It sounds as though Blizzard is open to exploring generative AI during the development of its games.
Answering a question I asked during an Overwatch press conference at Blizzard campus last week, Blizzard president Johanna Faries said: “I like when we are dev-led in our approach. We want our dev teams to be able to utilise or explore whatever new technology is out there, to the extent that they’re comfortable doing with it what we believe is responsible, and a lot of those principles that are communicated are really around rooting in responsible choices.”
The principles she’s referring to were outlined internally to staff at Blizzard, I was later told. I wasn’t told what they were.
Faries went on to say: “We do actually, at Blizzard, have a centralised governance team specifically focused on AI and the role it can or should play in our development cycles.
“What’s great about that is it’s very cross functional, so you’re going to have voices from around the horn thinking about not just what’s hot-topic now, but where do we want to be five, 10 years from now? What’s the implication on our teams? What’s the implication on our values? How do we make sure that we don’t stymie the opportunity for devs, artists, whomever, to want to play with new tools and play in the sandbox, if it unlocks creativity or gets rid of drudgery or what have you? We want happy devs, right?
“But to the extent that it can be an accelerant in our creative process, we also want to make sure that it’s a responsible tool and aligned with how we want to show up as a company,” she said. “So I feel very good in terms of the process we have in terms of vetting: is it secure, is it safe, is it values led? But I keep coming back to: I want the teams to feel safe, to explore to the extent that it drives joy in the work. And I think we have a good process, all up, in terms of making sure we’re doing it in a responsible manner.”
“But to the extent that it can be an accelerant in our creative process, we also want to make sure that it’s a responsible tool” -Johanna Faries
Faries’ remarks come a few months after a lead World of Warcraft artist talked about using AI to remove some of the “boring” tasks of game development, such as tweaking helmets to fit the heads of different-sized races in the game. “Things like AI help a lot with that,” Gabriel Gonzalez explained. “I would say the philosophy is always how we free up more time for our team to be creative, and take away the menial.” Gonzalez balanced his comment by emphasising the strength of Blizzard’s handcrafted approach to art and making games. “That is, and always will be, a big part of it,” he said.
Overwatch director Aaron Keller echoed that sentiment in the same interview, seemingly ruling out AI-use in the development of his game. “Right now, we don’t use AI to create characters or gameplay,” he said. “I think Blizzard as a whole is known for handcrafted games and handcrafted worlds. So, we try to pour all of our creative energy and all of our passion into doing that.
“For us, it is more important to get the details right, and to make sure that the gameplay is as impeccable as it can be and withholds the Blizzard standard, rather than trying to make something as quick as we possibly can.”
Blizzard has been linked with generative AI-use before. In 2023, Blizzard reportedly told staff about a generative-AI concept art tool it had developed, called Stable Diffusion, that had been trained on the company’s artwork. “We are on the brink of a major evolution in how we build and manage our games,” read an email from Allen Adham, one of the co-founders of Blizzard, who once led the company. He left and rejoined the company a couple of times since those earlier days, leaving again in 2024. The email also mentioned “voice cloning”, “game coding”, “anti-toxicity”, and “autonomous, intelligent in-game NPCs” among other potential uses for the generative AI tool. It’s not clear whether this still exists in any form.
Nevertheless, generative AI is, as Aaron Keller noted in the above interview, an increasingly prevalent technology, “So we are going to see more of it.” Exactly how much we’ll see of it in Blizzard games, however, remains the question.
But Blizzard isn’t the only major game development studio exploring the use of generative AI. Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian revealed in December that it was exploring some uses of gen-AI during development – a decision it faced heated backlash for, causing it to walk back on some uses it had in mind.
I visited Blizzard campus last week for three separate days devoted to Overwatch, Diablo and Hearthstone. The coverage embargoes for these days are staggered, but the Overwatch restriction has now lifted, hence a barrage of Overwatch news hitting the site. And there’s a lot to write about. Overwatch is getting a big push from Blizzard, as it drops a giant expansion-like release and adopts an expansion-like approach, and drops the “2” from the name to make it “Overwatch” again.
