It is always a huge challenge to make a movie or game sequel if one of the actors playing a central role passes away in the process. I recall when Paul Walker Died before the shooting of Fast and Furious 7 was completed, CGI and his brothers were brought in to complete the role. With the advent of AI, things have become a lot easier. CD Projekt Red was able to keep the role of Miłogost Reczek who died in 2021 in Phantom Liberty with the help of AI.
Reczek was the Polish voice actor who voiced Viktor Vektor in the Polish language in Cyberpunk 2077. Sadly, the actor died before the making of Phantom Liberty. CD Projekt Red was forced to brainstorm on how to retain the character in the Phantom Liberty expansion.
One of the options that the studio had was to recruit a new voice actor to redo the entire lines from the base game as well as the new lines of the expansion to ensure a consistent experience for players. However, the idea did not scale through for several reasons.
Firstly, that would have been an expensive venture—although not impossible. In a statement to Bloomberg, CD Projekt localization director Mikołaj Szwed said one of the reasons why the company did not like the idea was because Reczek “was one of the best Polish voice talents” with “stellar” performances. In other words, eliminating him from the franchise was not an option.
CD Projekt Red eventually found a more acceptable solution. It involved hiring a new voice actor to perform new lines and using a voice cloning software called Respeecher to digitally alter the new voice to sound like Reczek’s.
“This way we could keep his performance in the game and pay tribute to his wonderful performance as Viktor Vektor,” Szwed said.
This was done with the family’s permission by the way. According to Szwed, his sons “were very supportive” of the idea. That was a genius move. I bet many players would not have noticed the difference.
CD Projekt’s use of AI in Phantom Liberty is how it should done
The use of generative AI in the entertainment industry (including interactive media) has continued to generate ethical concerns. Most people are particularly worried that the use of AI will lead to massive job cuts—and we are already seeing that in the video game industry.
In fact, it is one of the issues that members of SAG-AFTRA want ironed out. Last month, members of the union overwhelmingly voted in favor of a video game strike action—should negotiations fail to reach a consensus.
“The unregulated use of artificial intelligence poses an existential threat to anyone who makes their living using their voice, image, or performance,” said the union leader Ray Rodriguez.
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Although generative AIs are currently used in the video game industry, most studios are careful about disclosing this for fear of backlash. For example, Squanch Games made use of AI artwork in some levels of High on Live. The studio also used some AI-generated voice acting.
However, how CD Projekt has literally brought back Reczek from the dead to continue his role in Cyberpunk 2077 shows that AI has its place in the entertainment industry. AI can step in to fill the role of actors of a franchise if for one reason or the other they are unable to complete the role they already signed up for—with their permission of course.
Also, whenever AI is used to recreate an actor’s likeness or voice, it is always important to give them the credits—and they should get some royalties too. Nevertheless, it is hard to trust studios to ethically use AI tools, when not being monitored.
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