Extreme Vocals and Vocal Health for Video Games

17th December 2024 – 3.30pm GMT  / 7.30am PST / 08.30am MST /9.30am CST / 10.30am EST

Extreme vocals are prevalent in video games. Whether it is for human characters or creatures and monsters vocalizations, they can put untrained voice talent at risk and seriously jeopardize their vocal health. What are the options for anyone who wishes to train and reduce the risks associated with extreme vocals?

In this session, Sébastien Croteau, President of The Monster Factory AV INC, gives insight into the different kinds of rough vocal effects used in video games and the science behind extreme voice techniques in singing and voice acting. He will also dive into the options offered to voice talents who wish to get comfortable with extreme vocals.

Metal vocalist since 1991 (Necrotic Mutation) and throat singer (Tibetan,Mongolia and Inuit throat-singing) since 1996, Sébastien Croteau masters an impressive number of extreme vocal techniques. He began teaching metal voices and throat-singing 15 years ago. Since then, he has trained hundreds of metal vocalists and voice talents around the world and he is a renowned expert in vocal distortion, extreme sounds and creature voice design.

It is thanks to these techniques that he began to work for video game companies in 2005. Since then, he has specialised in vocal stunt work and sound creation of the voices of monsters and creatures. He has worked on more than forty video games (including Baldur’s Gate 3,Warhammer: Realm of Ruins, Gotham Knights, Meet your Maker, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Dead by Daylight, Dungeons and Dragons: Dark Alliance, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Far Cry 5, Rainbow Six Siege:Outbreak, Prince of Persia – The Forgotten Sands and Assassin’s Creed 2) and has lent his voice to more than 300 characters.

For The past few years, he has been a casting director and a voice director for various projects. He also teaches voice acting at INIS (National Institute of Sound and Image) in Montreal and for various organizations like The Halp Network (LA), Wonderland VO (UK) and Brava UK. In 2018, he created a company called The Monster Factory, a talent agency that specializes in extreme sounds, vocal stunts and creature/monster voices