Video game actors join the picket line over looming AI clones

Video game actors are the latest sector of actors to get involved in the fight against studios using AI to capture actors' likenesses for future projects.

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Video game performers who are part of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) participated in a strike last Thursday against AI technologies, which has been deemed a "sticking point" in the negotiations occurring between studios and actors. The video game actors now joining the picket line comes after a nearly four-month actor strike that concerns were directly tied to studios using AI to reproduce the likenesses of actors in future projects without the actor receiving proper compensation.

Essentially, actors have warranted concerns that studios are simply going to use the media they already have of them to create a digital clone that they wouldn't have to pay nearly as much for to include in a project, perhaps even without the permission of the actor. The interactive media space, which video game performers fall under, isn't immune from suffering from the same fate, with SAG-AFTRA chief contract negotiator Ray Rodriguez saying video game voice actors, motion capture actors, and physical performers are all worried they will be cloned.

"The industry has told us point blank that they do not necessarily consider everyone who is rendering movement performance to be a performer that is covered by the collective bargaining agreement," Rodriguez said

Rodriguez added the industry doesn't necessarily consider all movement performance to be a performer that is covered under the collective bargaining agreement, and the movement could simply be treated as "data". As a result, the actors decided to go on strike.