The latest game to fall into the trap of annoying or even estranging fans by using generative AI without disclosing it is The Alters. Accusations from the community over the use of generative AI in The Alters have been coming from all corners but most prominently from Steam reviews and the game's subreddit. The accusations included everything from AI-generated text in parts of the environment to AI-translated dialogue that included part of the AI prompt in the final game. These accusations became so commonplace that gamers even started to suspect that some of the visual assets had been created with generative AI. Adding insult to injury, there was no disclosure on the game's Steam page that confirmed the use of AI, so it seemed as though 11 Bit Studios was trying to hide the use of AI-generated content in The Alters.

After the allegations started to make the news, though, 11 Bit Studios responded to the accusations, explaining that generative AI was used during the development of The Alters, specifying that "AI-generated text for a graphic asset, which was meant as a piece of background texture, was used by one of our graphical designers as a placeholder." The studio goes on to explain that the asset was never meant to make it into the final version of the game, and that it has conducted a thorough investigation and determined that this is the only instance of AI-generated placeholders making it into the game. 11 Bit Studios also says that there are instances of "last-minute translations" made to some of the licensed movies that characters can watch in the game—these are seemingly the examples pointed out by a game localization expert on LinkedIn. According to the statement put out by the game studio, the studio's usual translation partners were not included in the localization hotfix, which largely adds to the concerns of those who oppose the use of generative AI in media and gaming, since that work would likely have been done by a human instead of an LLM. Ultimately, the studio made the decision to use AI instead of its translation partner because of time constraints, and it acknowledges that it should have disclosed the use of AI from the outset.Read the full statement from 11 Bit Studios below:

We've seen a wide range of accusations regarding the use of AI-generated content in The Alters, and we feel it's important to clarify our approach and give you more context. AI-generated assets were used strictly as temporary WIPs during the development process and in a very limited manner. Our team has always prioritized meaningful, handcrafted storytelling as one of the foundations of our game.

During production, an AI-generated text for a graphic asset, which was meant as a piece of background texture, was used by one of our graphical designers as a placeholder. This was never intended to be part of the final release. Unfortunately, due to an internal oversight, this single placeholder text was mistakenly left in the game. We have since conducted a thorough
review and confirmed that this was an isolated case, and the asset in question is being updated.
For transparency, we've included a screenshot to show how and where it appears in the game. While we do not want to downplay the situation, we also want to clearly show its limited impact on your gaming experience.

In addition to that, a few licensed movies that the alters can watch in the social area of the base were added at the final stage of development. While those were externally produced, our team was not involved in the creative process, and these required additional last-minute translations. Due to extreme time constraints, we chose not to involve our translation partners and had these videos localized using AI to have them ready on launch. It was always our intention to involve our trusted translation agencies after release as part of our localization hotfix, to ensure those texts would be handled with the same care and quality as the rest of the game. That process is now underway, and updated translations are being implemented.

To give you a better understanding of what a small part of the overall scope of the game's narrative layer they are, those few external movies are approx. 10k words out of 3.4 million across all languages in the game, or just 0.3% of the overall text. The alternative was to release those specific dialogues in English only, which we believed would be a worse experience for non-English-speakers. In hindsight, we acknowledge this was the wrong call. Even more so, no matter what we decided, we should have simply let you know.

As AI tools evolve, they present new challenges and opportunities in game development. We're actively adapting our internal processes to meet this reality. But above all, we remain committed to transparency in how we make our games. We appreciate your understanding and continued support as we work towards that goal.