Yet despite this, the company says it will use artificial intelligence for the dialogue — well, it’s not that simple.

Saber Interactive’s upcoming Rideshare Stimulator has attracted attention after the company’s CEO, Matthew Karch, confirmed that the game’s trailer contains a subtle criticism of Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford. However, the same trailer prompted a more sombre response from former lead writer Stella Sacco, who claimed that ChatGPT had replaced her on the project. Saber refutes this claim, stating that they have not replaced any writers with artificial intelligence on Rideshare or any other game.

“I didn’t even see this had been announced. I was the lead writer on this one! Saber replaced me with ChatGPT midway through development. All the passenger voices were AI too. Either they changed direction at some point, or they’re not disclosing it on Steam,” she wrote, also sharing an image of a social media post from December 2023 in which she wrote that she had been replaced by ChatGPT on one of the games she was working on. According to Sacco’s LinkedIn profile, she worked as a lead writer at Saber Interactive from July 2023 to July 2024, during which time she worked on Stuntman Hollywood and other games.

Sacco claims that the decision to replace her with a chatbot was made by one or two senior Saber executives who were unfamiliar with AI. She adds that she has no issues with Unigine, the developer of Rideshare Stimulator: “My boss, to his credit, argued over and over with the C-level executive who pushed for the AI — “We already have Stella, and she’s funny. She’s good at this; she’s done live games before, so live ops are no problem“, etc. — but the executive insisted that “gamers love new tech“, so using AI would be “great marketing“.”

The accusation sparked an immediate backlash on YouTube and Steam due to the alleged use of AI, as well as the lack of information on the game’s Steam page. However, in a statement to PCGamer, Saber refuted Sacco’s claim, though it did acknowledge the presence of AI in the game: “Neither Saber nor Unigine have replaced any writers with AI for Rideshare or any other game. In fact, Saber’s team of writers has tripled in size since 2023. Rideshare’s story was written entirely by real people. The game will also feature an experimental free-ride mode that, by necessity, incorporates AI, given that the number of passengers in the game is infinite. We firmly believe in using AI tools to enhance gameplay experiences and NPC behaviour, as we have done since Saber’s foundation in 2001. While the industry has continued to shrink, Saber has continued to recruit. None of our 3,000+ employees need worry about being replaced by AI.”

In response to Saber’s statement, Sacco told PCGamer: “They can say what they want — I was there. I posted about it on Facebook at the time and have mentioned it several times on Bluesky without using the game’s title. They took me off the project so they could use ChatGPT to write the rest of the text, including the planned live updates. If they changed their plans in the intervening years, that’s great, but again: It was my job to write the game, but then it wasn’t once Matt Karch decided that using ChatGPT would generate great publicity for the game.”

According to the Steam page for Rideshare Stimulator, players encounter unique and unpredictable passenger stories on every ride, guaranteeing varied and engaging gameplay. This aligns with what Saber said about the game’s free ride mode, which promises the opposite of a strong narrative and well-crafted dialogue. The fact that the story was written by humans is practically meaningless since this could refer to anything from the basic plot to a specific script. Furthermore, it excludes narrative elements such as dialogue, which are ultimately what make a game like this work.

Furthermore, information regarding the AI is conspicuously absent from the Steam page.

Source: PCGamer,Bsky,bsky.app,bsky.app,bsky.app,LinkedIn,Steam,store.steampowered.com