Bethesda’s Todd Howard isn’t buying into the hype of AI replacing artists anytime soon. In a recent interview, the creative lead behind Fallout and Elder Scrolls made it clear: AI is welcome but only as a tool. The magic, he says, still comes from people.
AI can speed up workflows, but Todd Howard won’t use it for game content
At a press event for Amazon’s upcoming Fallout Season 2, Howard sat down with Eurogamer and took a clear stance. Bethesda, he said, isn’t tapping AI to generate quests, dialogue, or worldbuilding content. Instead, it’s used behind the scenes to make the production pipeline smoother.
“I view it as a tool,” Howard said. “Creative intention comes from human artists, number one.”
To illustrate his point, he compared AI to old versions of Photoshop, not something you use to replace talent, but something that’s evolved to help it work faster. For Bethesda, AI is about speeding up iterations, checking environments, and improving tools, not replacing writers or designers.
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Most game studios embrace AI, but Bethesda’s keeping it at arm’s length
Howard’s cautious take on AI comes at a moment when the rest of the gaming industry is charging in. According to a recent Google Cloud survey, a whopping 90% of game developers already use AI in some form. Most rely on it to cut down repetitive tasks like asset tagging, level testing, and QA passes.
Some key numbers from the survey:
- 95% said AI cuts out the boring tasks, letting them focus on creativity
- 94% expect AI to lower game production costs in the long run
- Most use AI for efficiency not for actual creative decisions
AI in games is booming, but Howard says the soul still matters
The timing of Howard’s remarks is sharp. Many studios that’ve embraced AI are also slashing jobs, raising concerns about where this tech is really headed. By framing AI as a backstage utility instead of a frontline creator, Bethesda draws a clear line in the sand.
Howard closed the interview with a pointed statement: “We want to protect the artistry. The human intention of it is what makes our stuff special.”
Bethesda bets on humans to keep its games human
In an era where AI threatens to flatten creativity into algorithms, Todd Howard is taking the opposite stance. For Bethesda, the soul of a game doesn’t come from code, it comes from the people shaping the story, the world, and the details players obsess over. AI might help push pixels faster, but it’s not writing the next Skyrim. Not yet.
