Wizards of the Coast Magic: The Gathering and Respawn’s Apex Legends, both extremely popular properties in the gaming world, have come under fire for their use of AI-generated artwork in their recent promotional materials.
Forbes reports that the issue was first highlighted when Wizards of the Coast, famous for the popular Magic: The Gathering card game, was accused of incorporating AI-generated art in their promotional content.
The company initially dismissed these claims, insisting the art was human produced, but keen-eyed observers were quick to highlight elements in the artwork typically associated with AI generation.
The tweet even received a community note on Twitter highlighting the AI-generated telltale markers.
Despite initially denying that the artwork was AI-generated, the company backpedaled a day later, apologizing and admitting that “some AI components” may have “crept into our marketing creative.”
As you, our diligent community pointed out, it looks like some AI components that are now popping up in industry standard tools like Photoshop crept into our marketing creative, even if a human did the work to create the overall image. (2/5)
— Magic: The Gathering (@wizards_magic) January 7, 2024
The company promised to ensure that it’ll support human artists in future marketing efforts, stating: “While the art came from a vendor, it’s on us to make sure that we are living up to our promise to support the amazing human ingenuity that makes Magic great.”
In a similar situation, Respawn – the developer behind the video game Apex Legends – was accused of using AI in its promotional materials. However, it doesn’t seem that the company used AI completely; rather, the company was accused of running its promotional video through an AI filter.
Fans trying to cancel Apex over AI Artwork used in the FFVII Trailer.
U/moyamoya-kimochi pointed out parts of the trailer that looked like it was made by AI.
The chances of EA using AI is pretty high. Here’s what the CEO Of EA said about AI in the company ⬇️#ApexLegends pic.twitter.com/SxpGfb5Q8l
— Ketchup (@notKetchupNEWS) January 7, 2024
The emerging use of AI in promotional material is likely to cause controversy not just among human artists who feel as if they’re being replaced but also could lead to copyright claims related to the training data that many of these AI image generators are programmed on.
Read more at Forbes here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship.