this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2026
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A Steam dev is deleting his own game after girlfriend made him realize AI is bad (www.polygon.com)
submitted 6 days ago by tonytins@pawb.social to c/games@lemmy.world
70 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

AI in video games is a caustic enough subject that Valve requires developer disclosure if a title utilizes the generative technology. This way, people who have qualms about AI or its impact can opt out of purchasing anything that uses the genAI. One developer, however, is saving everyone from the moral quandary in the first place by just deleting their game altogether.

Hardest is a free-to-play roguelike on Steam that was released in the summer of 2025 with the tagline, "stop time, summon tsunamis, shoot with bubble guns, feed cards to mimic, collect rare negative cards!" Except for a user who says the game helped him bond with his son, Hardest mostly got a negative reception. "I assume the whole thing is AI slop," one reviewer wrote.

You'd think flopping like this would be the end of the story, but half a year later, Rakuel, the developer, has undergone a revelation. On Jan. 10, the indie creator posted an update to Hardest announcing that he would pull the game from the platform by the end of the month.

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[–] HarkMahlberg@kbin.earth 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I don't think you deserve this many down votes for this take, but I'll provide a counterpoint. Not being able to afford a real artist is not as large a barrier as you think.

Balatro's music was created by Spanish musician Luis Clemente, known online as LouisF, after developer LocalThunk hired them on Fiverr in 2023.

https://balatrowiki.org/w/Music

And here it is being played at the Game Awards.

[–] LwL@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago

It depends on the project, I think. If you require hundreds of pieces to make the concept work (and such concepts have floated in my mind) even hiring an amateur would get pretty expensive. If it's just small scope art (and for most games it will be) I agree, it can be relatively cheap. Though I'm still privileged in being able to afford that, some people couldn't even really spare 200€ for a project that, statistically, is unlikely to make even half of that back.