In recent times, the gaming world has witnessed a significant shift with the emergence of AI-generated content. Valve, the proprietor of Steam, has provided clarity on its stance regarding AI-generated content in games. This move comes amidst rising discussions and concerns in the gaming community and AI developers about the use of AI-generated assets in games.
Valve’s latest announcement clarifies that there is no overarching ban on AI-generated content on Steam. However, the focus is on ensuring that developers possess the rights to the content included in their games. Valve has recognized the complexities introduced by AI in game development, especially regarding asset creation.
The main issue revolves around the legal rights associated with AI-generated assets, including images, text, and music. Given the legal uncertainties regarding the data used to train AI models, Valve’s policy necessitates developers to have appropriate rights for the content in their games.
Valve emphasizes that their intent is not to discourage AI’s application in game development. Instead, they aim to integrate AI use into their existing review policies, reflecting current copyright law and policies.
With AI tools capable of generating character models and in-game assets, which might be sourced from existing franchises, the legal territory becomes murky. Therefore, Valve insists that game developers using these AI technologies must have appropriate commercial licenses and must not infringe on existing copyrights.
The stance taken by Valve is also a precautionary measure to avoid potential legal disputes. With AI scraping the internet for assets, it’s crucial to ascertain that game developers hold rights to the artwork and assets used.
This is particularly important since the US Copyright Office stated that AI-generated art cannot currently be copyrighted.
As such, Valve’s guidelines state that while there is no explicit ban on AI-created content, developers should refrain from submitting games with content they do not own the rights to.
