Game kicked from Indy Game Awards for AI
Expedition 33 is a game that used ai to generate some placeholder assets early in development. The assets were later removed after new assets were made by human digital artists.
Expedition 33 was going to win an Indy Game Award, but was kicked because of this. Part of the problem was that E33 SAID they used no ai during development, then they later confessed to using ai early on.
Or so I learned from a YT short and corrections by commenters.
Many commenters thought it was ridiculous that a game would be pulled from the awards for EVER having used AI in the development process, especially since the production game no longer has AI assets.
"This is how ai should be used, as a TOOL," many people said. "placeholder PLACEHOLDER", yells another. "They didn't take an artist's job," says another.
Those PLACEHOLDERS were only able to be generated because corporations STOLE work from artists across the entire planet.
There are already existing asset stores for video game developers, where E33 could have purchased placeholder assets. Alternatively, they could have used simple polygons. That's money taken from digital artists.
There is an environmental cost, too. More AI use means more AI development, which means more data centers, more electricity generation, more water usage for cooling, etc. Even generating placeholders helps support this system and indicate to the AI Players that they should keep going. It tells legislators that THE PEOPLE want this.
I wish the developers of E33 well. I hope their game is successful. I hope they are successful.
I also think we should create a culture where you get punished and shamed for using AI. Where there are real-world consequences for your participation in unethical systems. I don't care if it was just placeholders. They did a bad thing, and ripping away the game award helps to build the kind of culture that fights against AI.
NOW - There are other controversies here - Blue Prince apparently took their spot. Some commenters said Blue Prince used AI. Others said that the devs of Blue Prince run the game awards. I also didn't fact check anything, and quite frankly I'm not interested in the facts of the situation.
What I am interested in is the public response to the situation. The people defending THIS USE of generative AI. The people who don't take responsibility for their part in the LLM-dominated hellscape that is being built.
If you use generative AI, you share responsibility. It's not your fault alone. You're not an evil or bad person. Your boycott alone won't stop the forward march of AI. But you are partially responsible for supporting a system that is grossly unethical.
And while, yes, we should point to the governments and corporations and billionaires and blame THEM for all the bad they bring forward ... we should also look at ourselves and take responsibility for how we support all those bad actors. We are not innocent. Not you. Not me.