Square Enix Starts 2024 By Going All In On AI For Some Reason

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We regret to inform you that Square Enix is at it again, with the company’s president releasing a new years letter that, frankly, should have been expected but is no less disappointing. After previously committing to NFTs in years past, this year Final Fantasy publisher Square Enix has decided to go all in on AI.

Square Enix president Takashi Kiryu – who took over from previous president Yosuke Matsuda last year – released a letter to bring in the new year, which was released on the Square Enix Group investor relations website. The letter has the usual fluff, with Kiryu thanking workers and employees and reflecting on the year that was.

It talks about emergent technologies, such as “the metaverse and other virtual spaces,” though notably absent is talk of NFTs, something previous new year’s letters name dropped. Kiryu does, however, talk about AI, and it seems like the president really wants Square to be doing stuff in the generative AI space.

“Artificial intelligence (AI) and its potential implications had for some time largely been subjects of academic debate,” Kiryu says, which is understating it a little bit, “However, the introduction of ChatGPT, which allows anyone to easily produce writing or translations or to engage in text-based dialogue, sparked the rapid spread of generative AIs.”

“Its release made it apparent that the applicability of generative AI was by no means limited to text,” he continued, “and the subsequent months saw a quick succession of launches of new services and content that expanded generative AI into a variety of domains with close ties to digital entertainment, including images, video, and music. I believe that generative AI has the potential not only to reshape what we create, but also to fundamentally change the processes by which we create, including programming.”

AI technology like ChatGPT has come under heavy fire in the last year, and subsequent generative AI services, like those that generate images from copyrighted works, have been even more controversial. Just about every company that’s used the technology has come under heavy fire for it, including Xbox, which used an AI-generated image recently for a holiday post on its indie-focused account, only to later delete the image following massive backlash.

Related: Video Game Voice Actors Vote To Authorize Strike

Generative AI has also been widely condemned by artists and performing artists, with the technology being a large part of the reason why film and TV writers and actors went on strike in 2023. SAG-AFTRA and the WGA sought assurances from major film studios that their jobs wouldn’t be replaced or forcibly changed by AI, something that was ultimately agreed to by the studios after months of striking.

Of course, we don’t expect Square Enix to be running with AI for particularly long, as it’s pretty clear the publisher is chasing trends. The technology is already facing legal battles, and much like NFTs before it, will likely fall by the wayside when the dust settles. By then, we imagine, Square will have moved onto whatever other technobabble nonsense is making blue checks on Twitter sweat, so we wouldn’t expect many, if any, products using generative AI to ship.

Related: Netflix Cancels Shadow And Bone After SAG-AFTRA Strikes