For better or worse, generative AI was released in the gaming industry.
February 4th Roblox announced that it is adding 4D generation to its existing AI generative tool, which allows players to create interactive objects such as cars and planes instead of just static objects. The company's generative tools for creating artificial intelligence are similar to Google's Project Genie, which was introduced on January 29 and users instantly “created” generative worlds reminiscent of popular series such as The Legend of Zelda.
Project Genie is a text-to-generation tool where users provide a prompt like “make a game where my dog's toys get up and fight back,” and Genie runs it, creates a scenario, and lets you run around the generated world for a limited time.
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Whether generative AI tools are seen as a Prometheus moment – the Titan who stole fire from the gods and gave it to humanity – or more like a Pandora's Box – a box that was opened and released all evil into the world – is up for debate. It's most likely somewhere in the middle.
Does generative AI have a place in game development?
Indie game developers share their thoughts on generative artificial intelligence
According to this year's Game Developer Conference State of the Gaming Industry survey, 52% of gaming industry professionals surveyed believe that generative AI is having a negative impact on the gaming industry. This is 30% more than in 2025.
“I was a little anxious at first, because if we can actually start making games like this, then an entire industry of people who have spent years perfecting their craft could end up out of a job,” Alexis Brutman, CEO and game director of indie studio Astral Clocktower Studios, tells GameRant.
At a time when it seems like every week brings a new round of layoffs to the industry, Google's Genie or Roblox's Cube Foundation Model aren't exactly doing much to ease that stress.
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While there was some initial anxiety, Brutman explained that it dissipated somewhat after he saw that Genie wasn't powerful enough to make big, immediate changes in the industry. Although this raises a few questions: Do these tools have a place in game development and how far will they go?
“[AI] it has no place in creative design work, especially since so many AI models are being trained to do the work of artists they weren't allowed to be trained, and games are supposed to be made by humans, period,” Brutman said. And consumers seem to mostly agree.
According to a Quantic Foundry survey, of the more than 1.75 million players who participated, 62.7% said they had very negative feelings about the use of generative artificial intelligence in video games. In particular, respondents had issues with generative AI used in the creation of art, music, sound effects, dialogue, and narrative story elements such as quests.
“The players' opinions seem to be overwhelmingly negative, and that's what really matters in the end,” Brutman said. “If the players are yelling at the developers that they don't want to see it [generative AI] in the games, I think maybe we'll let the hell out of it.”
Generative AI tools give studios the ability to cut costs and cut costs in the name of increasing efficiency, often impacting the creators behind the games.
“As humans, trends come along and we decide we don't like them, and our wallets start talking,” Marcus Brown, CEO and co-founder of FanArcade, an independent mobile game studio, tells GameRant.
However, at the same time you have games like Arc Raider. The game was a huge success. At the time of writing, the game has 231,470 concurrent players on Steam. It also uses generative artificial intelligence to work with voice commentary.
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Larian Studios, the developer in the background Baldur's Gate 3another critical success, also caught flak for saying they used generative artificial intelligence to create the concept art. Concept art has always been replaced by human artists, but the community backlash was enough to force the developers to say they would no longer use generative AI during development.
It is generally up to the players to decide how the generative AI is used
Players may have more power than they think
The power of the consumer lies in their wallets. If there's something a developer is doing—like using generative AI tools during the development process of their games—players can essentially vote on how they feel about it.
Mat Piscatella, managing director of Games with Circana, a market research and data analytics company, compared the situation to the ten dollar project.
Project Ten Dollar was a 2010 initiative by EA that sought to get publishers to generate revenue from the sale of used games, rather than the money just going to retailers like GameStop. Basically, if you bought a used game at GameStop, you would also have to pay EA to unlock the game's features, including multiplayer access.
Games like Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2 both had downloadable content behind this initiative. In the end, consumers voted with their wallets and the project failed.
“[Publishers] they all went strong because they wanted to fight [game sales]. Consumers pushed the concept very hard and within a year it was dead,” Piscatella tells GameRant.
The same could happen with generative AI in video games. Unless consumers are buying games that contain Gen AI assets, we probably won't see too many use cases for AI assets.
“If all the games come out that have Gen AI and it's all garbage, then it won't last very long. If we get a lot of games with Gen AI and they're good or well received by the player base, then all of a sudden you'll see more,” he said.
Gamers can shape the industry, and given the precedent set by Arc Raiders' adoption and pushback from Larian's generative use of AI, it looks like developers will be listening.
“At the end of the day, the dollar trumps everything,” Brown said. “If consumers [say]No, we don't like this because it's so obviously AI and we're turned off by it, you're going to see game studios pull back on how much they implement.”
Can consumers, developers and executives find common ground?
For better or worse, AI has changed the game
Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said in his recent earnings call that the company is fully utilizing generative AI. Take-Two releases huge games including Borderlands 4, NBA 2K, and upcoming Grand Theft Auto 6.
“We're actively embracing generative artificial intelligence,” he said when asked during the company's earnings call.
“We have hundreds of pilots and implementations across our company, including our studios, and we see opportunities to increase efficiency, reduce costs, and create an opportunity to do what digital technology has always enabled, which is to make mundane tasks easier and less relevant, allowing our creators to do more interesting tasks while creating great entertainment.”
Overall, it's not a surprising shot. CEOs, Piscatella pointed out to me during our conversation, are generally excited about tools that could save their company money. And according to a GDC survey, 36% of game industry professionals already use generative AI tools to some extent in their work.
But when a CEO starts saying things like seeing opportunities to increase efficiency and cut costs, that can sometimes mean layoffs. According to Brutman,
“Generally, as a human race, we need to put some boundaries on what we're okay with. It's the wild west out there. They do whatever the hell they want.” [AI].
While Brutman doesn't think the creation of AI is inherently bad, it's hard to deny that the lack of oversight has made it significantly more negative.
“It's increasingly negative, in many different ways, displacing people in their jobs in an already unstable economy in many areas. There should certainly be some clear standards, and I think every studio should have them,” she said.
For example, when Astral Clocktower Studios hires voice actors, their contract includes AI riders. It's an agreement that says the studio won't train the AI using their voice or use the AI in their game at all.
It's something she'd like to see more of in the industry – studios taking a clear stance that makes it easy for players to choose the type of development they want to support.
“Developers will have to make very personal decisions about who they work for and in what capacity they are comfortable using AI,” Brown said. Before starting FanArcade, Brown worked for Epic Games on Fortnite, specifically the game's Festival Mode.
According to Brown, in the current climate, studios will likely need to adopt AI tools to remain competitive. But he said that when it comes to music, voice work, art — the more creative aspects of game development — AI has no place.
“When you look at a painting, no one expects the artist to hand-work the canvas that the artist is painting on,” he said. “So any of those elements within what we're doing that I would consider part of the scaffolding or the canvas, I don't necessarily have an aversion to using AI. But all the things we create will still have a human touch in terms of the actual painting.”
Artificial intelligence will never be able to replace human ingenuity. Brown specifically points out that AI by its very nature cannot create anything new because it cannot think outside of what it is trained to do.
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It will still be left to the people to decide what trends come next. But when it comes to making mundane tasks easier, that's where AI can shine in game development.
“Reducing technical barriers doesn't replace the need to have good taste or come up with good ideas. To be disciplined enough to have the right creative voice to speak to players,” Brutman said. “If anything, it could make those qualities even more important, because viewers can tell when something has real intent behind it, versus something that was put together by a machine.”
The conversation about artificial intelligence and its place in game development will continue to evolve. There will likely have to be a reconciliation between what players are willing to support with their money, how managers push AI on their employees, and how much game developers are willing to accept or push back.
