Xbox has been accused of using AI-generated art to promote indie games on social media. Using AI art in social media posts is often controversial, and many gamers criticized Microsoft for posting what they believe is an AI-generated image.

When services such as Midjourney, Dall-E, and ChatGPT became a huge hit, content generated by artificial intelligence became a contentious topic, especially in the case of AI-generated art. While small segments of AI-generated text are hard to detect, AI art’s imperfections are easy to spot. Many gamers and artists criticize AI companies for training their models using the work of artists without consent, so the conversation gets pretty heated when a company is caught using this kind of content.

On December 27, the Xbox account ID@Xbox tweeted asking fans what their favorite 2023 indie games were. The tweet used an art piece that showcased kids using sleds in the snow together with the words “ID XBOX.” While the art seems normal at first glance, it’s easy to spot uncanny details such as children with mustaches, weirdly shaped objects, or even a man whose lips are fused with his teeth. This enraged some of the community, as several gamers believed that these were signs that Microsoft was using AI art. After the controversy grew, Xbox deleted the original tweet.

Nothing says "we don't care about indie developers" like using AI.

If you can't hire an artist to do advertising, I highly doubt you'll do it with independent developers https://t.co/wgFgIlIYUG

— NecroKuma (COMM OPEN 2024!) (@NecroKuma3) December 27, 2023

While gamers have generally pushed back against the use of AI art in both games and advertising, some developers seem to have somewhat more positive opinions of this new technology. For example, Persona series director Kazuhisa Wada shared a positive opinion about AI earlier this year. According to him, AI art can be useful for generating sketches while coming up with different concepts for the same idea. However, he did not believe that AI art could replace artists, or that it should be employed in the final product.

Microsoft announced new AI partnerships last month and seems ready to use more of this technology in game development. By offering products such as Azure AI and Copilot for Microsoft 365 to developers, for example, Microsoft aims to provide developers with new tools. Whether this will turn out to work as intended remains to be seen, though.

Posted: Jan 01, 2024 1:44 pm
Related Forum: Xbox Forum

Source: https://gamerant.com/xbox-ai-art/