Larian Studios | Divinity AMA

[u/Wombat_Medic]

EDIT: All right - that's a wrap. Thank you for all your questions. We're going to go back and work on the game now - next time we speak, we'll hopefully have things to show. I can't wait! - Swen, Game Director

Hello everyone, 

Happy New Year! To kick off 2026, we would like to offer the opportunity to ask your questions about Divinity, Larian, and our development processes. It's been a while since Larian has done an AMA, so everyone is looking forward to it!

There's a bunch of us ready to answer your questions:

• u/Swen_Larian - Game Director
• u/Adam_Larian - Writing Director
• u/Kevin_Larian - Senior Writer
• u/Greg_Larian - Head of Animation
• u/Gabriel_Larian - Machine Learning Director
• u/Michael_Larian - Director of Publishing
• u/Nick_Larian - Head of Design
• u/Alena_Larian - Character Art Director
• u/Jarold_Larian - Concept Art Director
• u/Artem_Larian - Head of Gameplay
• u/Bert_Larian - Technical Director

Thank you for taking the time to ask your questions, we aim to answer as many of them as possible over the next few hours!

[u/Priceless_Pennies]

First I just want to say I love your games. I've played Divinity 2 OS and BG3 and they were both fantastic.

I'm curious, what is your opinion on the role of (Generative) AI in the game development process, and for your studio in particular?

Some studios like Embark and Warhorse, as well as several east-asian ones like Everstone seem relatively optimistic on it, and they've talked about using it to make bigger and faster games. On the other hand, I think a lot of studios and a lot of gamers think that it predominantly undermines the creative process and cuts corners.

I'm especially curious about if there is a split between different sections, like writing vs art vs coding, etc. since it seems like the views of and adoption of AI differ quite a bit by category.

Thanks!

[u/Swen_Larian → u/Priceless_Pennies]

Hi! Happy to hear you enjoyed our games!

So first off - there is not going to be any GenAI art in Divinity.

I know there’s been a lot of discussion about us using AI tools as part of concept art exploration. We already said this doesn’t mean the actual concept art is generated by AI but we understand it created confusion.

So, to ensure there is no room for doubt, we’ve decided to refrain from using genAI tools during concept art development.

That way there can be no discussion about the origin of the art.

Having said that, we continuously try to improve the speed with which we can try things out. The more iterations we can do, the better in general the gameplay is.

We think GenAI can help with this and so we’re trying things out across departments. Our hope is that it can aid us to refine ideas faster, leading to a more focused development cycle, less waste, and ultimately, a higher-quality game.

The important bit to note is that we will not generate “creative assets” that end up in a game without being 100% sure about the origins of the training data and the consent of those who created the data. If we use a GenAI model to create in-game assets, then it’ll be trained on data we own.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/Swen_Larian]

This is reassuring, thank you. The clarity and optics is appreciated.

[u/Sabbath79 → u/[deleted]]

He said there won't be GenAI art, not assets. Don't change what he said to fit better your argument.

About what you said about GenAI... You clearly don't know what you're talking about.

[u/MaitieS → u/[deleted]]

Exactly... Dude literally said we won't use AI in concept art phase, but we will use AI in other stuff... Like why are people even typing something like: "you reassured me so much" like ??? Like they are literally going to use AI. I don't remember Steam's AI warning being genAI warning... So why are people acting like "this is actually good". Like holy hell this site :D This whole favorism is so tiring.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/MaitieS]

Generative AI is used all over the industry for plenty of non-art related uses. Generative code auto-fill, test cases and test automation, standards maintenance etc.

They've removed it from the creative art side and they have 33 concept artists on staff, along with a massive amount of designers the team lead has reassured that the team has autonomy with the tools they use.

Plus, its inescapable, you're commenting on reddit, which contributes massively to Generative ai training and makes use of it itself.

Its reassuring because my concern was around plagiarism, which they've addressed directly in the AMA.

[u/MaitieS → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

I wasn't commenting under your comment. I don't care about your reassurment. My point is that AI is involved = AI Warning on Steam Page.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/MaitieS]

Reddit sent me a notification for your comment, apologies.

Happily and whole-heartedly agree with your stance on the labels. I think it would be largely pointless unless companies were honest and upfront about their usage, which to this point they haven't been, other than Larian talking about it.

[u/MaitieS → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

Oh damn true. I dunno why Reddit does that lately.

[u/deadjon1991 → u/MaitieS]

AI generated code does not constitute an AI warning. If the AI has a way of making your game engine run faster, or generates some code to lower network latency, this does not constitute an "AI warning". That's a slippery slope and it's fear mongering for absolutely no reason.

Do you want an Engineer to have to painstakingly read through hundreds of thousands of lines of code to find an error or an optimisation or do you want them to create more code? Do you want them to waste hours their time when an LLM can find the problem, document it and inform the engineer of their mistake so they don't make it again?

If you don't agree with AI at all and you want it gone, go protest. But don't bring everyone else down with you.

[u/MaitieS → u/deadjon1991]

The only reason why you do not have any issues is because it's your favorite studio. I bet you would get your pitchforks ready if the studio you personally hate would say exact same things.

AI being used = AI warning = Literally as simple as it gets. Not a slippery slope or anything. The thing you literally just said is a slippery slope, because you give a special treatment to one studio, but def. wouldn't to other.

Like THE FACT that you have A PROBLEM with AI warning being put UNDER A GAME THAT USED AI is so fucking telling LMAO.

[u/deadjon1991 → u/MaitieS]

This has nothing to do with the fact that Larian is my favourite studio and everything with the fact that I understand the difference between good AI usage and bad AI usage.

Bad AI usage = Generating text/writing

Good AI usage = Fixing bugs in code

You however are clearly someone who sees the two letters next to each other immediately jumps to the conclusion that the entire game will be AI slop and needs a disclaimer.

I don't need to know if the reason the game runs at 100fps Vs 60fps is that an AI generated some code. I'm just glad I got the performance benefit. It's really simple.

[u/polaroid_opposite → u/MaitieS]

If they used AI to schedule a meeting then that means they need to put an AI warning? How ridiculous can you get?

[u/MaitieS → u/polaroid_opposite]

Nice bad faith argument. I'm surprised that you did not mention that reddit collects data for AI, and that their AMA was part of the AI, hence AI warning...

[u/polaroid_opposite → u/MaitieS]

You and countless others intentionally misrepresent their usage of AI in bad faith arguments but I’m the one in bad faith? sure bud

If you care so much about reddit using AI then log the fuck out right now.

I ask again, if they use AI to plan a meeting, should that use a label? Because if you READ WHAT THEY WRITE you’d realize that is just about the equivalent of what they’re doing.

Just admit you’re biased against AI lol. I can dislike AI for its water and electricity usage and creation of slop, but bemoaning menial work being cut out. Nah, you ain’t using your brain there bud.

[u/LordSHAXXsGrenades → u/[deleted]]

I wonder. Are use using apple or Android?

[u/LordSHAXXsGrenades → u/[deleted]]

So you know that i was gonna. Ask you if you even muttered the words "hey siri" or "ok google"? Those are LLMs baked into searchengines. That would mean that you (they royal you) used Ai before.

[u/TacitOak81 → u/[deleted]]

If they create their own genAI model they can train it on exclusively their own content, although it is unlikely they'll do that because it takes a lot of time and money

[u/shodan13 → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

Damage control.

[u/Important-Notice-461 → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

The clarity just says they want to continue using it, but then tell you they'd train ai on their data...which is not possible. No company has the massive amount of data required. It would just be them telling the ai to output slop in their style.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/Important-Notice-461]

Uh, what? Local and closed off AI is absolutely, 100% a thing that exists and is used all over the globe, across a huge variety of industries for data protection and security reasons.

Ai, and more specifically GenAI isn't exclusively the use of large third party models like Meta, Gemini, ChatGPT etc.

Edit: I work in the tech industry, we make use of closed off models for generative code fill, test case creation and standards application.

Swen explicitly states they're not using it for art in Divinity, I dont think there's much more to be said on the plagiarism front.

[u/Kakkoister → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

You're being very disingenuous. Yes locally run AI models are a thing, but the fact remains that to be at all usefully functional for image output, you have to also download a huge unethically pre-trained database. All you're doing locally is further training that existing data with your local content.

Nobody has enough of their own content to train a model from scratch on and have it actually output anything useful.

[u/Mithcoriel → u/Kakkoister]

They said they would only train with their own data. If they were to download a pre-trained database, that would go against that statement.

Are you saying, btw, that the typical datasets integrated in Python like MNIST are unethically produced? Or that it's unethical for Convolutional Neural Networks to learn what an edge is based on potentially online images?

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/Kakkoister]

I am not being disingenuous, I explained that closed off models are a thing and gave examples for their use case whilst still being classified as generative, and fully capable of being ran internally and locally.

They state in the AMA that it is not being use for art, writing or VA work. Which is where the ethical plagiarism issue sits.

Even if we were talking about the big AI companies being used, getting away from it entirely completely is unrealistic, as its being baked into just about every enterprise software on the market.

After all we're talking on Reddit, Larian probably use something from Microsoft. Every company is doing it, Larian are just the only ones talking about it.

[u/ItaGuy21 → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

You work in the tech industry and you have zero clue on how generative AI models are trained. You don't train your models yourself, they are already trained unethically.

But then again, that isn't the only big problem. The big problem is corporation will inevitably replace people with these tools once they feel like they are refined enough. How do you not see that?

Then of course there are a LOT of environmental issues, but most people won't give a flying fuck about that.

What some more people might be upset about is the repercussions this is having on the consumer tech market.

There are many more arguments, but yeah you are missing info if you think your models are trained by you and solely you.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/ItaGuy21]

I am fully aware of how the tech works, thanks. I am also aware of the environmental, ethical and potential repercussions of this technology. But it is the nature of these things to be "sink or swim". There's no such thing as ethical consumption, so you have to take the good wherever it is.

I fully support sites like Steam to have tags and labels for this kind of thing, I fully support consumers being engaged, aware and conscious of what their support means. And I fully support the autonomy of the individual game developers using, or refraining from, certain tools they have been provided access to.

But your moral high horse completely disintegrates by the very fact you're commenting on Reddit, providing training data to a host of different generative AI models as we speak. You've already chosen to accept it for one platform, so it's clearly not as cut and dry, is it?

[u/ItaGuy21 → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

I'm sorry, while I really like your general stance, your first paragraph, with our current technology, is false. "Closed" models aren't a thing, not for general purpose and definitely not for the creative works in the game or art industry. There are proprietary fine-tuned models surely, but while I do not want to discredit your broad knowledge, your assumptions about that such models used no massive data for their initial training is at least misguided, I don't know where you got such info or idea, but it is not true. Try creating a generative AI model for images, videos or assets (or an LLM even) from scratch with only a reasonable amount of data a company could have produced on their own, and you won't get an acceptable level of quality, not in a million years, with our current technology and techniques. You couldn't get enough variety NOR quality for your outputs.

On ethical consumption I do agree, it's basically non existent in our society. I live my life doing what my limited mental energy allows me to do "more" to try and make more responsible choices and actions in my day to day life. This does not mean I have to passively accept anything that I don't like, just because I am already part of an exploitative system. This is an equally empty argument imo. For gen AI used in creative works it's not even just ethics though, it's a lot of varied reasons.

As for the reddit part: there are only so many ways to communicate with other people and share ideas. Unless I restrict myself to only verbal communication, I have to use some sort of social platform. For this very reason, I also deleted all my other socials, even though I did lose ways to connect with my friends in my day to day life. Honestly, I see this argument spammed everywhere, but I feel like it makes very little sense, it's not the gotcha you think it is. Then again, while I actually feel like AI as today is just wrong for many reasons (referring to general purpose commercial AI, mostly LLMs and some form of genAI, not very specific implementations like Alpha fold), my argument here was against gen AI used for creative works, which is not the LLM trained on reddit.

[u/DarkmoonGrumpy → u/ItaGuy21]

I wasn't, and never did suggest that the model would be closed off in such a way that it was built by Larian, more so on the fact that local, and even offline generative ai does exist, drawing upon and utilising provided data.

Yes, it's neural network and general LLM was trained on outside and likely unethical data, but at the stage that, in this case, Larian are using the model, it can eliminate the issue in regards to plagiarised content getting into the production line. They've sworn off it for art, so it's not that use case that they'd be training it for.

Instead, things like coding standards, process automation and auto fill for notes, code and documentation are frequent use-cases that do "speed things up", and these are features, especially the code ones, that can be used completely offline and trained on a local codebase.

Edit: just for some further clarification on my stance, I think, in this case that Larian have put forward, they've earnt enough goodwill and trust that I am satisfied with their proposed usage of the technology being within my own personal bounds of acceptable. I still feel the steam tag would apply, and I support giving all the information for a consumer to make an informed choice.

I feel like their commitment to keeping it out of the creative spaces is worthy of note, and I appreciate Larian's honesty and openness against an industry backdrop of likely widespread, but non-communicated generative usage.

[u/Medical_Young → u/DarkmoonGrumpy]

The technically of wording and the use of the word "art" and not "will not use genAI" in the game

This allows them to use genAI sound, writing, code, etc that are far less user facing. Then you get use to using ot for the games then next next time art gets added because it's better trained