Video game development veteran Masahiro Sakurai, who is best known for creating the Kirby franchise and for his work on the Super Smash Bros. series, has said the current model of large-scale game development is "becoming unsustainable."
He told ITMedia as translated by IGN, "I think it is becoming unsustainable to continue producing large games on the scale that companies currently do, as it requires too much work."
Sakurai added that independent game developers are facing challenges, too. He said indie developers "need a lot of luck, effort, polish, and stand-out elements to succeed in the market."
The developer went on to say that he sees generative AI as a possible solution to help developers, especially teams that make large-scale games.
"The only effective breakthrough I can think of at the moment is generative AI. I think we are getting to the point where (AAA studios) have to change their way of working by using gen AI to improve work efficiency. I think we are in an era where only the companies that successfully respond to these changes will be able to survive," he said.
Sakurai mainly makes games for Nintendo, but his company, Sora Ltd., is not owned by the gaming giant. Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser has said he believes AI will play a role in the future of gaming, but the ""human touch" will always be necessary to make great games.
Bowser is basically echoing what Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa said back in 2023. At the time, the executive said Nintendo would consider leveraging AI like it would any new technology, but games will not be made by "technology alone." Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, meanwhile, has said Nintendo won't necessarily rush to utilize AI just because other companies may be doing so.
Sakurai is not the first person to question the sustainability of the AAA landscape, as former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden has been beating that drum for years. As for the role new AI systems can play in the future of game development, it remains to be seen how it will shake out, but developers are already using such tools to speed up development. EA Sports said this week that it created a "newly upgraded machine- learning-based pipeline" to speed up development on CFB 26. In 2024, the majority of video game developers worldwide were using AI tools to make games, despite ongoing concerns from workers.
Kingdom Come director Daniel Vavra previously spoke positively about his hope that an "AI revolution" will help his studio make games faster and more efficiently. Not everyone is so enthusiastic about the role of AI in gaming going forward, as enigmatic game developer Yoko Taro recently said "AI will make all game creators unemployed." It remains to be seen how companies adopting AI systems might impact employment. Larian Studios' Swen Vincke has embraced AI to automate tedious tasks no one wants to do.
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He told ITMedia as translated by IGN, "I think it is becoming unsustainable to continue producing large games on the scale that companies currently do, as it requires too much work."
Sakurai added that independent game developers are facing challenges, too. He said indie developers "need a lot of luck, effort, polish, and stand-out elements to succeed in the market."
The developer went on to say that he sees generative AI as a possible solution to help developers, especially teams that make large-scale games.
"The only effective breakthrough I can think of at the moment is generative AI. I think we are getting to the point where (AAA studios) have to change their way of working by using gen AI to improve work efficiency. I think we are in an era where only the companies that successfully respond to these changes will be able to survive," he said.
Sakurai mainly makes games for Nintendo, but his company, Sora Ltd., is not owned by the gaming giant. Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser has said he believes AI will play a role in the future of gaming, but the ""human touch" will always be necessary to make great games.
Bowser is basically echoing what Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa said back in 2023. At the time, the executive said Nintendo would consider leveraging AI like it would any new technology, but games will not be made by "technology alone." Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, meanwhile, has said Nintendo won't necessarily rush to utilize AI just because other companies may be doing so.
Sakurai is not the first person to question the sustainability of the AAA landscape, as former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden has been beating that drum for years. As for the role new AI systems can play in the future of game development, it remains to be seen how it will shake out, but developers are already using such tools to speed up development. EA Sports said this week that it created a "newly upgraded machine- learning-based pipeline" to speed up development on CFB 26. In 2024, the majority of video game developers worldwide were using AI tools to make games, despite ongoing concerns from workers.
Kingdom Come director Daniel Vavra previously spoke positively about his hope that an "AI revolution" will help his studio make games faster and more efficiently. Not everyone is so enthusiastic about the role of AI in gaming going forward, as enigmatic game developer Yoko Taro recently said "AI will make all game creators unemployed." It remains to be seen how companies adopting AI systems might impact employment. Larian Studios' Swen Vincke has embraced AI to automate tedious tasks no one wants to do.
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