Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick speaks out about the GTA 6 leaks and how it has affected Rockstar in an interview with IGN following the parent company’s latest earnings call.
Zelnick described the leak as “really upsetting and frustrating to the team,” but has not affected the company or the game from a business perspective.
The GTA 6 leak dates back to September 2022, when extended gameplay videos and screenshots from the game appeared online. In addition to reportedly confirming the game’s rumored Vice City setting and Bonnie and Clyde-inspired story, the leak revealed that the game could feature sex robots and alligators.
Within days of the leak coming to light, the supposed perpetrator appeared in court and was held in a youth detention center.
During the same earnings call, Zelnick spoke to the implementation of AI in video games. While Zelnick believes that new AI tools could help with development, he is skeptical of its ability to develop a game without human developers.
The executive went on to say that the popular AI tool ChatGPT is similar to a hand calculator. Decades ago, parents worried that hand calculators would mean children wouldn’t need to learn math, but that wasn’t the case. “The answer is yes, you still have to learn math, turns out, you absolutely have to learn math, but you have a tool that makes it easier to do. And ChatGPT is the same thing,” he said.
Looking at the wider gaming industry, Battlefield publisher Electronic Arts is working on AI technology, and has been for years. In 2018, EA announced Project Atlas, an R&D project with 1,000 people working on it that aims to change how games are made through AI and neural networks. This technology was implemented into the Battlefield series, and it was smart enough to play the game and even play the objective.
A game that some people might believe to be a product of AI is The Day Before, a highly anticipated survival zombie game that has once again opened itself up to controversy.
The game’s developer Fntastic has previously been criticized for its claims that the game is being built by over 100 “volunteers” and tested by dozens of unpaid “supporters”. The title was meant to release in March of this year before being pushed to November which the developer initially stated was due to a copyright claim, before later revealing that the delay was planned before the issue around rights was even raised.
The copyright claim did however delay a 10 minute gameplay trailer that the developer claimed needed to be approved by lawyers before posting.
Wonder if their legal team are volunteers as well?
