Another day in the 21st century, another fresh round of frustration and accusations that a company is using artificial intelligence to replace the labor of human beings. This time around, Françoise Cadol, Lara Croft’s French voice actress as heard in the localized version of Tomb Raider IV – VI, has issued a legal notice to Aspyr Media, which is owned by the Embracer Group, over accusations that AI was used to touch up her performances.
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As reported by Game Developer, Cadol, an outspoken critic of AI and member of the French anti-AI “Touch pas à ma VF” movement, asserts that the alleged AI use came across her radar in August, following a patch pushed by developer Aspyr to the Tomb Raider collection. These patch notes mention restored voice-overs, tweaks to volume, and other audio adjustments that, ordinarily, wouldn’t raise much concern, especially as the Brazilian Portuguese localization is the only version that the notes specifically mention. However, attentive fans spotted some unusual affectations in Cadol’s recorded performance, bringing the concern to her attention. A video from French YouTuber Kingdom of Stott documents the changes here:
Starting right around 9:56, you can hear the original performance from Cadol, followed by the alleged AI version (the video is in French, so auto-translate captions help here for some of us). Despite failing French a number of times, I can recognize a clear difference in these two performances, as can many fans in the comments of this very video. Is it proof of AI use? Cadol seems to think so, describing the difference as “metallic” (via Google Translate) to French publication Le Parisien. And some recent negative reviews on the game’s Steam page are also accusing the developer of pushing AI into the game. Having worked with audio for many years myself, I can think of at least half-a-dozen other things that aren’t AI that could make the audio kinda sorta sound like this, but there’s still an undeniable rigidity that screams AI and, well, look at the times we live in.
Kotaku has reached out to Aspyr Media for comment.
The same video also mentions that fans have speculated AI was used in newly added loading screens a bit earlier. I’m more skeptical of that claim, but AI is getting better at hiding its trademark oddities. (Remember when it couldn’t render fingers well?)
But this is the wonderfully miserable hell we find ourselves in these days, a perpetual anxiety not just that advanced tech is being used in creative works, but that industries are finding ways to cut out the human talent, the labor, that has built these works and that we come to creative productions to appreciate.
Anyway, if you want an even fresher dose of our modern hellscape, check out the AI-voiced slop that’s reporting on this very AI-themed controversy that I had to sift through before finding an actual human documenting this silliness. Frakin’ Clankers.