In under 24 hours, Darth Vader learned to swear and blurt out “skibidi toilet.” This is the latest AI experiment in Fortnite. Players can chat with the Sith Lord, but Epic Games has already rushed out a patch to rein him in.

Epic Games has caught players off guard with a brand-new feature in Fortnite: a voice-activated AI system that lets users hold conversations with Darth Vader in-game. Naturally, the community wasted no time diving into multiplayer mode to push the boundaries—and, as expected, some managed to make the Dark Lord of the Sith utter wildly inappropriate words and phrases. Developers responded quickly, releasing a patch to tone down the character’s language.

The feature was announced on the official Fortnite site and described as follows: “Use your voice to plan strategies with the ultimate Sith Lord, and he’ll respond with conversational AI. […] Ask him anything about the Force, the Galactic Empire… or even how to survive the final storm circle. The Sith Lord has answers.”

If Darth Vader sounds suspiciously familiar, there’s a reason: Epic Games has integrated the original voice of James Earl Jones, the late actor who gave Vader his iconic, ominous tone. According to his family, “For James Earl, the voice of Darth Vader could not be separated from the Star Wars story and it was always his desire that all fans of all ages could continue to enjoy the experience.” They hope the Fortnite collaboration brings the character to life for both longtime fans and a new generation of players.

This experimental feature uses Google Gemini 2.0 Flash and ElevenLabs’ Flash v2.5, and was designed to avoid anything sexually explicit, terror-related, or overtly offensive. Still, players managed to push the limits. Clips have surfaced of Darth Vader saying “freaking fucking” (via Loserfruit) and “skibidi toilet” (via ZozolFN). The former spread so rapidly online that Epic Games was forced to act and issued a patch to bring Vader’s AI back in line.

AI Vader Is Met With Player Backlash

Despite the novelty, many players voiced strong criticism against Epic for introducing an AI system that, in their view, adds nothing meaningful to Fortnite’s gameplay. Social media lit up with reactions like: “Putting generative AI in your games is not very Epic” (SalmonPersonjpg), “it’s the most useless shit ever” (lunalililey), and “yeah cool why not, I definitely want to hear and speak with the voice of a dead man when I enter a match. What does this have to do with playing the game, other than wetting investors’ pants with buzzwords?” (MothLordDip).

One thing’s for sure—this was a test run, and Epic Games is likely to issue more updates in the weeks ahead to refine how Darth Vader’s AI behaves. For now, the reaction from the community is a strange mix of amusement and exasperation.

Source: 3djuegos