Electronic Arts (EA) has already caused some controversy in recent weeks when it announced it had been acquired by the PIF (Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund), Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners for a cool $55 billion.
Now, the company is back at it again. In a new announcement, Stability AI (of which acclaimed movie creator James Cameron is part of its board of directors) has confirmed that it has entered into a new partnership with EA to “co-develop transformative generative AI models, tools, and workflows that empower EA’s artists, designers, and developers to reimagine how games are made”.
As part of the announcement, Stability AI said the following:
“EA and Stability AI are both trailblazers in their respective fields. For more than 40 years, EA has led through technological shifts across interactive entertainment, redefining what is possible for its global community of players.
“With the launch of Stable Diffusion, the most widely used image model in history, Stability AI transformed how visual media is created and put generative AI in the hands of millions of creators. This partnership combines EA’s leadership in interactive entertainment with Stability AI’s unparalleled technical expertise in generative AI.
“Together, we’re opening new creative frontiers that will shape how EA designs, builds, and brings experiences to players around the world.”
Meanwhile, over on EA’s website, the company states that with “humans at the center of storytelling, we’re evolving how we work so that AI becomes a trusted ally”. It stresses that AI will primarily accelerate workflows, enable faster iterations, and expand creative possibilities – whatever that means.
In an effort to potentially lessen the backlash that this news will inevitably generate (chortle!), EA said that AI “can draft, generate, and analyze, but it can’t imagine, empathize, or dream”, and that it is up to the human mind to drive true creativity.
Even so, we can’t imagine this announcement will go down too well with many folks. The company is well known for its sports games like EA SPORTS FC 26 and Madden NFL 26, but has also helped produce intriguing adventure titles like Split Fiction and Tales of Kenzera: ZAU.
