In the Assassin’s Creed Shadows dubbing competition, fans can lend their voices to NPCs

June 19, 2024

Highlights

Ubisoft is hosting a TikTok dubbing contest where fans have the opportunity to lend their voices to NPCs in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
Fans will be invited to perform duets using cutscenes from the game, with the winners being chosen to voice a “secondary NPC” in their language.
It follows a trend in recent years in which Ubisoft has turned to fans for development material, which has been criticized in the past as morally questionable.

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Ubisoft has announced that it will be holding a voice-over contest on TikTok in the next few days, giving fans the opportunity to lend their voice to an NPC in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.

Even though Assassin’s Creed Shadows is currently causing so much anger and controversy, Ubisoft knows that the series has some pretty loyal fans who would jump at the chance to be involved in the game’s development in some way. That’s why the company has decided to host a voice-over contest on TikTok over the next few weeks to recruit some fans to voice various NPCs in the game.

In a video on TikTok, it was announced that the “Assassin’s Creed Shadows Dubbing Challenge” begins today and ends on July 2. Fans are tasked with using one of the various cutscenes on the official Ubisoft account to sing a duet where they read the script as a dub. Participants must then tag their video and Ubisoft will select the best performer for each available language to voice an NPC in the game.

Ubisoft lets fans lend their voices to NPCs in Assassin’s Creed Shadows

Yasuke and Naoe in a small village in Assassin's Creed Shadows

Of course, the NPCs these people voice are classified as “secondary NPCs” by Ubisoft, and all of the main characters and NPCs were voiced by professionals, but it still feels a bit odd that Ubisoft is essentially making fans work for them without getting paid. Sure, it sounds nice to sit in on a voice acting session, but these people are still doing the work that would have otherwise been done by professional voice actors, and should probably be paid accordingly.

It’s also worth noting that this isn’t the first time Ubisoft has turned to fans to provide material for its titles. Back in 2018, the company faced a lot of heat for working with Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Hitrecord to source music and artwork for Beyond Good and Evil 2. Those who submitted work weren’t even guaranteed payment for their work, and the whole thing felt more like fan exploitation than a fun attempt to get fans involved in development.

Ubisoft also ran a similar contest ahead of the release of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, asking fans to submit tattoo designs that might appear in the finished game.

Granted, this voice acting competition doesn’t promise people any pay, but maybe that’s what Ubisoft should do if it wants fans to essentially do the work of a professional voice actor. It’s a cool opportunity, but it’s still a job.