AI this, AI that - you can't go anywhere without something trying to force AI on you. Usually a company trying to get you to buy into what they've wasted billions on. So indie devs have begun fighting back with their No Gen AI Seal.
There's an increasing amount of developers using some form of AI generation from small developers to the AAA lot that I keep spotting recently, and so you might want to pick some out that are actually 100% human made. While Steam (being the easiest example) does have newer rules around AI disclosures, these are buried at the bottom of store pages and can be pretty easy to miss.
One way would be for developers to put a big badge on a store page to show off their human side, and that's exactly what some indie developers have chosen to start doing.
Announced by Alex Kanaris-Sotiriou of Polygon Treehouse (Mythwrecked & Röki) on Bluesky, they've launched the free to use No Gen AI Seal available via the Polygon Treehouse website. Writing about why it can be problematic the website states:
Generative AI is a technology that can create pictures, movies, audio (music or voice action) and writing using artificial intelligence. The issue is that these generative technologies are trained on existing works by human artists who have not given their permission, or been compensated, for their work being utilised. Essentially their work has been stolen.
The seal looks like this:
You can see it on the store pages for the likes of Mythwrecked: Ambrosia Island, Rosewater and more in the sidebar.
Perhaps in future we might see stores add specific filters to select "No Gen AI". It's clearly a growing market though, which is what pushed Valve to add their new disclosure rules, and we're likely to see a whole lot more games use generative AI as time goes on. It's going to get more messy and confusing for consumers as time goes on, at least until the ridiculous bubble finally bursts.
There's a lot of silliness going around like how Phil Spencer of Microsoft Gaming thinks generative AI will help game preservation and the Take-Two CEO believing AI will increase employment and productivity. Going by the latest 2025 GDC Survey there's clearly a lot of developers concerned about it and plenty working in companies currently using it.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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mr-victory 8 hours ago
Hello, based department?
2 Likes, Who?
That's cute. Now we need to have a similar stamp but for those "procedurally generated" skeleton of games that rely on "roguelike" elements to make it sound like their game is longer than it actually is 
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hardpenguin 6 hours ago
I like this!
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That's nice!
Please also make a stamp for "No Procedurally Generated Junk".
Please also make a stamp for "No Procedurally Generated Junk".
1 Likes, Who?
There's going to be so many issues with this. People using AI not declaring it, or using it for other aspects. Say, translation. What if I write a game in french and use the help of ChatGPT to translate it? The material is already mine, its not stolen. It would noticeably improve the quality of the translation. Would this void the use of this badge?
2 Likes, Who?
Would this void the use of this badge?If you use generative AI, you don't get to display this badge. Seems clear enough to me. This is specifically about the use of generative AI, not quality or anything else. I don't see why you'd go looking for loopholes.
4 Likes, Who?
Arehandoro 5 hours ago
If you use generative AI, you don't get to display this badge.
In that case, I'm pretty sure no one will be able to use the badge. Code completion is somewhat based in AI. If someone searches on Google and the summary given by Gemini is correct, and they use it, they'll have used GenAI... I think what @Drakker is asking it's a valid question.
1 Likes, Who?
What if I write a game in french and use the help of ChatGPT to translate it? The material is already mine, its not stolen.The source- and target- language materials used to train the LLM to perform translation are stolen, even if the text you give it to translate isn’t, so it’s exactly the same as other uses.
1 Likes, Who?
I like this idea; it is good to see this information. I have not been able to understand what I can’t share a game or song with a friend, but billionaires can steal the whole internet (including pirated materials) and earn money from it.
1 Likes, Who?
Ah, yes, the "AI bad" bandwagon.
We'll see how that is going in 5-10 years
Personally, I'd rather indies use what tools are available to them and make good games than reserving game making only for those who can afford everything hand-made.
We'll see how that is going in 5-10 years
Personally, I'd rather indies use what tools are available to them and make good games than reserving game making only for those who can afford everything hand-made.
2 Likes, Who?
I can see it all, a future where No true Scotsman arguments around this seal pop out once it turns out that devs forgot current machine translation uses Gen AI, or that their spellchecker and grammar correction comes from, again, AI.
Generative AI isn't the devil, the corporate-minded "people" who started stealing left and right to create it are. It's a tool without sin, and the good or evil it can cause is solely based on the people who use it. It's also not going away, even once the bubble burst, and even when it does burst, it's because it's become cheap enough to run smarter models cheaply on consumer hardware, which is already happening.
Generative AI isn't the devil, the corporate-minded "people" who started stealing left and right to create it are. It's a tool without sin, and the good or evil it can cause is solely based on the people who use it. It's also not going away, even once the bubble burst, and even when it does burst, it's because it's become cheap enough to run smarter models cheaply on consumer hardware, which is already happening.
2 Likes, Who?
So many people missing the whole point here. Or commenting based on the title, more likely.
The technology isn't being targeted here. This is specifically about current generative "AI" products being trained on material without original artists' permission, because that's pretty much the only way to source a large enough set of high quality source material. That's what artists, writers and other copyright owners object to. And I tend to agree with them. Ends do not justify the means.
Again, all it might prevent you from doing is using this badge to promote your game. I'd say "you don't get to have your cake and eat it too", but this is barely a cake. There's no need to be dramatic.
This is just something a bunch of indie devs proud of their work have come up with to promote the fact that they don't take shortcuts at the potential cost of using someone else's IP without permission.
The technology isn't being targeted here. This is specifically about current generative "AI" products being trained on material without original artists' permission, because that's pretty much the only way to source a large enough set of high quality source material. That's what artists, writers and other copyright owners object to. And I tend to agree with them. Ends do not justify the means.
If someone searches on Google and the summary given by Gemini is correct, and they use it, they'll have used GenAI...Then how about not including that AI-generated summary in your game?
Again, all it might prevent you from doing is using this badge to promote your game. I'd say "you don't get to have your cake and eat it too", but this is barely a cake. There's no need to be dramatic.
This is just something a bunch of indie devs proud of their work have come up with to promote the fact that they don't take shortcuts at the potential cost of using someone else's IP without permission.
2 Likes, Who?
Kimyrielle 3 hours ago
I wish people would stop using the word "stolen" when nothing ever was taken away from anybody. This is solely about whether or not using people's works to train LLMs is still fair use or not. That question is currently before the courts. Right now we're not even sure what the outcome will be, so maybe we can demilitarize the used vocabulary at least until then?
1 Likes, Who?
This is solely about whether or not using people's works to train LLMs is still fair use or not. That question is currently before the courts.I don’t need a court to tell me whether I think it’s fair that my work is being used without my consent to generate profit for others, regardless of the license I chose for it. What’s even the point of licenses if companies can just use whatever they want however they want? Why should I pay for things if they don’t have to?
1 Likes, Who?
Kimyrielle 2 hours ago
I have non-flattering opinions about some things people do, too. I still don't get to label their actions criminal if they're not. Me not liking what they do isn't a crime unless the law says it is.
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Please also make a stamp for "No Procedurally Generated Junk".Noita would like a word. And HellDivers 2. And Astroneer. And Path of Exile. Windblown. Dead Cells. Remnant. Those are just the games I've played in the last three months that use procedural generation, and are superb.
Say, translation. What if I write a game in french and use the help of ChatGPT to translate it? The material is already mine, its not stolen. It would noticeably improve the quality of the translation. Would this void the use of this badge?Yeah, an on/off badge is going to be problematic for reasons like this. A lot of the authors I read now have disclaimers at the start or end of the book, basically saying "no AI was used in the creation of this work". I think for games, it's not a disclaimer that's needed, but a declaration. If you can say "AI was used to generate the French translation, but no other AI tools were used", that's still really valuable.
Ah, yes, the "AI bad" bandwagon.As Tubbi notes, it's not about "AI is bad", it's about the creators of any given AI stomping all over people's rights. No attribution, no compensation. Just stealing people's work from torrent sites (a good read: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/02/meta-torrented-over-81-7tb-of-pirated-books-to-train-ai-authors-say/).
We'll see how that is going in 5-10 years
I wish people would stop using the word "stolen" when nothing ever was taken away from anybody.This is an insane shill response. It's clear you've never created anything that people would pay for, only to have a faceless corporation suck up your creative works IN ORDER TO PROFIT FROM IT. And you're arguing about the word "steal"??? Jesus.
Anyone thinking that what AI companies are doing here isn't bad - just look at Sky. If you buy a Sky Sports sub, it's about £30/month for your household. If you buy it for a pub, where many people will benefit, it's between £1100/month and £2100/month.
If AI companies actually compensated their sources for the works they stole (again, read that Ars Technica article on Meta above) to create their offerings, AI just wouldn't be possible. Authors can make anywhere up to £12K in the UK when their book hits the library. But AI? Nah. Just rip it off the torrents and pay whatever meaningless fines the courts decree.
Using AI today is ethically bankrupt. No two ways about it.
3 Likes, Who?
Kimyrielle 58 minutes ago
It's clear you've never created anything that people would pay for, only to have a faceless corporation suck up your creative works IN ORDER TO PROFIT FROM IT.
Got to love it when people make braindead, idiotic, stupid assumptions about other persons when they don't like their opinion.
For the record, I earn money with developing software and written works, and have done so for a long time. And yes, I actually own full rights for my works, because I am not employed (thankfully). I would be actually insulted if my stuff wouldn't be in these training sets. Do I feel corporations creating for-profit LLMs (including ClosedAI) should pay some sort of compensation for using my stuff? Absolutely. I hope they will place a tax on for-profit (only these) AI models one day and distribute the proceedings among creators.
It's still not stealing when use it without asking me. How can we make the other side take us for serious when we can't even use the correct words to argue our case?
PS: What META did was a clear case of copyright infringement, and I hope they get massively fined for it. That's an extreme case, though. Most of the AI models I am aware of used scrapers to collect openly accessible texts/images etc. If that's even illegal under current law is a different question.
Last edited by Kimyrielle on 24 Feb 2025 at 7:01 pm UTC
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When someone invents a whole new thing to do, I don't think the question "Is it illegal under current law?" is meaningful. Take cloning--ethicists and policymakers have been thinking hard about whether and under what circumstances human cloning should be legal. Pre-existing law wasn't the issue, the question is what laws should be written to cover it. Luckily they've had a good deal of lead time on cloning, so by the time it becomes a thing the laws will by and large be in place, or in places where they aren't they can use places where they are as a model.
Internet-scraping generative "AI" came on the scene rather quickly, before anyone had had time to do that kind of deliberation and lawmaking around it, and companies are taking advantage of that to say "Well, there's no existing law that really covers this not-previously-existing thing, so we can do it!" Well, maybe they can get away with it, but it's still a bankrupt position ethically to say it's OK because no law.
Internet-scraping generative "AI" came on the scene rather quickly, before anyone had had time to do that kind of deliberation and lawmaking around it, and companies are taking advantage of that to say "Well, there's no existing law that really covers this not-previously-existing thing, so we can do it!" Well, maybe they can get away with it, but it's still a bankrupt position ethically to say it's OK because no law.
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