Anno 117: Pax Romana takes the franchise’s city-building formula back to the ancient empire but used modern generative AI tools in the development process. Fans have already begun ripping into one particularly egregious-looking piece of AI-generated imagery that appears in the background during a loading screen. “Very big difference between this and the high quality background art and loading screens of Anno 1800,” one fan wrote. Ubisoft tells Kotaku it’ll be replacing the offending image in an upcoming patch.
The loading screen art that fans have spent the most time picking over shows a banquet in a Roman palace with dozens of people walking, chatting, and lounging around. Stare for a moment or two more than usual and you can start to see the weird incongruities and errors that have become familiar hallmarks of AI-generated images. Some faces in the background are disfigured or smeared, joints and torsos don’t always match up, and stray lines appear out of place.
Anno 117: Pax Romana is the first Ubisoft game to appear on Steam with an AI disclaimer. “AI tools were used to help create some in game assets,” it reads. “In all such cases, the final product reflects our team’s craft and creative vision.” Fans have been sharing other examples of the “team’s craft and creative vision,” including Romans debating politics in the Senate with no heads:
Ubisoft has since put out a statement about the bangquet image:
This image was a placeholder asset that unintentionally slipped through our review process. The final image is attached here and will replace the current version of this artwork with the upcoming 1.3 patch. With Anno 117: Pax Romana being our most ambitious Anno yet, we’ve assembled the largest team of artists ever for the franchise and to help meet the project’s unique scope, they use AI tools for iterations, prototyping, and exploration. Every element players will experience in the final game reflects the team’s craft, artistry, and creative vision.
Here’s the new image:
Players are calling it an improvement, but the shadow cast by AI usage more broadly remains. Even if the team behind the game, Ubisoft Mainz, didn’t intend for any AI artifacts to be visible in the finished game, it’s now clear that at least some of the background art was composed with AI tools. Where does the human concept art begin and the slop machine end?
It’s a shame since Anno 117: Pax Romana is otherwise getting great reviews. “The use of AI slop for the artwork is really disappointing from a series that’s always had such beautiful art,” writes one user on Steam. “There are so many low quality and very obviously AI generated images used without any touching up at all. I don’t mind the use of AI as a creative tool, but it should never be the finished output in a $90 [Gold Edition] game. Hire real artists.”
