While open world gacha game NTE has enjoyed a big launch, trouble has been brewing beneath the surface regarding accusations of generative AI usage.
Fans found some art assets in the outing which demonstrated obvious use of generative AI, generally on advertising hoardings around the city of Heathereau. These were identified due to some strange artefacts, consistent with the use of generative AI.
The accusations led popular VTuber Ironmouse to break her streaming contract with the game, after she suggested she was lied to about the use of the controversial technology. Now several days later, Chinese dev Hotta Studio has released a statement.
“Neverness to Everness is built on human creativity. The characters, stories, and world you experience are the work of artists, writers, and designers. AI-assisted tools were used only on a small number of background and environmental assets, not on the characters or stories that define this game.”
It’s committed to reviewing and reworking a couple of assets found in the game, and one particularly egregious animation has already been removed while it reworks it.
This Is Just the Beginning
This isn’t the first game to be caught slipping generative AI into the final product, and we suspect it won’t be the last. Crimson Desert also recently shipped with some generated art assets in the game, which were promptly replaced.
It’s a touchy subject for gamers, because generative AI is trained on the work of humans, without credit or compensation. As such, while the assets that are generated are technically “original”, they simply wouldn’t exist without the endeavour of human artists to begin with.
The legality of all this is still up for debate, and there are also environmental concerns about AI, considering the sheer amount of electricity and power required to run the giant server farms behind technologies like ChatGPT.
While NTE is just the latest example of a developer being caught shipping generative AI assets, we’re fairly confident it won’t be the last.
A recent poll at GDC earlier this year revealed over 30% of game developers are using generative AI in some capacity, and that means we’re increasingly going to see it wheedle its way into our favourite games.
