ladja in the film Dragon Quest: Your Story and provides the voice for Nobunaga Oda in the animated series Yasuke. Additional anime roles include Tomoru Sakishima in A Lull in the Sea, Ookuninushi in Noragami Aragoto, the Black Dragon in Chaos Dragon, Edward Higgins in Cyborg 009 Call of Justice, and Glaive Magna in How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom. In the series Back Street Girls: Gokudols, he lends his voice to the character Kouji Nagata. His body of work also includes roles in The Dawn of the Witch, So I'm a Spider, So What?, and Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation, among many others.

Beyond anime, Schäffler is a highly active and respected voice in the German video game industry, having voiced characters in well over 150 games. He is widely recognized as the German voice of Commander Shepard in the acclaimed titles Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3, a role he took over from the first game. His extensive video game portfolio also includes characters such as Nick in Left 4 Dead 2, LeChuck in Return to Monkey Island, Simon "Ghost" Riley in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, Albert Wesker in Resident Evil 4, and Hadvar in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. He also frequently serves as a dialogue director for video game localizations, as he did for Mass Effect: Andromeda.

Schäffler is also a familiar voice in live-action dubbing. He is the standard German voice for television presenter Jeremy Clarkson in shows like Top Gear, The Grand Tour, and Clarkson's Farm. His other dubbing credits include voicing Charlton Heston, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Liam Cunningham in various productions, as well as appearing in German versions of popular series like 24 and The Sopranos. In the audio drama world, he is known for his roles in long-running German series, having taken over the part of Onkel Titus in Die drei??? and Asmodis in Geisterjäger John Sinclair.

In addition to his voice work, Schäffler has a background in stage acting, having been a permanent ensemble member at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. He is also active as a theater author and director; his stage adaptation of Tyll premiered in Hamburg in 2020, and he has been awarded the Bavarian Theater Prize for his own productions.