Fortnite is moving deeper into artificial intelligence. During its “State of Unreal” keynote on Tuesday, Epic Games revealed a new tool for Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN) that will let creators build AI-driven NPCs with personalities that go off-script.
These upcoming characters won’t just loop canned phrases. Developers will be able to change voice tone, delivery style, and even personality traits to suit their in-game worlds. Epic says the NPCs will generate responses in real time, rather than follow pre-written dialogue trees.
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To show what the system can do, Epic introduced Mr. Buttons, a character designed to convince players to press a red button in a room plastered with warnings. When asked about the ominous signs, the character responded with flair, dodging concerns and urging mischief.
The tech behind Mr. Buttons, according to Epic, relied on around 20 lines of prompt text. It generated dialogue on the fly during the demo, responding to voice input from a presenter.
That said, the system still has a few kinks. Conversations are limited to back-and-forth exchanges, with noticeable pauses while the AI processes its next line. The presenter had to push a button to activate the mic, and while Mr. Buttons filled the silences with “Hmmm” and “Ummm,” the breaks were hard to miss.
The new tool builds on a previous experiment from last month, when Darth Vader appeared in Fortnite: Galactic Battle. His voice lines were created using Gemini 2.0 Flash and generated to sound like James Earl Jones via ElevenLabs’ voice tech. The late actor’s estate signed off on it.
The result was mixed. AI Vader quickly made the rounds on social media after parroting a player’s profanity-laced prompt. In one clip, Vader dropped an F-bomb, then chided the player for inappropriate language. Epic issued a hotfix soon after and said it had adjusted the system to avoid similar incidents.
Developers using UEFN will get access to the new NPC creation tools later this year. As for how players and creators will use them, and what sort of interactions might unfold, Epic seems ready to find out.
