A video game developer claims their account was suspended after their artist in Texas secretly used AI to create assets. Reddit user Omnistar_42 explained on r/legal how they had finally launched their game on Steam last month, only to have it taken down by another publishing studio. “They claimed my character designs were derived directly from their copyrighted concept art,” Omnistar_42 wrote, adding how the accusing studio had evidence the artist had blatantly copied their artwork.
The developer recalled how, in the contract with their artist, they agreed that “all deliverables must be original work created by the contractor.” After Steam allegedly suspended OP’s developer account due to infringement and froze their game’s revenue, they confronted the artist about his “original work,” and his response was unbelievable.
After casually admitting to using an AI image generator to “speed up his workflow,” the Texas game artist “claims he did nothing illegal because AI-generated art cannot be copyrighted, so he is technically not infringing,” Omnistar_42 wrote. Needless to say, OP isn’t planning to take this artist’s actions sitting down and plans to sue him, and Reddit has the developer’s back.
Reddit Dragged the Texas Game Artist Over His Alleged Response
“The freelancer’s excuse is complete nonsense. Copying someone else’s work pixel for pixel is copyright infringement, regardless of what tools he used to do it,” remarked a commenter, suggesting OP hire an attorney to go after the artist. “The freelancer is stupid,” agreed another. “While he’s right that AI-generated art can’t be copyrighted, that means his work product can’t be copyrighted. It can still violate the copyright of others.”
Others added that the artist’s violation was quite severe, and that the damage fines would go well beyond the $4K OP says he was paid. As a Redditor points out, he would be charged with “damages for lost revenue, hiring a new artist, legal fees incurred dealing with the IP holder and Steam, potentially there’s punitive damages, too.”
Even if this game developer comes out on top in court against the Texas artist who used AI, their game cannot be salvaged unless they redo the art assets. Not to mention, the loss of potentially years of one’s passionate work because someone wanted to “speed up workflow” with AI is tragic, regardless.
