I’ll always choose a game without AI voice acting over one with. That said, Konami’s Shine Post: Be Your Idol! presents an interesting case study of perhaps justifiable(?) use.
The Japan-only game is a Switch 2 launch title in which you manage idol groups and try to keep your agency afloat. Your actions and choices alters the idols’ stats (img 1), which affect their singing pitch, tempo, volume, vibrato, and note length when in concerts. An idol may make mistakes (img 2) that result in poor performances (img 3). Konami uses AI to generate singing voices with these variations.
To train the models, each voice actor recorded 30-40 songs of their choice. Mistakes in the recordings were not corrected but used as is. Suzushiro, one of the VAs, said that by combining creative direction and model training, the generative singing voice is somewhat different than hers, but probably is how the character themselves would sing.
Producer Ishihara stated that to avoid negative reactions to the use of AI, great care was given to ensuring rights and compensation, so that players, staff, and talents can all feel secure. A promo video featuring many VAs suggests that the VAs participated willingly and were presumably paid.
(Source 1, source 2, and source 3)
[Originally posted on 2025-11-17 Pacific Time]
