Chris Bourassa Rejects AI Voice Use for Wayne June
Chris Bourassa says Red Hook will never use generative AI to recreate Wayne June’s voice, even after June gave the studio permission to train an AI on it before he died. The co-founder and creative director said the studio would not erode the narrator’s work by teaching a machine to sound like him.
Bourassa wrote on Reddit that June’s voice and delivery was human, and that he was grateful to have written for him. The response landed inside a wider industry fight over synthetic voices, with Darkest Dungeon’s narrator central to how the series sounds.
Bourassa’s Reddit reply
One of Bourassa’s last-email details made the choice more complicated: “In one of his last emails to me, Wayne gave us permission to train an AI on his voice, something he'd staunchly opposed prior to the end.” Bourassa added, “I declined, and we donated to his family anyway.”
He was responding to a Reddit discussion about possible replacement actors for June, and he made his position plain in a separate line: “I would never, ever erode his incredible and timeless performances by teaching a machine to sound like him.” That is a hard line, not a temporary pause, and it effectively shuts the door on one of the more obvious shortcuts available to a studio thinking about a sequel.
Wayne June’s legacy
June died in January last year after voicing the Ancestor in Darkest Dungeon. The character is more than a menu-screen presence: the Ancestor kills himself shortly before the events of the game, the opening cinematic is his suicide note, and he continues to speak to the player throughout the game.
That makes the voice decision unusually central to any future Darkest Dungeon project. Bourassa said, “In this moment, the Most Right thing we can choose is to eschew AI and preserve Wayne's legacy.” He also said, “You can't make decisions based on fear.”
Darkest Dungeon 3 stakes
Red Hook was discussing the currently hypothetical Darkest Dungeon 3 when Bourassa made the comment, so the studio is drawing a public boundary before a sequel can turn the question into a production decision. Last May, SAG-AFTRA took Epic to court for using generated AI to recreate James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader, which shows how quickly this issue now reaches beyond one franchise.
For players, the signal is simple: if Red Hook moves forward, June’s narration is being treated as an earned performance, not raw material. That is the cleaner creative choice, and in this fight, it is also the safer one.
