I love dunking on Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, who ruined a social media platform, apparently sucks at video games, and played a key role in the United States’ descent into fascism. It’s one of my favorite pastimes here on this website. The cool thing about dunking on out-of-touch rich people is that it’s not just writers who can engage in this storied tradition. People who actually have first-hand knowledge and experience with the industries these motherfuckers love to parachute into can also participate. And when I see Larian Studios’ Michael Douse, the director of publishing at the acclaimed RPG studio responsible for the excellent Baldur’s Gate 3, saying that Musk’s promises of an AI-generated video game are a bunch of bullshit, I believe him.
Musk has founded an AI video game studio called XAI, and says that the Grok-powered team will release a “great” AI-generated game before the end of 2026. He makes this claim in a tweet posted above AI-rendered footage of a nonexistent military shooter that looks like shit. Musk, a man known for making promises he can’t keep, may put out some AI-generated slop game in 2026, but is anyone really asking for that beyond his biggest simps?
Douse, meanwhile, who works at a studio that makes games people actually like, responded to Musk’s plan with a tweet of his own, arguing that while AI can be a tool in game development, it lacks the vision that makes good games.
“Genuinely, what this industry needs is not more mathematically produced, psychologically trained gameplay loops, rather more expressions of worlds that folks are engaged with, or want to engage with,” Douse wrote. “AI has its place as a tool, but we have all the tools in the world, and they aren’t compensating for the incredible lack of cogent direction. AI isn’t going to solve the big problem of the industry, which is leadership & vision.”
I just like watching people who know their stuff smack down people who are just parachuting in without any real understanding of how any of this works. Baldur’s Gate 3 is out on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Mac, and Linux, and it’s good as hell.