Valve responds to controversy over Steam games using AI assets

A developer recently claimed its game was rejected by Valve for having “obviously AI-generated assets.” The story gained traction and Valve has now released a statement concerning its position on using AI to create Steam games.

In summary, it’s not a hard ‘no,’ developers just need to ensure they obtain all the necessary rights to anything within their games. At the moment, as many AI tools scrape copyrighted artwork, a lot of the resulting products exist within a legal gray area. “There is some legal uncertainty relating to data used to train AI models,” Valve’s statement reads.

But it seems as long as developers can prove they have the rights to the dataset and end product, Valve won’t ban a game for using AI tools to create assets. The company simply says, “It is the developer’s responsibility to make sure they have the appropriate rights to ship their game.”

Valve asserts that it is aware the technology and laws surrounding AI are evolving and does not wish to discourage developers from using AI. “Stated plainly, our review process is a reflection of current copyright law and policies, not an added layer of our opinion.”

Valve adds that while developers can utilize AI tools, “they can not infringe on existing copyrights.” So if you’re looking to submit a game to Steam and you’ve used AI, just make sure you own the rights to all the data used to train the AI, and you shouldn’t have a problem.

If your game does still get rejected though, as potterharry97 claims theirs did, worry not, as Valve will be offering refunds for the normally non-refundable App-submission credits while it continues to work on its review process.

Here is the full, unedited statement from Valve:

“We are continuing to learn about AI, the ways it can be used in game development, and how to factor it in to our process for reviewing games submitted for distribution on Steam. Our priority, as always, is to try to ship as many of the titles we receive as we can. The introduction of AI can sometimes make it harder to show a developer has sufficient rights in using AI to create assets, including images, text, and music. In particular, there is some legal uncertainty relating to data used to train AI models. It is the developer’s responsibility to make sure they have the appropriate rights to ship their game.

We know it is a constantly evolving tech, and our goal is not to discourage the use of it on Steam; instead, we’re working through how to integrate it into our already-existing review policies. Stated plainly, our review process is a reflection of current copyright law and policies, not an added layer of our opinion. As these laws and policies evolve over time, so will our process.

We welcome and encourage innovation, and AI technology is bound to create new and exciting experiences in gaming. While developers can use these AI technologies in their work with appropriate commercial licenses, they can not infringe on existing copyrights.

Lastly, while App-submission credits are usually non-refundable, we’re more than happy to offer them in these cases as we continue to work on our review process.”