I’ve seen enough AI-generated images to suspect that these are the work of an AI, not actual artists.
As some of you probably know by now, I really hate AI, particularly when it replaces actual artists. I feel like using AI is cheating to an extent.
I was hoping the devs wouldn’t be so quick to use AI, but it appears I may have been wrong. Rather disappointing.
Well both have the same style as the already existing icons, and honestly those were pretty obvious choices for Armenians and Georgians. There’s even a thread in this forum where someone was able to separate most of the assets used in the icons (shades, shapes, strokes, etc), so it wouldn’t be a surprise if the creative team of the game already had them and just put the shapes of the crosses and the lion on top of it.
Funny coming from the self proclaimed caucasus history expert who said I will not buy the dlc if its not exactly as I wanted it to be.
Quit nitpicking things and enjoy the game.
I’m allowed to nitpick things if I want to.
for the sake of argument assume you are right and these were AI-generated.
microsoft has been working on their own AI and owns the original assets, so what’s the problem? they are not stealing from any artists
AI taking over the work of artists and eventually programmers and voice actors can be concerning.
Why tho? If AI is doing a good job then i don’t see why this is an issue…
If the AI can Eventually make the game by itself then whats even the point of gamedev any more
AI right now needs to be strictly controlled in order to be effective, we can’t really tell how it will develop. As long as there is person from the team checking and verifying the results of the AI, i’m pretty okey with using it, as support of course.
When it gets to the point of “hey AI make another expansion” and it does it I will stand vehemently against this otherwise one man operation. Its not there YET. It needs to be kept in check if it can steal jobs.
And we’re allowed to tell you that this is dumb, and boring.
Back to the topic, i don’t really see what’s wrong with those emblems, The Georgian one is the one i was expecting. For the Armenians i didn’t think that they would focus on the Cilician Armenia but after quick check, the emblem seems to be quite historically accurate to me (I am not an expert ofc, someone who studied history of the region or lives there should be asked to express his opinion)
Professional 2D artist here, to be honest I couldn’t tell myself if those are AI generated or not. I’d be much interested to hear on what basis you consider these assets AI generated exactly.
My own guess is no, these are not AI generated items. Why? Because both of these items could be made in Photoshop using regular techniques in more or less 30m, even less if you already have assets to work with in the first place (which is most likely the case). So why even bother going through generative AI programms in the first place? No point at all.
Also I’m pretty sure this kind of items are vectorized anyways, so once again, no point going through generative AI at all.
Finally, AI generated images cannot legally be used for commercial purposes in most countries, and even if some companies do, it creates rabbit holes for potential troubel ahead. They already got permanent 2D artists on the payroll. Microsoft is paying Craig Mullins… The guy’s a first class world-wide renowned artist who probably ask your own life’s income PER ASSIGNMENT. What makes you think that Microsoft would skimp on the money for creating two icons? It makes 0 sense to me.
To have a life like this where my job is to just draw coats of arms like his. What a chad. And people say gamedev is a bad path. Granted being the designer who gets to tell the team what civs they will add is living the dream.
Granted I wasnt blessed with knowledge in the field of game dev and lord knows Ive asked for answers but still if the assignment is 2 shield emblems… hot dang
Idk, generative voice AI is helping me tremendously voicing over my own campaign, with almost life-like results. Keep in mind that it is a paid service. Yet I couldn’t afford to have this amount of lines voiced by real actors though. So it’s not a missing revenue for them, because I wouldn’t have recruited them in the first place if AI wouldn’t provide me with the service.
Really good voice actors will still have their jobs. Really good writers will still have their jobs. And really good (or niche specialized) artists will still have their jobs. But yeah, people who made a buck with average skills, or with too mainstream specialization/domain, they will go out of business. Is that a bad thing? Idk.
I like to think about it in the same way as the current restaurants situation in France. We got tons of restaurants, in facts there is way too much of them. 80% of these establishment are living off illegals who are shamefully slaved around between the trash cans and the kitchen, they serve crp and they ask full price for it. Everybody would win if those establishments would just close and leave the place to the better restaurants who do things seriously and morally, and you get what you’re paying for, not pre-cooked reheated crp ordered from a central kitchen.
Well Google Advice is slowly starting to put these crooks out of business. I see it as a good thing. Good restaurants will still be around. Crooks won’t.
Im just worried as someone who has wished I was blessed with gamedev skills beyond civ concepts.
It takes a lot of character to admit my imperfections here doesnt it? I kmow it will get mockery but I think we should respect those who want to do better. Every one of us! Hesitating to enter a saturated field and all
I think most of the doomerism WRT tech and AI is greatly overblown. Ultimately it’s just a tool. There are growing pains when it comes to every new technology (see: the Luddites), but by and large labor-saving devices and technologies are a net positive.
There will always be someone or something to blame for why you don’t have a bigger piece of pie. In my field (manufacturing), before it was robots, it was cheaper foreign labor. Now it’s both. Doesn’t matter. Study, adapt, succeed.
Back on topic, I agree with @MLC8896. Don’t have any reason to think that these are AI. Even if they are, they fulfill their purpose. Hell, if AI/automation helps the devs actually make new buildings/architecture sets, I’m all for it. Although I don’t think its needed.
My point is its not there yet. But heavy power working machinery was once upon a time not there either. Nor automatic assembly machines. Those aspirations are getting lost as well. Yea maybe doomer and Ill admit I wish I could be better at this sorta stuff but still Im always worried about it inching ever closer
Support human artists, and don’t spend any money on AI-art-involved products (unless they fully explain where the training data came from and how they use the AI), that’s the best a customer can do I guess.
Back to this case, I agree with MLC8896, and I also couldn’t tell if the coats of arms were AI-generated or not. I understand why OP suspects, the coat of arms looks blurry, and the middle metal part of Georgians’ coa is not fully rounded for some reason, both are what AI art would look like. But why bother to set up and use AI for such a simple task when they already have full-time artists?
Because they’d rather focus the artists time on other aspects of the project?
Though that argument would have more teeth if they made a new architecture set or new unique castles for other civs…just saying.
Ngl I intend to keep beating that unique castles dead horse until it happens 11.