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Indie Game Awards Disqualifies Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Due To Gen AI Usage (insider-gaming.com)
submitted 10 months ago by to c/games@lemmy.world
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[–] 60 points 10 months ago (10 children)

They were disqualified for failing to disclose the AI usage, not just for using AI at all.

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  • [–] 19 points 10 months ago (9 children)

    To me, this is worse.

    We are getting closer and closer to not being able to tell the difference between AI and reality. This lying about the use of it or hiding the use of it is a bad fucking idea.

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  • [–] 10 points 10 months ago (1 child)

    They didn’t disclose it because there was no AI in the final product. The AI was for placeholder textures, which were replaced by real artists’ work as they were made. Some of the AI textures slipped through the cracks on release day, but a week 1 patch removed all traces of the AI before anyone even realized it was AI.

    IMO this looks bad on the awards show, because the final product didn’t have any AI. And the production team was proactive in ensuring it didn’t have any AI before any kind of public backlash ever happened. Once they realized the issue, they issued a patch to fix it on their own, without needing to be pushed into it by public pressure. That’s what a company should do, and it shows that the devs really cared about their game.

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  • [–] 1 point 10 months ago (6 children)

    The reason they didn't disclose it as being used in the creation of the game is probably because no AI was used in the ultimate development. It's an artist who uses AI to generate concepts and inspiration using AI in their artwork, even if everything in the end is hand crafted and doesn't resemble any of the generated images?

    One thing we need to take into account going forward too is that AI will inevitably be used for things like texture maps and environmental generation. Things that have been randomly generated with algorithms. In a year it's going to be nearly impossible to say no game can have any AI used at all, unless you want the pool of potential to be incredibly small.

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  • [–] 14 points 10 months ago (5 children)

    In a year it's going to be nearly impossible to say no game can have any AI used at all,

    Damn, that sucks. I guess I'll have to find a new hobby.

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  • [–] 6 points 10 months ago (2 children)

    Nah, just pirate the stuff.

    If they don't give a fuck about original creators, why should we give a fuck about paying them?

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  • [–] 6 points 10 months ago (1 child)

    You think my problem with AI is that it costs money?

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  • [–] 2 points 10 months ago

    Of course not, but I think not supporting those that use it to produce something you want to enjoy doesn't necessarily imply not enjoying what they produce, as long as it's not too thoroughly damaged by their use of it and as long as it can be obtained in ways that won't support them.

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    • [–] 80 points 10 months ago (7 children)

    I kinda feel like Clair Obscur is sort of stretching the definition of indie game.

    I guess _technically _ it is.

    I’m not saying every game needs to be made in someone’s garage and take 12 years to make, but it sounds like this game was completely funded by Kepler and parts of the game were outsourced to other companies. Sandfall is made up of experienced developers from places like Ubisoft. Kinda feels like Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise made their own movie with funding from a lesser known subdivision of Warner Bros, outsourced SFX to 300 animators, and called it indie because they filmed it with 10 people.

    I do think Clair Obscur is a fantastic game and deserves to be Game of the Year (aside from the AI use). Sandfall and Kepler did a great job with a reported budget of $10M(!) and I especially appreciate what Kepler is doing to support the gaming industry.

    I guess I see the point of the award to inspire people to believe they shouldn’t give up on their dreams by recognizing small teams making games outside of the traditional industry. I just don’t feel like Sandfall qualifies.

    In the end, it’s not my award and they can give it to whoever they want!

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  • [–] 18 points 10 months ago (3 children)

    I agree with your take. The definition of what an "indie" is is very vague and subjective, but given the budget and resources and circumstances of E33's development it seems outside the scope of what seems to be the "spirit of the award".

    Blue Prince should have gotten the award to begin with.

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  • [–] 2 points 10 months ago (2 children)

    Well the definition for indie is independently published. Its not vague in its self, but the way people have started to use the word have changed its meaning to from something well defined to something more feeling based consept. I personally dont like it. People counted game like Dave the Diver to be an indie game when it had huge company Nexon publishing it.

    If followed by the original meaning of the word Blue Prince is not indie game either. It was published by Raw Fury, but Baldurs gate 3 would be indie as Larian published it.

    Indie as a word is like AI. It does not follow its original definition and because people have became used to misusing the word it has became the new norm.

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  • [–] 5 points 10 months ago (1 child)

    People didn't call Dave the Diver an indie game. The Game Awards nominated it in that category, and rightly got a lot of shit for it.

    Indie is a fraught and vague term in whatever genre of culture it gets applied to. During the early 00s indie music era you had tons of mass produced "indie rock" pushed out by big labels too.

    Everyone kind of knows what it's supposed to mean: small budget, small crew, independent of the major commercial publishers/labels/whatever. But there will always be edge cases in both directions.

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  • [–] 2 points 10 months ago

    Plenty of people called Dave the Diver indie game. There are also lots of reviews from the time that call it indie game, both from youtubers and "real reviewers" like IGN.

    We can talk forever what indie means personally for everyone and everybody who has a opinion has little different view.

    But originally in both movies and music indie meant indepented publishment. That means the artist have no oblications for outside parties and can freely and without restrictions carry out their own artistic vision. Budget or crew size has nothing to do with it. Only reason people associate it with small teams is that largest portion of indepentedly published projects were done by small teams and or passion projects.

    Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets is indie movie with budget of 220 million while average hollowood movie budget is somewhere between 100-150 million . Hell, passion of the crist, had budget of 30million and is maybe one of the most famous indie movies.

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  • [–] 4 points 10 months ago

    It's not indie, it had the full support of a publisher. Indie is a handful of people making a game with their own money, not getting a millions of dollars in investment from a publisher.

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