Epic Games CEO Argues “Made with AI” Tags in Game Stores Are Pointless

Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Epic Games, has stated that stores like Steam should remove “Made with AI” tags. He believes these labels will soon become irrelevant as generative AI becomes a common tool in game development.

Sweeney shared his views on X, responding to calls for digital marketplaces to drop such tags. He wrote that while AI labels are useful in art exhibits for disclosing authorship or on digital marketplaces where licensing rights are important, they “make no sense for game stores, where AI will be involved in nearly all future production.” In a follow-up post, he sarcastically suggested that with that logic, developers could be forced to disclose “what shampoo brand they use.”

This commentary comes after Steam, which initially took a cautious stance on AI-generated content, changed its policy to allow most games developed with AI, provided its use is disclosed. Sweeney, who also runs the competing Epic Games Store, now considers this kind of disclosure unnecessary.

Sweeney’s perspective on the ubiquity of AI is shared by other industry leaders. Earlier this month, Junghun Lee, CEO of publisher Nexon, stated it was “important to assume that every game company is now using AI.” This followed criticism of Nexon’s use of AI for voice lines in the game Arc Raiders. At that time, Sweeney also commented, arguing that AI significantly boosts human productivity and should lead to “building better games rather than employing fewer people.”

Statistics from companies like Microsoft, which claims 91% of its engineering teams use GitHub Copilot, support the idea that AI is becoming embedded in development tools far beyond gaming.

However, despite its growing prevalence, not all developers would support removing AI labels. A growing number of indie developers are now using “AI-free” as a selling point to attract certain customers.