Embracer Group Discusses Plans To Lean Into AI

This is likely the least surprising news you’ll be reading today – at least if you’ve been following the Embracer Group’s timeline or the game industry in general. After the company bought up a bunch of developers, sold off or shuttered several of them, and then broke the entire organization up into three smaller ones under the Embracer umbrella, it can’t be too shocking that AI came up as part of the company’s plans during the annual report.

As stated in the report – first covered by Game Developer – the group plans to use AI to boost game production. Embracer Group is adopting a new AI policy package to “massively enhance” production. They believe it will increase efficiency, improve personalization, and optimize gameplay as well as provide players with a “personalized experience”.

The intended use of AI in the game development process isn’t surprising. Every large company is more or less chomping at the bit to add it to their workflow. Where things get really interesting is that Embracer also plans to use AI in areas like HR, to “improve planning, decision-making, support talent acquisition and enhance employee experiences or retention.” That last bit is a little interesting considering they laid off more than 1,500 employees, not all that long ago.

The company goes on to state that it is “taking a human-centric approach” with AI and that rather than using it to eliminate employees, it might actually create room for new ones – specifically in the coding department. Embracer’s head of privacy and AI Thomas Hedman notes a potential benefit to people with disabilities, giving an example of someone not being able to use a keyboard as easily as others.

The other thing of note is that Embracer is taking what they call a “risk-aware approach” with AI. The company notes that the fact AI is trained on historical data can cause it to have issues with things like making decisions. It’ll be interesting to see how it all plays out.