Epic Games Reportedly Orders Staff to Adopt AI-First Game Development

Summary

Epic Games has reportedly instructed developers to adopt an “AI-first” production model for an unannounced shooter being made with Disney. The reported directive includes “no more handwritten code” and an art pipeline in which all artwork would be produced through full AI workflows. The project is said to feature Marvel and Star Wars characters, while Disney invested $1.5 billion in Epic in 2024. Bloomberg reports that development has moved more slowly than expected, partly because Epic underestimated its staffing needs, and that developers were told last week to use AI tools including Anthropic’s Claude, with humans managing and guiding the output. Some developers reportedly reacted with surprise and joked about asking Claude to repair errors in its own work. Epic said development would be AI-accelerated but led by its developers, who remain the creative drivers. CEO Tim Sweeney separately said Epic was undertaking a major pivot to move developers toward maximum AI acceleration, with the goal of helping teams build more and better content rather than doing the same work with fewer people. The move comes amid continuing concerns over plagiarism and the quality of generative AI output in games. Epic has previously supported generative AI, and Unreal Engine 6 is expected to integrate models including Claude and Gemini to reduce tedious development work and assist creative and technical teams.