Many game developers may be tempted to use generative tools to create some items for your projects. This type of move could make sense in a world where the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is drastically transforming certain work mechanics.
However, there is also the possibility that this alternative that could be used to save time and money ends up becoming a headache. It is that the distribution platform owned by Valve has adopted a new position towards the content generated by AI that can leave some titles out of the game.
Games with AI generated content on Steam
According to a statement sent this week to the Ars Technica pageSteam has partially closed the door on gaming with AI generated content. We say partially because it will only refuse to publish games whose elements created with generative technology “infringe existing copyright.”
The question does not end there and has a greater scope. It is not enough that the tool used to generate these elements allows their commercial use, since the data with which the AI model has been trained must not infringe copyright either. Certainly this rather complex scenario is on the table.
Much of the AI models available today have been trained on content protected by Copyright of different forts grouped into huge datasets. Among the most resonant examples we find DALL·E from OpenAI, the company directed by Sam Altman or Stable Diffusion, from Runway and LMU Munich.
From Valve they reflect on the matter and ensure that “there is some legal uncertainty related to the data used to train AI models.” They also point out that it is the responsibility of the developer to ensure that they comply with the game publishing requirements. specified in your Steamworks program.
We are certainly witnessing the early stages of what appears to be a long evolutionary path of generative tools and its relationship with copyright. At Adobe they seem to have foreseen this scenario and have announced that their Firefly models will be trained with content free of copyright or whose licenses have expired.
Images: Steam | Hitesh Choudhary
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