Up until now, dubbing game dialogue into multiple languages has been costly and time-consuming. However, advances in AI dubbing technology are revolutionising this process, reducing localization times and costs, thus making games more accessible worldwide. That’s why, as the second part of the ‘AI Dubbing Race’, now we’re focusing on the video game industry and AI Dubbing’s rise in the industry.
This article explores the latest AI-driven innovations, industry tools, challenges, and what the future holds for AI dubbing in game localization.
What AI is Bringing to the Table
Real-Time Voice Synthesis for Dynamic Narratives
One of the challenges for localizing interactive storylines is precisely the ever-changing nature of their content. This affects the speed at which translated content must be available for players. Modern games often feature branching storylines where player choices influence dialogue and outcomes, and this requires either a voice-over of all the possible iterations or real-time translation capabilities.
AI voice synthesis now enables real-time generation of character lines that adapt instantly to player decisions. Companies such as Speechify and ElevenLabs enable real-time voice synthesis solutions that help dubbing content without prerecording all possible scenarios.
Multilingual Voice Cloning for Emotional Nuance
Maintaining the original character’s personality and emotional tone across languages is one of the obstacles AI-Dubbing must overcome. Plain AI dubbing affects the overall experience of a game as much as a “bad” translation. Dubbing is not only about replicating content in another language. It’s about conveying the overall feeling of the characters and other nuances you can only feel by tone, pauses, and pitch.
To tackle this, platforms are also betting on voice cloning to preserve all these characteristics in AI-voice synthesis in multiple language combinations. See, for instance, Resemble AI, or ElevenLab’s voice cloning capabilities.
Lip-Sync for Realistic Matching Expressions
Ever felt like expressions, specifically lip movement, don’t quite match a character’s voice? That’s the “Uncanny valley” effect, the feeling that there is something odd about AI-produced content. To reduce this, AI dubbing tools such as Rask AI automatically synchronise dubbed audio with character lip movements and facial expressions. By automating lip-sync, studios save time and costs previously spent on manual animation tweaks, enabling faster localization cycles.
Source: Speechify
Challenges in AI Game Dubbing
- Cultural nuances and humour: AI, in general, still struggles with idiomatic expressions, local slang, and culturally specific humour. Despite advances in this regard, language experts are key in ensuring the cultural appropriateness of AI-generated outputs and preserving the game’s original intent.
- Emotional depth of synthetic voices: Voice conveys emotions and sometimes can make the difference between a sarcastic remark and a regular question. Although some companies have tackled this with voice cloning capabilities, replicating the full emotional range of human actors is still difficult to attain.
- Ethical concerns: Who controls the rights to a digitally cloned voice? This is just one of the questions regarding AI-Dubbing; issues regarding consent and ownership must be addressed properly to ensure AI safety practices. There’s also an ongoing discussion of what AI safety means and how it can be reinforced
Source: Unmixr AI
AI Dubbing in Action and What’s to Come
AI Dubbing is the perfect partner when it comes to speed and high volumes of content. For instance, Roblox, the online gaming platform, is using AI Dubbing to enhance multilingual user experiences. The platform, characterised by the high amount of live user-generated content, offers a challenge for localization. Real-time translation/dubbing is key here for an immersive player experience.
Developers seem to be looking at AI Dubbing more and more. ElevenLabs, for instance, has partnered with AMGI Studios, among other companies, to produce voiceovers for their interactive stories. With more game developers jumping on board the AI dubbing ship, we can expect more advances on the following:
- More emotional and human-like voice synthesis.
- Personalised experiences thanks to predictive models and content that adapts instantly to players’ preferences.
- Integration with AR/VR games.
AI dubbing is transforming video game localization by making global releases faster, more affordable, and accessible than ever before. While challenges around cultural nuance, emotional depth, and ethics remain, ongoing innovation and hybrid human-AI workflows promise a future where localized games resonate authentically across languages and cultures.
