You can talk to Darth Vader in 'Fortnite' now thanks to generative AI
Fortnite is now in the business of resurrecting the dead, apparently.
On Friday, developer Epic Games announced in a blog post that Darth Vader is back in Fortnite as a recruitable boss character in the game's primary Battle Royale mode. He can be recruited to fight alongside you and your friends, but here's where things get strange: You can voice chat with Darth Vader and he'll respond using an AI approximation of the late James Earl Jones' voice. According to Epic, the Jones estate signed off on this, providing a statement in the blog post:
James Earl felt that the voice of Darth Vader was inseparable from the story of Star Wars, and he always wanted fans of all ages to continue to experience it. We hope that this collaboration with Fortnite will allow both longtime fans of Darth Vader and newer generations to share in the enjoyment of this iconic character.
The ethical concerns here are numerous and obvious, but it should be noted that Jones himself signed off on his voice being used in this exact manner back in 2022, before his death. Mashable recently reported on a similar case involving the voice and likeness of Agatha Christie.
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Anyway, Epic said you can ask him questions about the Galactic Empire or the Force and he'll answer them. Of course, it took about 30 seconds for someone to make the AI bot say something it shouldn't say:
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Epic Games did program the Vader character with safeguards in place (read more about parental controls in this FAQ), and he'll reportedly refuse to engage in romantic talk or discuss killing younglings. If a user discusses self-harm or mental health, Vader will direct the user to seek help.
Right now, the AI Darth Vader only speaks English, and Epic Games says they used a combination of Google Gemini 2.0 Flash and ElevenLabs' Flash v2.5 AI models.
You can check out the AI Darth Vader in Fortnite now, unless you're on iPhone.
Alex Perry is a tech reporter at Mashable who primarily covers video games and consumer tech. Alex has spent most of the last decade reviewing games, smartphones, headphones, and laptops, and he doesn’t plan on stopping anytime soon. He is also a Pisces, a cat lover, and a Kansas City sports fan. Alex can be found on Bluesky at yelix.bsky.social.
