The Creators of Baldur's Gate 3 Clarifies Its Use of Generative AI for Next Divinity

The team behind acclaimed role-playing games like Baldur's Gate 3 and Divinity: Original Sin just teased its next major project, creating significant hype within the gaming community. However, follow-up remarks from the studio's co-founder have brought clarity to the conversation, touching on the developer's approach toward generative artificial intelligence.

Augmenting Workflows, Not Cutting Jobs

In a recent clarification, the studio's founder detailed that the company is utilizing machine learning for certain preliminary functions. These include developing presentation materials, generating initial artistic references, and writing placeholder copy.

Notably, Vincke stressed that the shipping content in the game will be created entirely by actual artists. "Our team is developing all the content ourselves," he affirmed.

Our studio is constantly increasing our pool of storytellers and are actively forming writing teams.

As this area is being particularly called out — we currently have twenty-three visual developers and have roles to fill for more talent.

Each initiative we do is supplementary and aimed at having people spend more time on making content.

Every ML tool implemented properly is additive to a creative team workflow, not a substitute for their craft.

Tempering Reactions with Clear Intent

The admission of employing this technology initially generated backlash among some the player base. In response, Vincke issued additional clarification on online platforms.

"Our team utilizes machine learning to explore references, similar to we use the internet and physical media," he wrote. "In the very early ideation stages we use it as a basic framework for composition which we then swap out with hand-crafted concept art."

He continued, "We've hired artists for their creative vision, not for their capacity to replicate what a AI generates."

Focused Uses for Machine Learning

Vincke had in the past broken down the company's focused approach to AI and ML, defining its use into primary areas:

• Automation of Tedious Tasks: Areas like motion capture cleaning, dialogue cleanup, and pipeline-specific tasks like adapting animations for different models.
• Accelerated Iteration: Using systems to quickly build rough models of gameplay ideas to test concepts prior to complete development.
• Long-Term Aspirations: Investigating how machine learning could in the future facilitate emergent gameplay, particularly in managing dynamic reactions in a vast role-playing world.

He explicitly affirmed that key artistic domains — like music composition — are not fields where the studio is cutting artistic involvement. On the contrary, Larian is recruiting more in these precise fields.

"We are not launching a game with any AI components, nor planning on trimming down staff to replace them with artificial intelligence," Vincke summarized.