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If the developer’s brand involves AI-generated assets, then they should have no problem telling people “hey, we have AI generated assets”. Also “It's not for the platform to force this AI disclosure on the developer.” - it literally is, as Steam is doing right now. It’s telling that the only people bothered by this are companies or individuals pushing AI heavily. Valve are not forcing anyone to use a label, when they can simply use a different store or not use AI at all. It’s not as simple as seeking human-made games when I’m interested in specific types of games. Human-made could be anything- I want to know if Fortnite or the new Star Wars game is using AI. That’s what AI disclosure is for, and again, it’s only a benefit to me that developers are required by Steam to display this. It would only benefit bad actors to hide it. Even if a game is human-made, or AI-generated, without the required disclosure, I don’t actually know for sure. That’s the obvious issue at hand. Maybe Steam’s intention is for it to become the default too. That’s why once again, it’s only a benefit to disclose it right now. Maybe it’ll change my mind? Maybe I’ll see that so many games have AI disclosures on Steam that I’ll start to think “damn, maybe this really is the future.” And maybe Valve will decide that it’s no longer necessary. But for now, it absolutely is for consumers to feel comfortable purchasing games.

Yes, consumers are voting with their wallets. It’s not exactly a label, but an opportunity to explain the ways in which your game uses AI. A single skybox asset? Maybe consumers genuinely see that in the same bucket as the rest of the AI generated slop market. That’s not for any one person to decide, that’s for the developer to be honest that they didn’t want to pay someone to create the skybox, and for the consumers to decide whether they want to purchase the game as a result. Not requiring it would mean that the consumers are not aware of what they’re paying for. Many of them are using the disclosure label completely as intended and avoiding games that use any AI at all. That’s entirely on every individual to make that choice, it’s not the fault of the platform for offering that choice. The problem with this idea you keep repeating about developers building their game around being “human-made” is that, again, this is expressly the default and has been for all of game development history. Games that choose not to disclose any AI will blend in and trick consumers into thinking that they’re human made too, even if every single asset in the game is AI-generated. Do you truly, genuinely, not see any issues with this? The problem is solved by the default being human made, unless AI usage is disclosed. No consumer has any problems with this, nor do I as a developer who doesn’t use AI-generated assets. I don’t need to build my game around being human made, bc it’s explicitly human made due to having no AI usage disclosed. You’re implying that consumers are entirely okay with games using AI for programming. Programming is not hard, and that’s ignorant and incorrect. Not every game in the future will need this. If AI disappeared tomorrow, I wouldn’t shed a tear. You do realise, if your intention of a “human label” is for every game that doesn’t use AI to have this label, then the situation is exactly the same as now, just inverted? Consumers would simply avoid games without the human label, which currently have the AI label. There’s genuinely no difference, unless you hope that people give up on the human level and thus consumers start to confuse human made games with AI slop.

“without the platform forcing a label on everyone else that's treated like a ‘warning’ or a stamp of low quality” is blatantly admitting to the problem that this is how consumers see AI. Without that label, you’re trying to obscure the fact that AI is being used to try and secure purchases from consumers who wish to avoid such low quality slop (as they perceive it). If AI is actually so necessary and good, then the developers of such games should let it speak for itself and wear that AI disclosure label like a badge of honor before it supposedly becomes the default. What exactly are they afraid of if those consumers don’t want to play their games anyway? People who don’t care will just happily buy it with or without a label.

“A developer who built their game with AI and markets it as human-made is doing false advertising and should be shut down. That can already happen on steam today, the label doesn't prevent it. But if disclosure is up to the developer, then not disclosing isn't lying.” So what exactly are you arguing? If people can already lie, then great, they should just go ahead and lie. But it’s not about lying, it’s about the fact that leaving AI disclosure up to developers rather than a storefront’s rules allows them to not disclose AI, which Steam is saying is wrong for consumers. That’s why consumers are completely for it, because it gives them power in deciding what they want to purchase. As I stated earlier, disclosing “human-made” makes no sense when it’s actually that consumers specifically want to know whether something uses AI. Making it required to tell consumers that you’re using AI solves that completely. A game that is human-made will be obvious because it doesn’t have anything to disclose. Players vote with their wallets, no different to the last 30 years. Steam will punish developers who wilfully lie, and players who inadvertently buy these games, thinking that no AI-generated assets are in use, can ask for a refund. There is truly no downside to this system as it stands, and if anything what you’re saying is that the rules for AI disclosure are TOO light and should require you to disclose more AI usage such as code. Which I completely agree with! On top of that, even right now developers who want to further highlight their lack of AI usage can still add “human-made” to their game’s description without any platform changes even needed!