Jane Perry Challenges AI Threats at Develop:Brighton
▼ Summary
– Generative AI is already significantly impacting voice actors’ livelihoods, affecting work in audiobooks, dubbing, and other areas beyond video games.
– Voice actors often lack context when working in games, performing in isolated environments without sets or fellow performers, which can be disorienting.
– Motion capture and closer collaboration with developers are improving performance quality, but secrecy in game development still limits actors’ understanding of their roles.
– AI poses a threat by potentially reducing voice acting to a mere “sound effect,” despite its growing recognition as an art form in gaming.
– While AI has some benefits (e.g., recording repetitive sounds), unauthorized use risks devaluing human performances, which carry unique emotional depth and authenticity.
The voice acting industry faces unprecedented challenges as generative AI reshapes creative workflows, threatening livelihoods while raising critical questions about authenticity in performance. British-Canadian actor Jane Perry, known for her BAFTA-winning role in Returnal, recently addressed these concerns at Develop:Brighton 2025, offering a sobering perspective on how technology is transforming her profession.
Perry emphasized that AI’s impact extends far beyond video games, affecting audiobooks, corporate narration, and localization, sectors where synthetic voices increasingly replace human talent. “We’ve already lost significant work,” she noted. “Non-English dubbing actors have seen opportunities vanish overnight as AI replicates their specialized skills.” The ripple effect touches sound engineers, writers, and studios, compounding the economic strain across the industry.
Unlike alarmist rhetoric, Perry’s analysis balanced pragmatism with passion. She traced the evolution of actor-developer collaboration, highlighting how performance quality in games has soared despite unique challenges. Motion capture, for instance, demands actors deliver nuanced emotion in sterile environments, wearing dotted suits, wielding prop weapons, and reacting to invisible worlds. “It’s disorienting but exhilarating,” Perry admitted, recalling how film actors like Léa Seydoux initially struggled with the medium’s technical demands.
Yet Perry finds hope in deepening creative partnerships. She described a recent table read where developers and cast shared insights, fostering a rare sense of unity. “Hearing their vision transformed my approach,” she said, citing a conversation with CD Projekt Red’s animation head: “He asked for performances that give animators ‘more to work with’, reminding us that voice acting is a collaborative act, even when teammates never meet.”
AI’s encroachment looms large, however. Perry warned against reverting to outdated views of voice work as mere “sound effects,” a mindset that undermines the craft’s artistic legitimacy. While some developers resist AI-generated performances, the technology’s speed and cost efficiency pose undeniable risks. “It doesn’t unionize or tire,” Perry remarked wryly. Still, she believes AI could inadvertently spotlight what makes human performances irreplaceable: the ability to imbue characters with lived emotion and spontaneity.
Her closing reflection resonated deeply: “If we replace human voices with synthetic ones, what do we lose beyond the obvious?” For Perry, the answer lies in preserving the intangible, the shared vulnerability between actor and audience that no algorithm can replicate.
Image credit: Develop:Brighton
(Source: Games Industry)