The good, bad and the ugly of AI in games

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The impact of generative AI on the games industry continues at a pace and the consequences are vast - both good and bad.

Developers have been airing concerns that their games are being copied by people using AI tools like Claude - even from something like a demo or a trailer.

We recently discussed on the podcast how one person had been decompiling apps and games to uncover their ‘secrets’. This process can take a matter of minutes and could surely be used for far more nefarious purposes.

The clone wars

Tom Giardino, from Valve’s Steam business team, was recently asked at Steam Indie Connect if the company would do anything about games being copied by AI and developers even being held to ransom by copycat threats.

As Inven reported, he responded: “Rather than relying on a single mechanic that someone can easily copy, you need to keep growing your game by adding features, personality, and creativity that stem from your own perspective.”

It’s a difficult situation for Valve - is it the platform holder’s job to police these tools and act as a gatekeeper? And how might it do that? And at such a volume, is Valve willing to dedicate the resources to uncovering what is a clone and what isn’t? So far on the latter, the answer appears to be no.

The volume of AI-developed content is an issue for all platforms. For example App Store reviews for new games are taking longer. Platform holders have yet to figure out how their current systems - where developers have already been concerned there are too many games out there - can apply to this new world without bottlenecks.

In an excellent newsletter this week, Game Maker’s Toolkit’s Mark Brown discussed the AI issue at length (you can also watch him talk about the matter on YouTube). His game Word Play has been copied by some Claude users, who then reached out to him about it to seemingly get permission for a commercial launch.

“I just do not know what to think about this at all,” said Brown. He wrote about the history of copycats in the industry and how developers often take inspiration from what’s gone before (two distinct points, I should add). He also spoke of how many months of work can now be replicated by others in minutes and how this could ultimately impact the regular income he gets. For now, he’s asked the people copying his game to hold off.

There’s potentially some respite for game makers. Anthropic is now not letting Claude users recreate specific games. But as Brown says, we’ll see if users can just get around that or use some other tools without such guardrails.

Practical applications

We’ve been reaching out to people in the industry to ask how their attitudes are changing on generative AI and what they’re using it for.

Village Studio founder Will Luton said a few things are undeniable for games:

• Consumers generally don’t like it being publicly facing (e.g. art, video, sound), especially in console/PC.
• It is impactful in speeding up development.
• It’s not as impactful as some thought or hoped.
• It’s not yet been meaningfully implemented as a game mechanic.

Burny Games’ organic growth lead Alisa Eren said she uses AI daily to extend her team’s capabilities. 

“After several weeks spent optimising our processes, my team can now handle at least twice as much work per week without overtime.”

Big Bang Accelerator founder Wenfeng Yang detailed a number of advantages for developers and publishers, such as creating low-poly assets, prototyping ideas, running ad creatives and A/B tests, and analysing products.

“That’s why I’m more confident about AI than I was about the metaverse. For me, AI has passed a simple test: teams are using it to get real work done. I see it as a lasting change in how games are made, what players experience and how companies work.”

You can hear more about how companies are using AI at our upcoming shows like Pocket Gamer Connects Jordan on November 7th and 8th and PGC Summit Montréal on November 10th. At PGC London on January 18th and 19th, AI will be a key topic of conversation, including at our AI Gamechangers Summit during the show.