Valve has recently addressed claims that it was rejecting games with AI-generated assets from its Steam games store. The company has clarified that its policy is evolving and is not a stand against AI in a statement given to VGC.

Valve further clarified their stance, stating that they could not ship games for which the developer does not have all of the necessary rights. This was especially the case if it was unclear if the underlying AI tech used to create the assets had sufficient rights to the training data.

Given that most AI tools can’t realistically claim to have legal rights to all their training data, this policy as stated essentially amounts to a blanket ban on AI-generated assets in games.

Source: Steam

Valve makes it clear AI content is still welcome

Valve has made it clear that their goal is not to discourage the use of AI in game development on Steam. The company is continuously learning about AI, its uses in game development, and how to factor it into their process for reviewing games submitted for distribution on Steam. Their priority, as always, is to try to ship as many of the titles they receive as they can.

AI creation tools can be used to generate basic character models and in-game assets based on material from other existing franchises. This can save precious time that could be used for other aspects of game development, but it also results in assets that fall into murky legal territory, as they were created from other IPs. Valve has stated that game developers on Steam can use these AI technologies in their work with appropriate commercial licenses, but they absolutely cannot infringe on existing copyrights.

In conclusion, Valve’s stance on AI-generated games is clear: they are not against the use of AI in game development, but they are against the infringement of copyrights. As long as game developers respect this rule, they should have no problems with Valve.

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