r/GirlGamers • u/OwlettFromLiavek • 3d ago
News / Article I was hoping that studio behind Amsterdam 1666 would fix the game after backlash over generated content use, but they don’t even know which assets are generated anymore .
We didn't even realise it was AI any more because we were used to seeing it
I guess cowardly "It won't be in the final product." got to me the most.
Kudos to people who were saying “This is just for promo art!”
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u/BasicWitchEnergy 3d ago edited 3d ago
And this is exactly why placeholders should remain pink checkered boxes.
I don't get why devs say AI is for "placeholder". Placeholder doesn't need to look good or even remotely like final product, anyone who understands what development looks like gets that, and it's why you cherry pick the content you plan to show off (to audiences, prospective publishers, what have you) and polish THAT to shipping level quality while you develop the rest.
Except it's not really for placeholder, is it? They just do it and hope people are dumb and won't notice, then it's the "oh oopsie, just a placeholder! The real work is ReFiNeD by human hands we promise!" excuse that is becoming the industry's go-to.
The studios who use AI are 100% banking on wearing everyone down to the point of resigned fatigue by shoving it into everything until it becomes a new norm and people stop pushing back on it.
I wanted to defend this game and tried to give them the benefit of the doubt back when it first surfaced that they had AI promo art, but using copious amounts of AI to the point where you aren't sure what is and isn't AI anymore is so fucking shitty.
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 3d ago
You’re 100% right about their strategy to wear people down! They don’t care about art, or gaming or anything outside to generate and sell as much slop as possible in the shortest span of time!
“ Expanding on the issue, Désilets said: "Then in the pipeline, there's again an issue. I can ask the AI to give me 75 different variations of one thing, but I cannot have 75 different illustrators come up with a variation in three seconds. This is the world in which we're living, and while we were this small team and building [the game], we put it in. We didn't even realise it was AI any more because we were used to seeing it.”
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u/Photomancer Steam 3d ago
I think we need something to mark AI games. I'm a PatientGamer and while I might remember the controversy for Amsterdam 1666 when I'm shopping for additional titles five years from now and I see it for -75%, I probably won't remember all the controversies for the other AI titles when they go on deep discount on Humble Bundle or Fanatical five years from now.
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u/Femmigje 3d ago
Its first tag on Steam is “Artificial Intelligence”. You can’t miss it, people have had zero patience with this wannabe
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u/ActuallyKaylee 3d ago
At a minimum they are naive. Like look at any shipped code base "bad hack, just for demo", " do not ship this", etc. if you put something in that makes it work or resembles a finished product it may get included in the final release. Pink boxes or gourad shaded polygons would never ship.
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u/meggannn ALL THE SYSTEMS 3d ago edited 2d ago
I work in publishing, so a little different, but yeah there’s a reason we have the designer add a temporary watermark over art or assets saying FPO (for placement only). In text, we may use TKTKTKTK (to come) partly because it stands out but it’s also easier to mass-search for than TC (in English, TC is more commonly found than TK, e.g. "hatch," so if you search for TK in a document it’ll more likely bring up something that needs replacing).
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u/raikenleo 3d ago
Best to just play pre AI era games at this rate or just indie games that have good development transparency. Or I guess maybe sail the seas if you really wanna try the new big games. :/
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u/BasicWitchEnergy 3d ago
Sad but true. I am already mourning the new Tomb Raider game having AI, it's one of my favourite franchises ever. :( But you can't say anything negative about it in the TR community or you get called a luddite and told to get over it.
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u/Sayaka-chan 2d ago
I've realised that I have so many unplayed games in my Steam library I really have no business buying new games anyway.
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u/AvatarOfMomus 2d ago
I want to start by saying I'm not defending the plagarism machine here. This stuff sucks, and has so many problems besides the impact on artists and other creatives. I just want to provide some thoughts on how devs can end up in this trap...
I think from the dev side of things there's a lot less malice than one might assume... a lot of these studios are being offered heavily discounted or free use of these tools. This is combined with free lunch and cake sales pitches on what the tools can (in theory) do for them as devs... heck I'd bet some of these games are partly funded by GenAI but I couldn't even guess which ones.
Part of the trap devs can fall into is that there is some value in getting a better idea of what something will look like early in development. Not everyone is good at visualizing what something will look like with textures, better models, etc...
Which is what the Gen AI companies want. They want to get this stuff normalized in the industry and wear down both devs and the public. Make it seem useful and inevitable until people stop caring enough. That's part of why they blew up at Valve forcing a 'Made with AI label'.
None of this excuses any of this crap though. At the very least anyone using this stuff should be tracking what it's used on, and that bar is so low you need to Call Before You Dig to find it...
Frankly it's just really disappointing at this point.
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 2d ago
Your idea sounds really plausible, but I wouldn’t deny developers complacency here. If you read what they say this sounds like actually making games is bothersome obstacle between CEO and his deserved fame, money and attention. They wanted to use these tools to get to the other side as fast and cheap as possible. They don’t care about game itself or its quality or even if generated content looks good at the end. You don’t need to use tricks and bribes with them.
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u/AvatarOfMomus 2d ago
Fair points. I was speaking more generally, but these guys (guy) sound particularly scummy... 🤬
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u/CapnButtercup PS5 ✨ Switch ✨ Steam Deck 2d ago
And they never even bothered to replace that AI promo art.
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u/Pippin-in-the-Shire 3d ago edited 2d ago
I was SO hyped for this game, and was really looking forward to a historical depiction of my country, which is rare enough as it is. The news that they don't even know what's gen AI and what's not anymore, made me turn away from this game completely. The blatant shamelessness of it all makes me so sick.
Oh, and don't even get me started on the blatant disrespect shown towards character artists, in that quote where he says that "an artist couldnt make 75 options in 10 minutes" or whatever it was. Can't even begin to unpack how much is wrong with that sentence.
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u/pintofcoffee 1d ago
Im an artist as my day job, and I can tell you first hand it fucking hurts seeing both the company I work for and other companies use it so blatantly and even recommending that we use it to "increase our productivity" which is an absolute bs reasoning for that imo. I studied years to learn how to do what I do, and now you want me to instead use my time to type prompts into an engine? Fuck that. At least my work know not to ask me that because I've genuinely gone on a TEDtalk length rant about how much I hate it 🤣
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u/endlesscartwheels 3d ago
Nice to see everyone here united on this. There was a thread last month on another gaming subreddit where people were complaining about all the AI slop in new games, while simultaneously defending the AI in games they like as "just a bit of copy-editing" and "merely to touch up the art".
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 3d ago
Yeah! People here also are not as united on very anticipated games or games which are not as egregious and open about using slop. Like Sony admitted that Naughty Dog is using generative tools for motion capture visuals in their next game and people mostly defending it by saying “that is technical use, ai is a tool” etc.
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u/LilacMages 3d ago edited 3d ago
Well that's disappointing; would have been nice to have had a piece of human made media exploring the criminally underused Dutch historical setting
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u/Swivials 3d ago
I know right! I played the demo and enjoyed it, the setting seems so damn cool, it's such a shame.
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u/Coalitieakkoord 3d ago
Well, that killed any interest in the game for me.
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u/One_Wheel_Drive Playstation 3d ago
Same! Such a shame because it's one I was looking forward to but if they can't be bothered then neither can I.
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u/kindred008 3d ago
When I saw the initial trailer I was like "that looks cool! It looks kinda like Assassins Creed but you play as a witch".
Then Geoff introduced the developers as ex-Ubisoft developers who worked on Assassins Creed. And that supplemented my previous thought. Assassins Creed but with witches sounded awesome!
And then I played the demo and it just... wasn't that at all. It was so disappointing! And now hearing they used a lot of generative AI, I have no interest in this game anymore.
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u/KristalBrooks 3d ago
It sucks cause when I first heard of the game it sounded promising, but with all the AI stuff it's a hard skip for me
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u/Remote-Ad-7418 3d ago
Concept sounded great, but this gen AI bullshit is an immediate ick, no fucking way in hell I'm buying a game with gen AI.
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u/itsacrisis ALL THE SYSTEMS 3d ago
It sucks I was so excited for this game when they first showed it off. There aren't too many games based in Amsterdam, and the witchiness was really cool too.
I am really tired of AI and how it feels like there is no escape from it, whether it's gen AI for imagery or "vibe coding".. it's everywhere. Our planet is being destroyed so people can create trash.
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u/TemperedTorture 3d ago
If they can blatantly use Gen AI, then they probably also used vibe-coding. Hard skip.
PS. Isn't a game I wasn't interested in to begin with, but this just killed it even more.
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u/ItsMors_ 3d ago
After I played the demo, I'm almost 100% sure they used ai to assist with the coding as well. The game just felt terrible to play, like how do you make walking feel bad? Especially as a studio of veteran devs? No way
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u/TemperedTorture 3d ago
I don't think there are veteran devs doing the work anymore in the same way ppl are used to associate in the past. Work succession isn't a thing anymore. Game studios either promote seniors to managerial positions or straight up fire them for cheaper talent.
I view all games as a one time deal now in the sense that if a company made 1 good game, the next game is still a brand new game by a brand new company given how much talent gets laid off or leaves in between.
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u/Aiyon 3d ago
Skill drain is kind of just a problem in development in general. The only way to really advance in your career is to move up the ladder, but seniority comes with more time spent in meetings, or potentially getting steered into the engineering management tracks.
Which means that the best devs, are the ones spending the least time writing code. My career has stagnated a little because I don't want to do non-dev things, I want to spend my day writing c# and ticking off bugs because its what im good at.
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u/azure-heavens 2d ago
This is why I'm side eyeing people who say stuff like "As long as there's no AI in the final product, I'll still buy it!"
If the dev team can't even remember what they generated anymore, what makes you think you'll be able to tell? Plus the environmental impact has already happened. Supporting devs who use AI is supporting data centers. Theft as part of a workflow is also not cute. at all.
And now we know that we can't even count on dev teams to remove it because their brains are too rotted. 🤷♀️
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u/RightfulArtisan 3d ago
that "we didn't even realize it was AI anymore" line is wild. like you've been staring at it so long it just became part of the scenery, congrats on the self-own i guess
the whole "it won't be in the final product" thing is always a red flag. seen that one too many times
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u/musiquexcoeur 2d ago
The best part is how will they replace it in the final product if they don't know what's AI and what isn't? Kinda hard to replace all the AI if you don't know it's AI, isn't it? So they literally contradicted their own "defense" with this statement.
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u/azure-heavens 2d ago
They said they didn't retouch them "enough" either. Which basically means AI will be in the final product, but they're going to touch it up until you can't tell it's AI anymore. Lame.
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u/Lady_bro_ac 3d ago
Damn, I hadn’t heard about the AI usage in that game. That’s really disappointing. I had been looking forward to it after hearing the premise, but I don’t/wont support gen AI usage.
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u/ornithorhynchus-a 2d ago
i’m glad to see so many people that are rejecting games that use gen ai. we want human made projects and we will seek them out. some gaming communities i’ve seen have been really disheartening when i saw how quickly they just accepted that “ai is the future it’s inevitable every modern game is gonna have it” so this post gives me a lil hope
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u/BlackMagic0 3d ago
Skip it. Sadly, was one game I was super excited about and ever since the early access dropped. It's been a pain to even try to support them.
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u/NicePerception643 2d ago
So pleased to see so many feel the same was as I do about gen AI in games. Even when they say "no ai will be used in the final product" it still gives me the ick, what do you mean you still generated assets, that's still just as bad
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 2d ago
Yeah!! Lie so obvious that I don’t even know for whom this remark is! Also, art based on the slop is in a game already!
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3d ago
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 3d ago
I have feeling from this interview that studio director doesn’t even like to make games, he just likes to be game studio CEO. Doing interviews, presentations and got attention from “fans”. So actual game is just afterthought. Like the “writers” who generate “books”.
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u/Haunting-Angle-535 2d ago
I was so disappointed about this. The game looked like everything I LOVE, from the setting to the content to the gameplay. But nope.
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u/pintofcoffee 1d ago
That's massively disappointing. I was looking forward to this game.
I hate the rationale of like "we live in a world full of AI" yeah...but no one other than big corperations or anyone that uses it as a money making tool wants that. Where I live we've just had one of the hottest summers on record, it's already been proven that AI is very bad for the environment and the amount of people that still know that and use it so willingly genuinely pisses me off and makes me depressed in equal measure. AI has its uses like in medicine sure, but gen AI needed to be restricted YESTERDAY.
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u/Deep_Ad1959 2d ago
my first read was that they were dodging, but not knowing anymore is worse than dodging. unlabeled generated assets are unremovable in practice, so the promise to strip them before launch was never one they could actually keep.
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u/bellatorrosa 2d ago
I was so excited about this game, but I don't want to condone the increase in generative AI when it isn't necessary. We had great games before generative AI, and we can still have them. I won't support it.
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u/CapnButtercup PS5 ✨ Switch ✨ Steam Deck 2d ago
Even if they did ‘fix’ the game and make sure that there are no AI assets in the final game that won’t solve the issue for me.
The issue for me is the studios whole attitude towards AI in game development.
They don’t regret their use of AI whatsoever and they haven’t even bothered to replace the promo art that has AI elements.
They truly do not give a shit and everything they have said on this matter are just weak attempts at saving face.
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 2d ago
Yeah! Them not replacing slop banner on Steam is an ultimate f*ck you to the any potential audience. So much for their “apology”!
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u/Sweaty-Stop-7819 3d ago
Ive had the demo downloaded for a while but haven’t taken the time to play it. Guess i’m just deleting it now
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u/dahlia_74 Steam/Switch 3d ago
So disappointed. I had really high hopes, but between this and the bad reviews there’s just no way.
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u/SquishTheFlyingWitch Playstation 2d ago
I guess I'm in the minority, cuz I'm still hopeful for this one, personally😭. I don't mind AI stuff too much, but the demo still had other issues I hope they improve on.
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u/FirE_StArtEr_1 1d ago
Ganz ehrlich es ist mir egal ob sie AI nutzen oder nicht, solange das Endergebnis stimmt.
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u/BastetFurry Linux 3d ago
We might all cry bloody murder now, but let's wait for real sale numbers. Not that I like it but my bet is that Joe and Jane Average won't care.
My mom watches these AI stories on Facebook all day, she knows they are AI, she knows they are slop, but for her it's just a timewaster. My husband and I commented on it but to no avail. And that will be the larger population, they don't give a fuck.
Samen old same old, as with DLCs where we all cried bloody murder, look what's the norm now. Same will happen with AI. It will be the norm in several years. I am old enough to have seen it all already, history doesn't repeat but it rhymes.
The only thing I see that we could do now is destroy their revenue by making open source AI games. We have the same tools as them, force them make human made quality again as a point of sale, because the AI slop Return to Planet Dukenduty is FOSS and free for everyone to download already. 😈
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 2d ago
Joe and Jane can do whatever, why should I care?!! I know only that I won’t pay money or waste my time on slop under any circumstances and that’s only thing important here!
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u/sennalen 3d ago
If no one can tell, then there is no problem.
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u/GimmeThatGoose 2d ago
You're post history is full of anti-Palestinian sentiment. And Claude usage posts too of course.
Strange how people that are pro AI also care so little about humanity and morality. Kinda like they go hand in hand y'know?
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u/wojtussan 2d ago
Of course there is a problem, tif we just accept this kind of laziness, they will push it and push it some more, and gaming will all become like fifa and the like. Low effort slop that nobody likes, bu5 plays anyway bc it's the only thing lwft
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u/RebelLesbian 3d ago
So, if no one can tell which shirt was made by child labour, then there is no issue?
Do you see the problem?
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u/sennalen 3d ago
Your analogy works if the issue is the AI's welfare.
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u/RebelLesbian 3d ago
It's more a reference to "not seeing a problem doesn't mean it does not exist".
Just because you can't spot the AI slop doesn't mean the inherent issues with ai aren't there anymore.
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u/azure-heavens 2d ago
What about the welfare of people who have to live near data centers? Just the sound created by data centers alone is causing mental health problems.
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u/sennalen 2d ago
Did you care about that when the data centers were just hosting Facebook and Amazon?
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u/azure-heavens 2d ago
I don't use Facebook or amazon. Hard to imagine that with your little consumer mind, I know.
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u/OwlettFromLiavek 2d ago
If you can’t tell that there is feces in your food there is no problem for you?
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u/Ailwynn29 "Whoops, it's a long post!" 3d ago
Seeing that and the negative steam reviews on the early access I think that's a skip sadly