Of course Steam said 'yes' to generative AI in games: it's already everywhere

SoftwarePlatformsOf course Steam said ‘yes’ to generative AI in games: it’s already everywhereWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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the finals

The more prescient observation might be thatSteam’s new AI policy—which gives the thumbs up to generative AI in games on Steam so long as its use is disclosed and it doesn’t break any laws—is really just an acknowledgement that generative AI is already everywhere, including on Steam. Valve hasn’t opened any AI floodgate that wasn’t already open:

Those are just a few examples of generative AI already being used on Steam, either during the production of a game or as a live feature—there are more, almost definitely including some we don’t know about.

I’ll be very thankful to avoid the ‘is it AI generated or just kinda bad art?’ theorizing that now happens so often.

The outcome of legal challenges likeThe New York Times' recently-filed lawsuit against OpenAIcould change the direction of commercial AI development this year, but for now there’s a mad dash to profit from it, and I think we’ll be seeing a lot more AI in games before the end of 2024. At CES this week, Nvidia showed off AI-powered NPCs from startup Convai—Jacobordered ramen from one, and said its responses were “frighteningly good.”

Knowing is half the battle?

Assuming most developers are upfront (if not for the sake of honesty, then for fear of being found out later) and these disclosures are thorough, I’ll be very thankful to avoid the ‘is it AI generated or just kinda bad art?’ theorizing that now happens so often and skip right to the part where we individually decide whether or not we’re OK with a game’s use of generative AI.

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It’s certainly imperfect, but we’ll have to rely on voluntary AI disclosure more and more to make decisions, because image generators probably won’t mangle fingers forever. If AI continues to improve at the rate it has been, or faster, how will we ever know if something’s AI generated, or AI assisted, or AI inspired without relying to some degree on trust?

Even MS Paint has a generative AI feature now.(Image credit: Microsoft)

Demonstration of MS Paint’s AI feature.

It would be nice if everyone would just slow down so we could take time to think about the consequences of generative AI before sticking it in every commercial product there is, but given that they clearly aren’t—they evenput it in MS Paint—it is significant that the biggest PC game store has established that a consequence of using generative AI is that you have to say that you used it and how, or be a liar.

If they can actually limit their custom AI model to only mimic legally obtained material, is it OK?

From a legal and ethical standpoint, generative AI tools like ChatGPT invite the obvious objection that they’re trained on copyrighted material and can be prompted to reproduce aspects of it—the basis of the NYT lawsuit—but each case is different. One company, Hidden Door,plans to pay authorsto use their settings, characters, and writing styles in generative AI storytelling games. If they can actually limit their custom AI model to only mimic legally obtained material, is it OK? Or is generative AI a fundamentally anti-human technology even when it respects copyright? I don’t have an answer for that yet.

For now, I’ll just be glad if we no longer have to listen to voice lines and wonder if they’re from real people or computer people, allowing us to skip past the speculation and sleuthing to get to the hard questions.

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Knowing is half the battle?#

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Knowing is half the battle?

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