WWE 2K24 was revealed this week, with the upc🍌oming wrestling game unveiling a trio of covers for all three editions of the experience. As is typical of the annual release, you will gain access to a variety of future downloadable content and similar unlockables, depending on how many pennies you’re willing to cough up. I’m not here to talk about the differences between each one though, I instead want to delve into discourse about the ‘Forty Years Of WrestleMania’ edition and its accusations of using generative AI to bring its artwork to life.
, who in the past has done a variety of work for o💟utlets li✃ke The Ringer. But, given it bore many of the callsigns of AI, we jumped to a quick conclusion.
MachineGames𝓰 Shouldn’t Need To Apologise For Indiana♛ Jones
After two brilliant Wolfenstein games ♉(and also Youngblood), MachineGames has more than proven itself.
Like many others, I noted hallmarks of brushed up skin tones, blurred text, and unusual facial expressions and proportions, then immediately believed that 2K had🔯 saved some money by asking a computer to do the hard work. I was wrong, and the fact a renowned artist like Bartlett was forced to disprove these false allegations mere hours after the game was revealed shows we jumped the gun, and speaks to wider conversation🐽s about the proliferation of generative AI across popular culture.
It’s hard knowing what or who to believ💫e anymore, changing our perception of new art and🍷 forming a guarded perspective on everything we consume going forward. While many mainstream audiences mainly see AI as a fun tool on TikTok, for creators trying hard to make a living, it has lasting repercussions.
2K using digital de-aging to alter the appearances of wre♑stlers like Hulk Hogan and Stone Cold Steve Austin in the didn’t help the conversation either, planting seeds of doubt in the minds of fans as the covers were revealed and spread across the internet. All other editions make use of photography featuring the likes of Cody Rhodes, Bianca Belair, and Rhea Ripley, so it gave the reveal a sense of authenticity that the expensive edition lacked. This led to fans calling into question how its art was made, and whether 2K used AI instead of an actual artist. Considering the untrustworthy landscape modern media currently exists in, I can’t blame people for being suspicious, or believing they’re doing the right thing by pointing out potential AI art, even when no proof is there.
We’ve seen this recently with Palworld, and though its accusations of plagi🌞arism are immenseꦇly more complicated than the open-and-shut case of WWE 2K24, they’re the same. AI has played a role in video games since their infancy, bringing characters to life and informing the scripting of virtual experiences, but the generative kind is different, and much more sinister. It is trained on the work of other creatives, most of whom are still working today, and uses lazy prompts to create something new out of their inspiration with no soul nor credit. When this is used to recreate real people - in this case wrestlers - it feels even more disturbing. People of good conscience are reacting to this with real emotion, but perhaps without realising how the acꩵ♈t of throwing around disproven accusations not only impacts the original artist if AI wasn’t involved, but places a focus on the wrong perpetrators.
I’m unsure how we can change this trajectory. Generative AI is becoming more effective and widely available, and has been shown to trick the average consumer who likely won’t bother caring about lost jobs in the indওustries they frequent anyway. As an outspoken critic of AI in video games, animation, and pretty much every other creative discipline, I was even briefly taken in by the outcry surrounding WWE 2K24, kicking myself after realising it 🐠was the work of a very real, and very talented artist.
Do we keep jumping through the same hoops before we eventually accept defeat, or wait for legislation to enforce exactly how t♏his technology is used in commercial products? There is no way to tell right now, or to stop a situation like WWE 2K24 from repeating itself. We need to be aware of the risks of AI, but also listen to real artists who have✃ the most to lose from this current evolution.
