The ongoing debate over generative AI use continues as Epic Games boss Tim Sweeney said he thinks it’s silly that Steam, the biggest PC gaming storefront, requires disclosure of AI use in games.
For those unaware – generative AI has become increasingly popular, though some platforms require creators to disclose whether or not they used AI. Steam is one of them and you’ve probably seen more games with the “AI generated content disclosure” ranging from using AI for inspiration to straight up using it for in-game content.
“The AI tag is relevant to art exhibits for authorship disclosure, and to digital content licensing marketplaces where buyers need to understand the rights situation,” Sweeney said on Twitter/X. “It makes no sense for game stores, where AI will be involved in nearly all future production.”
His comment on the “rights situation” comes from one of the primary arguments against generative AI: that it is wholly trained on protected and/or copyrighted works made by humans – whether it’s art, music, video, or even writing and coding. In other words, all generative AI is stealing the works of creators without their permission.
To be fair, Sweeney has expressed concerns about generative AI in the past, saying that AI companies shouldn’t be “hoovering up everyone’s art data.”
“They’re scraping the web to find people’s artwork and then using it, and not getting their explicit say-so on the thing,” Sweeney said when talking up their then-acquired company Artstation. “And a company shouldn’t do that sort of thing, right? Maybe that’s in bounds for research, but when you’re selling a commercial product that’s used to generate commercial artwork, you shouldn’t do that.”
Steam’s AI use policy is very thorough and covers whether a game uses pre-generated (static assets for a complete game) or live-generated assets, even going so far as putting in checks to make sure companies are not generating illegal content.
“Valve will use this disclosure in our review of your game prior to release,” the policy reads. “We will also include much of your disclosure on the Steam store page for your game, so customers can also understand how the game uses AI.”
Regardless of the legality behind generative AI being used in game development, it’s obvious that every time a game is found to have used it – there’s blowback of varying levels. In some cases, we’ve even seen AI-generated music topping charts with no one seemingly noticing until it’s pointed out.
A recent and very popular game, ARC Raiders, admitted to using AI text to speech for in-game dialogue, as well as their Steam AI disclosure which reads: “During the development process, we may use procedural- and AI-based tools to assist with content creation. In all such cases, the final product reflects the creativity and expression of our own development team.”
Following up on the blowback from the AI content in the game, the CEO of its parent company, Nexon, said we should assume “all game companies are using AI,” though he firmly believes human creativity will still be their primary strategy.
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