The Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), a major actors’ union, has signed an agreement to allow the use of AI voice replicas in games, leading to many voice actors speaking out against the union.

During the Consumer Electronics Show 2024 (CES 2024), SAG-AFTRA announced a deal with AI voice technology company Replica Studios to enable AAA video game studios and other companies to utilize AI voice replicas of actors in their products.

According to the announcement, the deal notes that it will enable Replica Studios to engage with “members under a fair, ethical agreement to safely create and license a digital replica of their voice.”

“Licensed voices can be used in video game development and other interactive media projects from pre-production to final release.”

SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said, “With this agreement, we have achieved fully informed consent and fair compensation when it comes to the use of our members’ voices and performances.”

“Our voice actor agreements ensure that game developers using our platform are only accessing licensed talent who have given permission for their voice to be used as a training data set, as opposed to the wild west of AI platforms using unethical data-scraping methods to replicate and synthesize voices without permission,” added Shreyas Nivas, CEO of Replica Studios.

From the statements, the agreement suggests that rather than replacing performers with AI as a whole, voice actors have control over the use of their voice replicas through formal licensing.

That said, it is currently unclear how the licensing, crediting, and compensation would work specifically, as well as how the voice data is stored and distributed.

Voice Actors Speaking Out 

Even though the announcement stated that the deal was “approved by affected members of the union’s voiceover performer community”, many notable video game voice actors have taken to social media to speak out and apparently were not aware of the deal.

Steve Blum, the prolific actor whose credits include being the voice of Wolverine in many projects, Baraka in the Mortal Kombat series, Brimstone in Valorant, and many more, wrote the following on Twitter as a response to the deal:

Excuse me? With all due respect…you state in the article “Approved by affected members of the union’s voiceover performer community.” Nobody in our community approved this that I know of. Games are the bulk of my livelihood and have been for years. Who are you referring to?

— Steve Blum (@blumspew) January 9, 2024

Yong Yea, YouTuber and the new English voice of protagonist Kazuma Kiryu in the Like a Dragon series, also stated that he and many voice actors he knows are not aware of the agreement.

Every voice actor I know not only didn’t approve this, they pretty much heard about this for the first time today on Twitter.

— Yong Yea (@YongYea) January 9, 2024

Elias Toufexis, known for his voice as Deus Ex protagonist Adam Jensen, wrote: “I would humbly consider myself one of the top voice actors working in games. No one asked me about this. No one reached out for my opinion.”

“From what I’m seeing, no one asked any of my peers either.”

Other prominent video game video actors who spoke out include Super Smash Bros. announcer Xander Mobus, the voice of Genshin Impact’s Beidou Allegra Clark, Apex Legends Valkyrie Erika Ishii, and many others.

Thomas Mitchells, an actor and director who worked on games such as Baldur’s Gate 3 and Dying Light 2, called the agreement a disappointment.

“Studios will look past creativity for convenience and this will potentially have a detrimental effect on artists.”