--- title: "Epic Games Is Suddenly Anti-AI Now That It’s Being Hurt by It" description: "Epic Games has been pushing AI at all costs. But now that vibe coded projects stealing its IP are here, it's singing a different tune." date: "2026-10-27" modified: "2026-10-27" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor.md" url: "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/epic-games-suddenly-anti-ai-hurt" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Ethics" --- # Epic Games Is Suddenly Anti-AI Now That It’s Being Hurt by It ![Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney arrives at the United States District Court on May 20, 2021 in Oakland, California.]() *Philip Pacheco/Getty Images* For years now, the video game industry has been hellbent on adopting AI, using it for everything from rapidly cranking out code to auto-generating high-resolution textures and [sloptastic upscaling algorithms](). Some publishers have even relied on AI for [character creation]() and advertisements, angering the broadly anti-AI masses and alienating longtime fans. (Last year, Square Enix director Jacob Navok lit the powder keg when he claimed that "[Gen Z loves AI slop.]()") Epic Games, the developer of the blockbuster shooter Fortnite, has been at the forefront of pushing AI at all costs. As [*Bloomberg* reported earlier this month](), the company instructed its developers to use more AI tools to finish an upcoming Disney collaboration that's been facing delays. The announcement stunned employees, who were wary of introducing more errors. But as [*Kotaku* points out](), Epic Games is also trying to have it both ways now that vibe coding has made it easier than ever before to rip off its intellectual property. As such, the company [issued]() a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown notice against a browser-based Fortnite port earlier this month. The hypocrisy is hard to miss. Despite doubling and tripling down on AI coding for its own products, Epic Games is suddenly crying foul now that the same tech is being used to reverse engineer video games and related tools. The trend highlights a [massive double standard inside the AI industry](), with frontier labs claiming they're the victims of copyright infringement despite training their models on vast amounts of rights-managed content without permission. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney has since pushed back against *Kotaku*'s reporting, arguing in a [statement on X]() that it "conflates a number of different things." He wrote that Epic Games does not allow people to "use Fortnite IP without permission or compensation." He also argued that a previous Anthropic court ruling had determined that AI training on copyrighted infringement "itself was fair use," defending the company's internal use of Claude. Microsoft has similarly gone after vibe-coded reverse-engineering efforts. That's despite continuously pushing for the in-house use of AI, with its subsidiary Activision [using AI-generated slop]() in the artwork for its latest Call of Duty games. Microsoft's own director of applied science Brent Hecht even privately called AI the "largest theft of labor in human history," [according to recently surfaced documents]() in the *New York Times*' ongoing legal battle against OpenAI and Microsoft. Another internal document warned that generative AI could "significantly disrupt the employment of the very people who generated the data on which the foundation model was trained." In short, it sure seems like both Epic Games and Microsoft are trying to have their cake and eat it. They're actively trying to set rules for others they aren't beholden to themselves — an infuriating hypocrisy that perfectly exemplifies the current state of the industry and the tech sector as a whole. **More on video games:** [*Creator of Super Smash Brothers Offers Blistering Takedown of AI-Generated Games*]() ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]() ## More - [Rumors Fly That a Famous Actor Is Dating an AI Chatbot]() - [The Military’s AI Fever Is Leading Into Disaster, Critics Say]() - [Character.AI Is Hosting Epstein Island Roleplays Scenarios and Ghislaine Maxwell Bots]() - [Dario Amodei Says Trump Is Mad That He Hasn’t Given Him “Dictator-Style Praise”]() - [AI Can Mass-Unmask Pseudonymous Accounts, Research Paper Finds]() - [Children’s Toys Are Shipping With Adult AI Inside Them]() - [OpenAI Says It Will Let Users Add Trusted Contacts to Alert If They Experience a Mental Health Crisis While Using ChatGPT]() - [Cities Are Shredding Their AI Surveillance Contracts en Masse]()