We currently live in a time when we're seeing more and more game studios brush off slight inconveniences with AI, whether that be generating cover art or placeholder assets, researching, designing and selling merchandise for events, or even voice generation in some rather major incidents (hello there Arc Raiders).

It feels like if there's anything burdensome in a video game, there's a risk that devs could turn to AI rather than do the hard work, but thankfully, that doesn't appear to be the case with Fable and Playground Games, at least when it comes to voice acting.

Each Of Fable 1,000 NPCs Will Have A Human Voice

Earlier this week, Fable got a fancy new gameplay trailer, once again giving us a look at the impressive scope of Albion. We know that extends to the game's population as well, as Playground Games has made it clear that each NPC you encounter will be unique, have their own life, and that you can choose to wreck or improve it however you wish.

However, unique NPCs need unique voices, and the task of giving over 1,000 NPCs a proper voice and lines to say is a rather monumental task that some developers have resorted to using AI to make easier (hello again, Arc Raiders). It would be a lot easier for Playground to implement some kind of text-to-speech AI behind each NPC, but thankfully, Playground has done the hard yard, confirming at Summer Game Fest that there is "no generation involved in it."

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"We’ve got a really fantastic cast of actors who have come in and recorded tons and tons of dialogue, which is what you’ve heard today voicing our NPCs," said a Fable dev at a Q&A attended by GameSpot. "All of our NPCs are fully voiced. We cast around 100 actors to voice our Living Population alone."

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That's very comforting to hear, and actually does make me quite excited to see more of the world of Albion and if there are any other ways in which Playground has gone above and beyond to make things unique. At the very least, when I smack a guy in the face and steal his wife, I'll know that there's a real human portraying the emotion behind that devastated civilian.

Fable Like Follow Followed RPG Adventure Action Systems Released February 23, 2027 ESRB Mature 17+ / Blood, Sexual Themes, Strong Language, Violence Developer(s) Playground Games Publisher(s) Xbox Game Studios Engine unreal engine 4, forza tech 15 Images Close
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Genre(s) RPG, Adventure, Action Powered by Expand Collapse