A Steam dev is deleting his own game after girlfriend made him realize AI is bad
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I would never judge anyone for using AI to fill in the parts they need to realize their project vision that they otherwise simpy couldn't (without putting in a lot more effort into a thing they probably don't really enjoy), but doing this is still a statement and pretty cool to do.
Not that I'll ever be motivated enough to actually finish a project, but I've thought about the art aspect of making a game, and eventually figured if I'd need to commission more than I can afford, I'd be morally fine with genAI if the game is either free or I use a large portion of profits (if there are any lol) to hire artists to gradually replace the art.
Though I also refuse to give a single cent to all the companies profiting off this so any image gen I'll ever do will be local on my pc (or for free on some service, I guess).
I don't think you deserve this many down votes for this take, but I'll provide a counterpoint. Not being able to afford a real artist is not as large a barrier as you think.
Balatro's music was created by Spanish musician Luis Clemente, known online as LouisF, after developer LocalThunk hired them on Fiverr in 2023.
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I wanted to make this joke but didn't want to downplay the breakthrough they had. But man I wonder what her argument was... How did she manage to convince him?
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We can't understand you with Andrew Tate's dick in your mouth.
Any plans for life after high school, or is hurling oddly sexual insults to others on the internet your only skill so far?
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AI in video games is a caustic enough subject that Valve requires developer disclosure if a title utilizes the generative technology. This way, people who have qualms about AI or its impact can opt out of purchasing anything that uses the genAI. One developer, however, is saving everyone from the moral quandary in the first place by just deleting their game altogether.
Hardest is a free-to-play roguelike on Steam that was released in the summer of 2025 with the tagline, "stop time, summon tsunamis, shoot with bubble guns, feed cards to mimic, collect rare negative cards!" Except for a user who says the game helped him bond with his son, Hardest mostly got a negative reception. "I assume the whole thing is AI slop," one reviewer wrote.
You'd think flopping like this would be the end of the story, but half a year later, Rakuel, the developer, has undergone a revelation. On Jan. 10, the indie creator posted an update to Hardest announcing that he would pull the game from the platform by the end of the month.
Sounds like mental illness to me.
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I'm not entirely sure what you're asking, but the main difficulty here is that using AI, even just for temp assets, is a virtue signal that demonstrates bad virtues. That's why it's socially repulsive. It's like inviting someone into your home and watching them stick their fingers in the soup.
It's not that using an AI asset for exactly 5 minutes only before swapping it out, and never even committing it to your git history—it's not that this disqualifies your work from being meaningful in other ways, it's just that being weak on this front, morally, makes you seem like kind of a dipshit. It's a failure to reject the siren's song that leads sailors to their death, you know?
And for what it's worth, I love seeing passionate work. As a proper art enjoyer, a professional liker of things, cubes and cylinders do nothing to dissuade me.
I think he means trying to make a proof of concept to get an artist to do the work.
If I ever get round to making games, I will need an art guy and a sound guy, because I know full well I cant do anything remotely good there. But I cant afford to pay an art/sound guy, so theyre not going to just do work for a random guy on the promise of a cut of the profits because what profits? I'm just a guy with a dream and a promise.
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We can't understand you with Andrew Tate's dick in your mouth.
This is the cowards awful reply...
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Sounds like mental illness to me.
What? Which part? Summoning tsunamis? It's not that fun I'm afraid.
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The announcement suggests the developer wrote all the code, but used the slop robot to generate assets. Sounds like the issue is that making art assets actually takes skill, and is something most programmer types underestimate.
I'd agree with this. I'm a dev, I can make things work, I can't do art/graphics/assets/etc for shit. Give me 5 or 6 hours and I might be able to get you one image that is semi passable if the intended artistic style is "3 year old with crayons"
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He says it's all coded by him, it's just the assets that are AI.
Controversial opinion'
This is kind of a valid take or use I suppose.
And it's something I struggle with as well.
I know how to program and I can make games with really shitty assets that no one would want to play because it looks like crap. I've tried many times and I don't seem to have the artistic skill set to make it happen. I've tried dozens of times to find and pay people on sites like fiverr, with extremely disappointing results.
And as a hobby I can't just afford to pay thousands of dollars to have someone make passable art either.
And someone like this as a student obviously doesn't have the money to pay someone to build all their assets.
So what do??? It seems reasonable to have a desire to finish your passion project in some manner
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It depends on the project, I think. If you require hundreds of pieces to make the concept work (and such concepts have floated in my mind) even hiring an amateur would get pretty expensive. If it's just small scope art (and for most games it will be) I agree, it can be relatively cheap. Though I'm still privileged in being able to afford that, some people couldn't even really spare 200€ for a project that, statistically, is unlikely to make even half of that back.
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AI in video games is a caustic enough subject that Valve requires developer disclosure if a title utilizes the generative technology. This way, people who have qualms about AI or its impact can opt out of purchasing anything that uses the genAI. One developer, however, is saving everyone from the moral quandary in the first place by just deleting their game altogether.
Hardest is a free-to-play roguelike on Steam that was released in the summer of 2025 with the tagline, "stop time, summon tsunamis, shoot with bubble guns, feed cards to mimic, collect rare negative cards!" Except for a user who says the game helped him bond with his son, Hardest mostly got a negative reception. "I assume the whole thing is AI slop," one reviewer wrote.
You'd think flopping like this would be the end of the story, but half a year later, Rakuel, the developer, has undergone a revelation. On Jan. 10, the indie creator posted an update to Hardest announcing that he would pull the game from the platform by the end of the month.
Normalize people taking the L for their bad takes!
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The announcement suggests the developer wrote all the code, but used the slop robot to generate assets. Sounds like the issue is that making art assets actually takes skill, and is something most programmer types underestimate.
There are endless assets online for cheap. It‘s kind of the last thing you would need AI for. If only more people realized that.
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Her personality changed when the latest model released
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AI in video games is a caustic enough subject that Valve requires developer disclosure if a title utilizes the generative technology. This way, people who have qualms about AI or its impact can opt out of purchasing anything that uses the genAI. One developer, however, is saving everyone from the moral quandary in the first place by just deleting their game altogether.
Hardest is a free-to-play roguelike on Steam that was released in the summer of 2025 with the tagline, "stop time, summon tsunamis, shoot with bubble guns, feed cards to mimic, collect rare negative cards!" Except for a user who says the game helped him bond with his son, Hardest mostly got a negative reception. "I assume the whole thing is AI slop," one reviewer wrote.
You'd think flopping like this would be the end of the story, but half a year later, Rakuel, the developer, has undergone a revelation. On Jan. 10, the indie creator posted an update to Hardest announcing that he would pull the game from the platform by the end of the month.
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Your usage still gives them justification to continue being global parasites. "Our daily active users is (X + you)."
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I can put it in simple English if you need me to.
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AI in video games is a caustic enough subject that Valve requires developer disclosure if a title utilizes the generative technology. This way, people who have qualms about AI or its impact can opt out of purchasing anything that uses the genAI. One developer, however, is saving everyone from the moral quandary in the first place by just deleting their game altogether.
Hardest is a free-to-play roguelike on Steam that was released in the summer of 2025 with the tagline, "stop time, summon tsunamis, shoot with bubble guns, feed cards to mimic, collect rare negative cards!" Except for a user who says the game helped him bond with his son, Hardest mostly got a negative reception. "I assume the whole thing is AI slop," one reviewer wrote.
You'd think flopping like this would be the end of the story, but half a year later, Rakuel, the developer, has undergone a revelation. On Jan. 10, the indie creator posted an update to Hardest announcing that he would pull the game from the platform by the end of the month.
Can't forget how polygon trashed Witcher 3 at launch with bad score because of "sexism and misogyny"
