{"id":292178,"date":"2025-11-15T00:44:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/292178\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T00:44:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:44:08","slug":"ubisoft-says-anno-pax-romana-ai-slop-slipped-in-by-accident","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/292178\/","title":{"rendered":"Ubisoft Says Anno Pax Romana AI Slop Slipped In By Accident"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anno 117: Pax Romana takes the franchise\u2019s city-building formula<\/a> back to the ancient empire but used modern generative AI tools in the development process. Fans have already begun ripping into one particularly egregious-looking piece of AI-generated imagery that appears in the background during a loading screen. \u201cVery big difference between this and the high quality background art and loading screens of Anno 1800,\u201d one fan wrote<\/a>. Ubisoft tells\u00a0Kotaku it\u2019ll be replacing the offending image in an upcoming patch.<\/p>\n

The loading screen art that fans have spent the most time picking over shows a banquet in a Roman palace with dozens of people walking, chatting, and lounging around. Stare for a moment or two more than usual and you can start to see the weird incongruities and errors that have become familiar hallmarks of AI-generated images. Some faces in the background are disfigured or smeared, joints and torsos don\u2019t always match up, and stray lines appear out of place.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Anno 117: Pax Romana is the first Ubisoft game to appear on Steam with an AI disclaimer. \u201cAI tools were used to help create some in game assets,\u201d it reads. \u201cIn all such cases, the final product reflects our team\u2019s craft and creative vision.\u201d Fans have been sharing other examples of the \u201cteam\u2019s craft and creative vision,\u201d including Romans debating politics in the Senate with no heads:<\/p>\n

Ubisoft has since put out a statement about the bangquet image:<\/p>\n

This image was a placeholder asset that unintentionally slipped through our review process. The final image is attached here and will replace the current version of this artwork with the upcoming 1.3 patch. With Anno 117: Pax Romana being our most ambitious Anno yet, we\u2019ve assembled the largest team of artists ever for the franchise and to help meet the project\u2019s unique scope, they use AI tools for iterations, prototyping, and exploration. Every element players will experience in the final game reflects the team\u2019s craft, artistry, and creative vision.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the new image:<\/p>\n

\"ArtUbisoft <\/p>\n

Players are calling it an improvement, but the shadow cast by AI usage<\/a> more broadly remains. Even if the team behind the game, Ubisoft Mainz, didn\u2019t intend for any AI artifacts to be visible in the finished game, it\u2019s now clear that at least some of the background art was composed with AI tools. Where does the human concept art begin and the slop machine end?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a shame since Anno 117: Pax Romana is otherwise getting great review<\/a>s. \u201cThe use of AI slop for the artwork is really disappointing from a series that\u2019s always had such beautiful art,\u201d writes one user on Steam. \u201cThere are so many low quality and very obviously AI generated images used without any touching up at all. I don\u2019t mind the use of AI as a creative tool, but it should never be the finished output in a $90 [Gold Edition] game. Hire real artists.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Anno 117: Pax Romana takes the franchise\u2019s city-building formula back to the ancient empire but used modern generative…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":292179,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[182,153072,181,507,74,15751],"class_list":{"0":"post-292178","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-anno-117-pax-romana","10":"tag-artificial-intelligence","11":"tag-artificialintelligence","12":"tag-technology","13":"tag-ubisoft"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}