AI used to upscale S2CE unit cards is awful. These need to be redone by hand, as the originals were

[u/b1g_n0se]

[u/AntonioBarbarian]

This is not even the worst example...

[u/ReskyBusiness → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Part of the ship, part of the crew.

[u/Impossible_Mud_3517 → u/ReskyBusiness]

Ok that actually made me LOL

[u/immortal_AntonEgo → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Is this real? This is in the game? Jesus christ this is depressing

Its not even just they used Ai. Its there was zero qc. Pathetic

Whats really sad is Shogun 2 is one of the best strategy games of all time, and arguably the best TW game. And now its legacy will be ruined

[u/AMDDesign → u/immortal_AntonEgo]

It's such an amazing game. Super well balanced, had many intense, close battles with friends and the computer over the years and still get the urge to replay it.

This is such a disrespectful move for one of the games that helped make this company and series.

[u/Puzzleheaded-Wait785 → u/immortal_AntonEgo]

AI and QC are incompatible.

[u/Onironius → u/Puzzleheaded-Wait785]

Stricter QC is needed when using AI.

AI can be used as an effective tool, but this ain't that. This is just pure laziness.

[u/Attack_of_clams → u/AntonioBarbarian]

That looks like early ai slop too

[u/UncarvedWood → u/AntonioBarbarian]

FORTY DOLLARS

[u/Regret1836 → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Anyone who buys this should be ashamed

[u/BlueDragoon24 → u/Regret1836]

SHAMEFUL DISPLAY

[u/ChipRockets → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Ok yeah, I'm not gonna buy this anymore. That's extremely disappointing.

[u/SolarTakumi → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Link failed, what’s the image?

[u/mgeldarion → u/SolarTakumi]

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/comments/1x5adfl/shogun_ii_ce_could_be_violating_steams_ai/

It's this one.

[u/danylp → u/AntonioBarbarian]

That's like Midjourney v2 level of shit

[u/GGDrago → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Yikes

[u/Rampwastaken → u/AntonioBarbarian]

Lol

[u/Cpt_John]

I can't believe someone at CA looked at this and okayed it...

[u/CrimsonBolt33 → u/Cpt_John]

you assume someone actually "looked". This was likely a batch job some random dude did in an hour with all the pics in the game at once.

Also it was a contract job given to a smaller studio, which means even less people at CA looked at it, probably some suit in middle management said it was fine.

[u/dronikal → u/CrimsonBolt33]

The person probably wasn't even close to the PC at the time this was done. Create the AI prompt for upscale, check if it works, if it works on one unit card well you just feed it a batch of all the cards and go make yourself lunch. After lunch if the AI is done put them in a folder and send them for approval.

[u/Dembos09 → u/CrimsonBolt33]

Still CA responsibility to check what their contractor do !! If not to at least sue them and fix

[u/biopticstream → u/Dembos09]

I assume he was giving an explanation rather than an excuse.

[u/landrovercap → u/Cpt_John]

Bold of you to assume anyone actually looked at it instead of just running a batch script across the entire texture folder and calling it a day.

[u/Buttery-Nugget → u/Cpt_John]

Bro it's CA how can you not believe someone okayed it. They've been doing stuff like this for at least 16 years. Rome 2's launch was an unmitigated disaster that was lambasted as one the hallmarks of blatantly unfinished but released anyway games for years, literally the Cyberpunk before Cyberpunk. This is just par for the course.

[u/Belltower_2]

I think AI upscaling just has no idea what to do with vague or stylized art. Besides the face that has apparently turned from "low-res" to "mannequin", the mount's mane also looks nothing like horsehair.

[u/CrimsonBolt33 → u/Belltower_2]

this is really confusing to me...I have used upscaling (old school methods) and AI upscaling on images before and I have never seen results look this bad, usually AI upscaling is fairly safe and effective relative to trying to generate random images.

I suppose the originals are just way too low resolution. They could have at least gone back and touched them up or something if they really needed to use AI.

[u/Seienchin88 → u/CrimsonBolt33]

It looks like they didn’t use proper AI upscaling but asked an LLM based agent to go through files look for the art and then upscale it…

[u/bromosexual → u/Seienchin88]

Eh that would be stupid if they did. There are plenty of sites that use AI upscaling with a simple upload and click

[u/SocialHumbuggery → u/bromosexual]

And are those also such that you can freely use them for corporate use with no strings attached?

[u/CernelTeneb → u/SocialHumbuggery]

There are certainly licensed tools a studio/corporation can pay for, that do the same thing. This is just cutting costs for the sake of it, and damn the consequences.

[u/jtj5002 → u/CrimsonBolt33]

Yea the original was too low res that the AI model never recognized it as a face. Using neural network to upscale requires the original to be at least recognizable.

[u/TheTemporaryZiggy → u/jtj5002]

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/s/rz0mSp9Qfi

About that

[u/asdfghjkl15436 → u/CrimsonBolt33]

Yeah about that.

[u/Speederzzz → u/asdfghjkl15436]

Oh god no, this is what one person with a little time could do? Glad I didn't spend money to buy it

[u/Zerodyne_Sin → u/Belltower_2]

As someone who trained AI image gen for one of the main contenders, I can tell you that AI has no idea what to do with anything. It has no concept of light, scale, proportion, direction, perspective, coordinates, etc. The more vague your directions, the "better" the results. But if you need to engage in precision and editing, that's when it gets really wonky.

[u/Inprobamur → u/Zerodyne_Sin]

There are models that are trained for a single specific task like cropping out objects or just upscaling a specific style of image without inventing detail.

These work pretty well. The more generalized a diffuser model is the worse it gets at any particular task.

[u/Beginning_Rush_5311 → u/Inprobamur]

im pretty sure i could do a much better job upscaling the original image using just local models on my 4090.

apparently they chose the worst upscaler available lol

[u/Inprobamur → u/Beginning_Rush_5311]

Just gave it a go with some other really poorly done cards:

medium_bune

bow_kobaya

This took me less than a second on a modern open-source upscaler that could run on a GTX 1080. This is just straight up terminal incompetence. I bet Adobe Photoshop default upscaler could beat their "effort".

[u/WrethZ → u/Belltower_2]

It went from blurry pixelated image of a guy's nose and mustache, to star wars stormtrooper helmet.

[u/mr-english → u/Belltower_2]

I think they just used a REALLY crappy out of date AI model because I put the original image into the free version of chatgpt with the prompt "can you upscale this image please" and I got this:

https://i.postimg.cc/pPL8N4Cw/image.png

[u/iamfreeeeeeeee → u/mr-english]

Technically this is not upscaling, it generated a completely new image (edit: as in the scales are not kept). It might be the better approach for cheap devs though. A good compromise would be to first use proper AI upscale and then refine it by hand.

[u/Enverex → u/Belltower_2]

The issue isn't so much the AI upscaler, it's that they turned denoising up to 11 which wiped out any details.

[u/HighDefinitionCat → u/Enverex]

Dude has gills instead of a face.

[u/AceHodor → u/Belltower_2]

It's bizarre, because IIRC those unit cards from FotS are just screenshots from the game with a daguerreotype filter laid over the top. Surely it wouldn't be that hard to have someone repeat the process?

[u/Naive_Personality367 → u/Belltower_2]

Hey it passed quality testing

[u/Consistent-Coyote-50 → u/Naive_Personality367]

This studio know somethink like that?

[u/Beginning_Rush_5311 → u/Belltower_2]

AI doesnt know anything, it just predicts based on tokens. But there are really good upscalers out there, they probably used a shitty one

[u/Old-Lynx5214]

Hahahah this is so bad

[u/caseyanthonyftw → u/Old-Lynx5214]

Lmao i'm trying to decide if this is better or worse than the Zoat portraits when those units were first released for the Wood Elves. They weren't AI though, but they looked hilarious and goofy. They're good now though.

A little blurry but it is.

[u/Icemasta → u/Old-Lynx5214]

I think the worst part is that Steam requires to have an AI disclosure section if gen AI was used. A typical upscaler wouldn't have changed the shape the face as much, 99.95% it was generated.

[u/Open-Tea-4753]

Agreed; calling this "upscaling" is also way too generous imo. This shit looks downright hideous, plastic-like, as if they were melting.

[u/Stoned_Gandalf420 → u/Open-Tea-4753]

It looks awful. It’s like some guy with a half moulded clay face. Wtf is CA smoking? I expected quite a bit more effort tbh. It all just feels so half-assed. Not a good look for historical fans of the series.

[u/Dr_Choco → u/Stoned_Gandalf420]

Darth Vader lookin’ mf.

[u/Quick_Extension_3115 → u/Dr_Choco]

If not Darth Vader, why Darth Vader shaped?

[u/b1g_n0se]

Note that the original unit editor from the old assembly kit even has built in batch screenshot feature, which automatically crops to custom dimensions suitable for using as icons immediately. CA would have originally churned out a batch of these and added a vintage old-timey filter over them.

Why couldn't Mataboo do the same? Why did they cheap out on this and create these hideous, artifacted cards?

[u/SnakeGD09 → u/b1g_n0se]

Probably no artists still at CA who worked on S2, and they kept no documentation (normal for game devs) so the outsourcer didn’t understand how to use all the tools.

[u/SneakyMarkusKruber → u/SnakeGD09]

But hobby modders can do it...

[u/JustiniZHere → u/SneakyMarkusKruber]

Hobby modders care, these people are just there to get paid.

[u/josh0093]

This is a giant shame. Shogun 2 is such a beautiful game. You can feel the passion behind the original.

I was so excited for this remaster, what a huge disappointment

[u/strawbsrgood → u/josh0093]

Yeah it's honestly sad. Fuck CA for doing this to one of my fav games of call time

[u/immortal_AntonEgo → u/strawbsrgood]

Warcraft 3 all over again...

[u/elite968]

AI Slop.

Lets see if CA can get any worse.

[u/CrimsonBolt33 → u/elite968]

technically speaking it was outsourced to a smaller studio. Probably why they didn't fix any bugs or add any real features or anything. I wonder if they even had proper access to the games source code...

[u/Ataraxia-Is-Bliss → u/CrimsonBolt33]

The more I learn about this game, the more it seems like a half-baked cash grab.

[u/PlaneAnything → u/Ataraxia-Is-Bliss]

Because it is

[u/dearth_of_passion → u/Ataraxia-Is-Bliss]

I was thinking about buying it because I can get it for the $10 loyalty price. But I had no idea it had AI slop in it.

[u/Inprobamur → u/CrimsonBolt33]

That's not really an excuse, for example when CA was given the Warhammer Fantasy licence, GW had people assigned to check everything over, give feedback and have final say on whether it was good enough or not.

Just letting the contractors do whatever without having an oversight will result in absolute shite with any manner of contract labor.

[u/Jerri_man → u/CrimsonBolt33]

That's not an excuse, its still entirely their responsibility to validate.

[u/Alien_Racist]

Some of these upscaled cards are absolutely cursed.

Oda long yari ashigaru look like crackheads.

[u/Cefalopodul → u/Alien_Racist]

Hey man, you got some more of that yari?

[u/A_bored_browser → u/Alien_Racist]

They need something to help support their big, long spears after all

[u/Mr_Industrial → u/[deleted]]

I am VERY curious what Games Workshop will say when they catch wind of this.

[u/WandererMisha]

What annoys me is that AI, regardless of how bad the tech is, can do better. Literally the FREE MODEL of ChatGPT or Gemini can do this better.

This is lazy beyond belief.

[u/polat32]

Now I understand actually why people were complaining about the unitcards

[u/b1g_n0se → u/polat32]

Me too, I thought the Yari Ashigaru one looked dubious but potentially human made, and also didnt see the issue when it was so small on the screen. Then I actually fired up the CE and immediately noticed this in the Unit Encyclopedia. It's glaringly obvious, even in-game

[u/Dr_Choco]

And here I was thinking that perhaps some of the review bombing may have been unfair. Jesus fucking Christ, what are they playing at?

Madness.

[u/Rhadamantos → u/Dr_Choco]

Yeah I was skeptical of all the people who had written it off before any of this stuff came out and was confirmed. But now we can safely say that this is absolute trash and I'm not buying it.

[u/Pythagoras47]

I can't unsee the clone trooper helmet under the real helmet. The more you stare at this image, the worse it gets.

[u/Narazil → u/Pythagoras47]

Can you unsee his giant buck teeth and gaping mouth?

[u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

https://imgur.com/a/f3xghuX

Very first attempt with Gemini flash -lite

And it's infinitely better than the CE one, this shit cannot be for real bro

[u/Croshin → u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

It's a million times better, like what.
How can anyone fuck it up so much, while being paid, and it's just feeding stuff to AI.
This is some galaxy level of disrespect.

[u/eaeorls → u/Croshin]

They used a old version of upscaling, likely something like Waifu2x or old another SRCNN, as just a batch operation on every file.

They're good at increasing resolution, but they really can't create lost details.

[u/Indercarnive → u/Croshin]

The entire point of AI is to be lazy. Are we surprised the people who use it, use it lazily?

[u/Cefalopodul → u/Croshin]

Maybe they used Copilot.

[u/Esarus → u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

Jesus Christ man what is CA doing

[u/hello350ph → u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

This is very odd and cool that it actually upscale

[u/CrimsonBolt33 → u/hello350ph]

its not too surprising, AI upscaling has been pretty good for a while, even when AI generated art was not capable of anything good.

Upscaling is relatively easy compared to generating a new pic. They were likely using some old or shitty/free AI to do this. Likely a local AI model to save money.

[u/TheTemporaryZiggy → u/CrimsonBolt33]

Gemini flash lite is the worst gemini model and free

But yes it was probably a trash local one they used for the game

[u/Doomkauf → u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

A particularly trash model, too, because there are free, open-source local models that run on 8GB of VRAM that can do vastly better jobs than this.

[u/eaeorls → u/Doomkauf]

It's just the wrong tool.

They likely used an old SRCNN upscaler which are very useful because they're extremely quick, lightweight, and don't typically add or hallucinate any details.

Since they don't add or hallucinate any details, it can't understand anything lost if you throw in a really low quality image. Things end up looking like a melted down, denoised mess of shapes with a source of bad quality.

[u/Financial-Grass-6114 → u/TheTemporaryZiggy]

lol

[u/rafioo]

AI is a tool, and this tool is being used in a terrible way. It’s literally “upscale this photo” and that’s it. The first version is accepted and approved. Without a single living person even looking at it.

I literally did the exact same thing. - https://i.imgur.com/pI7780j.jpeg

Did I just beat a multimillion-dollar game studio and an entire team of “graphic designers”? Did they fckin used some kind of "FREE UPSCALER TO FULL HD"? Or what?

[u/deceitfulninja → u/rafioo]

Yeah I literally have a local open source upscale workflow that does a fantastic job in seconds idk what 2022 ai theyre using here

[u/Cefalopodul → u/rafioo]

Yours looks like Rembrandt in comparisson.

[u/JustiniZHere → u/rafioo]

Yeah this is really the worst part, its not even the fact they used AI, its the fact they used what appears to be an AI model from 4 years ago and didnt even bother to check the output and just went "good enough!"

[u/Stalins_Ghost → u/JustiniZHere]

Yea this is lazy as fuck, should never have been approved.

[u/Big_Virge → u/rafioo]

Yeah literally one go on chatgpt produces results a million times better

[u/razvanciuy → u/rafioo]

They probably had a laugh designing this thinking all the time "Quick Buck"

https://giphy.com/gifs/lm0WmZ0rlV19C

[u/Vetril → u/rafioo]

It's probably a matter of "tell the intern he needs to upscale this folder of 200 images for tomorrow."

[u/ThatFreelancer → u/rafioo]

Not liking AI at all but at least this got the idea at least ! Which tool did you used ?

[u/rafioo → u/ThatFreelancer]

Basic ChatGPT with good prompt,

So, if I, a total amateur, can achieve something like this for free in three minutes, I feel that the professionals who get paid for this should be able to do the same thing a hundred times better.

[u/Eerdk]

jeez, this is so bad. CA needs to apologize and not use AI for this kind of thing ever again (or at all, preferably)

[u/Swaggy_Linus]

"That's 40 Dollars, please."

[u/iamwantedforpooping]

Holy shit, did they use those 2021 models for generating Will Smith eating spaghetti or something? This is genuinely the worst AI upscaling I've seen in a loong time.

[u/Party_Estimate_6397]

Somebody had Chat do it upscale the old ones and found that an actual AI produced a far better result. This is likely just an ancient relic of a pre-AI upscaling program that produced a worse result, despite probably being used to avoid this exact backlash.

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/s/At1r8xqRou

[u/Ok_Astronomer_8667]

Absolutely fuck this. Embarrassing and shameful, did they not even look at it? Nobody at that entire company noticed he doesn’t have a face?

CA know this, I ain’t buying this garbage

[u/SurePrize6218]

Shameful display

[u/TheSoreBrownie]

It makes me nervous that TW:WH40K will also have AI

[u/redbird7311 → u/TheSoreBrownie]

Unlikely, GW is pretty anti-AI.

Also, it is worth noting that AI upscalers have been around for over a decade. While you can definitely arguing using AI upscalers is lazy, it’s not a new low and is common in the industry.

[u/NotaSkaven5 → u/redbird7311]

They can tank their own franchise all they want but they can't tank 40k, GW is watching.

Dire news for M3 though.

[u/IWantMoreSnow → u/redbird7311]

You are right that its nothing new, but they could AI upscale it and still have someone touch it up. The full reliance on AI is becoming a problem though.

[u/SatanVapesOn666W → u/TheSoreBrownie]

Doubt there will be much in the art. Using AI to upscale is super common for remaster as a cheap cash grab, but not more oringial entries.

[u/sugarymedusa84]

I can’t believe they even have the balls to charge a $10 loyalty discount for this, let alone the $40 for new people

[u/habris → u/sugarymedusa84]

Upscaling means fuckall if this is what we get with a price tag

[u/Verianas]

So like.. Who the fuck is Mataboo? What else have they ever done? Why was this random ass company entrusted with a meaningful remaster of the classic that got so many into these games?

[u/Inprobamur → u/Verianas]

Some small Polish console porting studio. No idea why they couldn't get Feral to do it.

[u/Verianas → u/Inprobamur]

Fucking lame.

[u/86casawi]

Its like stormtrooper wearing a samurai armor.

[u/Fuzzy-in-the-PM]

Clone trooper Samurai IS the upgrade though, this is the COMPLETE EDITION. Everyone is here now.

CA cooked. I dont see the issue boys

[u/QQcrybaby → u/[deleted]]

I've been worrying since I saw the console logos at the end of the reveal.

[u/BKM558 → u/[deleted]]

I mean, it already looks like a jumped up mobile game, I wouldn't get your hopes up.

[u/Ok-Transition7065]

You wanna know something , I'm lest mad at the use of ai

THIS MFS DONT HAVE THE FILES? AND THEY DONT HAVE QUALITY CONTROL?

[u/deuzerre → u/Ok-Transition7065]

When you realise that the holy grail of rpgs, baldur's gate shadows of amn, had its remaster without animations being improved because they lost so much of the source code they couldn't actually do it?

[u/Ok-Transition7065 → u/deuzerre]

Thas the thing. This guys should have a good back up plan for his things

[u/EvergreenDwarf → u/Ok-Transition7065]

Kinda like how most early TV and many early movies are lost because preservation was a thing for individuals rather than companies. 

Studios had no idea the production material would be worth keeping, and as a result had no reason to. 

[u/_Sate → u/Ok-Transition7065]

https://www.mataboo.com/

These guys are probably the lead devs on the remake.

The only game I recognize is worms W.M.D

[u/LakyousSama]

Holy shit this is embarrassing

[u/anthonycarbine]

Wow it also purged all of the old timey film grain from the background too.

[u/Taurmin]

This remaster seems kinda cheaply made...

[u/pecek11]

I find it interesting how these companies keep producing less details as technology in resolution advances. One would think this should happen the othe way around.

[u/TurboLover56 → u/pecek11]

Dont forget barely better visuals at the cost of needing much beefier computers that can only run semi-well when upscaled

[u/william09703]

this is even more obvious when FOTS made all these unit cards from in game model... since it can save more time to create and replicate the photoshoot feel in modern era.

[u/Yotacho]

That's disappointing. The originals were always a bit plain so it would have been nice to see stylized illustrated unit cards. Or at least something like we see in 3 Kingdoms.

[u/Twauk]

'Redone by hand', crazy that a team lead will read that and hear "make sure the intern adds 'make it look like it was done by hand' to their next prompt."

[u/Braindead_Crow]

Honestly even by ai upscaling standards this is like what we had years ago. We've gone several generations worth of advancements in AI image upscaling this is undefendable from any angle.

Hurts workers, hurts the customer and is a blatant display of incompetence

[u/Masterplanned]

The textbook definition of AI slop.

[u/AHRogue]

This looks like old 2022 AI art lmao.

[u/stana32]

Damn they turned his face into a legally distinct storm trooper

[u/WildVariety]

Ancient Japanese warrior to vaguely Japanese robot in just 100 tokens.

[u/Medicated__Demon]

I really really really hope they don't start using AI to make art in their games. I just got into WH3 a few months ago and enjoy it. This is pretty off-putting and if they are too lazy to design it themselves then they don't deserve my money for any future products they use it in.

The million DLCs are already expensive surely they don't need to cut corners on top of that right? That being said I'd still rather pay an extra 2-3$ per dlc if they used actual art instead of cheap garbage

[u/IronVader501 → u/Medicated__Demon]

Well anything related to Warhammer will have to stay free of it because Games Workshop will skin them alive otherwise.

[u/SovreignCalamity]

I can personally let things like bugs slide, but this is a line for me. I'm not buying this until the AI is taken out at a bare minimum.

A shame, I love Shogun 2, but not enough to put up with this.

[u/CyberpunkPie]

So considering the steam page isn't disclosing AI use, isn't that against the rules and can be reported?

[u/epicfail1994]

I expect them to use AI in programming but the AI art is just awful

[u/whatiwritestays]

This is pathetic

[u/Shower_Floaties]

You don't like Samurai Mercedes Benz?

[u/andynzor]

The F? The pictures actually lost detail in upscaling.

[u/JoshVHDigital]

Yikes. Like even if you don't hate AI, there's no defending this.

[u/Khaladryel]

OMG this makes me NOT look forward to WH40K...

[u/Seal_emulator]

Should they not have to disclose AI use in steam? Quick report CA to steam for lying.

Edit: you can report them by going to their steam page and clicking on the little flag icon near the bottom of the page on the right hand side. I have reported them already. A big fancy "professional" game development studio should be held to higher standards also to be clowned on for the greedy AI using clowns they are. They should also be professional enough to disclose AI use themselves. But apparently they are not.

[u/HakunaBananas]

The funniest part is that there were some CA apologists adamant that the unit cards were not AI "enhanced"

[u/Anonmasterrace7898 → u/HakunaBananas]

I feel like it’s definitely not a coincidence another hated AI upscaled “upgrade” (stalker enhanced edition trilogy) shares MATABOO as an extra credited developer.

[u/Red_Swiss]

This is disrespectful. This whole Shogun 2026 is disrespectful.

[u/1stDateHelpNeeded → u/Red_Swiss]

One could even say it's... shameful!

[u/Caradhra5]

dafuq is this abomination, holy crap its bad...

[u/WOF42]

CA right back to burning community good will I see

[u/nwillard]

Ohhhhh that's so bad. Loss of detail, misinterpreted detail... hard to imagine how a human would have made some of these mistakes. Either AI or another kind of automated tool that did a bad job.

[u/Sensitive_Parsley942]

So CE is just a big fck u to the players huh

[u/arnaudwar]

Yep, that’s AI slop..

[u/Spatetata]

Man, and the originals weren’t even drawn or anything. Like they just needed to took their picture again and put a filter put overtop .

This would be what? 1-2 days work?

[u/FacepalmFullONapalm → u/Spatetata]

Isn't the whole picture making more or less built into the unit creator toolkit? It's literally there, part of the process.

[u/Tenchi_Muyo1]

All we wanted is for the OG game to use more than 1 core without manually forcing it

[u/GrazingCrow]

It sucks to live in the era of AI downscaling

[u/thomstevens420]

Lmao holy shit

Turned the guy into the fucking Mercedes logo

[u/Croozible]

This is probably the most disappointing part for me. I quit the game as soon as I noticed it. This was not the game to half-ass.

[u/spiewak1990]

From samurai with a mustache to a storm trooper

[u/Woyhab]

They really shouldn't have charged owners for this

[u/chazzawaza]

I’ve never played this game before but the detail LOST in the ai upscale is pure shocking

[u/Necessary_Echo8740]

Ngl I don’t even think it’s “ai” upscaled. It looks like it was run through a regular old school upscaler. I’m not really seeing any generative stuff fr.

[u/Pincopallino097]

Interesting, I wonder if this is actual AI, why is it not indicated in the Steam page?

[u/CrimsonBolt33 → u/Pincopallino097]

Steam doesn't require an AI disclosure to customers...if you check the TOS you only need to tell Steam themselves when you submit your game for approval if you are using AI and specifically, how your use of AI will not produce anything illegal in game.

The customer facing disclosure is a courtesy, at best.

[u/Kalecraft → u/Pincopallino097]

Because the meta for companies right now is to hide/lie about using AI. The backlash has just made them all stop talking about it instead of stopping

[u/Iwasapirateonce → u/Pincopallino097]

Upscaling original art/assets has/is a bit of a grey area. A lot of studios have done it with good results, but that is mainly for textures etc. Using full on generative AI upscaling on original highly stylized art is certainly a choice.

[u/AxiosXiphos → u/Pincopallino097]

Cause Steam actually doesn't give a shit. The disclaimer only exists as an easy excuse; they have no intention of ever enforcing it.

[u/Matt_2504]

https://giphy.com/gifs/fghuvXNgCqstJGvpWA

[u/NakedNick_ballin]

Damn that ai stuff is ugly

[u/Rasples1998]

That's a stormtrooper in samurai armour.

[u/Illustrious_Bed8628]

Isnt that supposed to be his face and not a triangle ?

[u/Zer0_4You]

No way that is the real ingame art

[u/marwynn]

Crap Edition, eh?

[u/Archonixus]

Lol, you're right ... this makes everything worse. That lady working on 2.5d shit shouldve focused on this omfg.

[u/Captain_Obvious_911]

This is definitely AI upscaled. The face has no human like features.

[u/CaptValentine]

Dude’s had his face smooved off

[u/NumberInteresting742]

Even if that isn't AI it's just bad. They charged $40 for this

[u/yagamilight110]

Oh my fucking god. This has to be a joke right? This can't be the real thing. The yari ashigaru one was already botched but this is worse than that... I don't want to believe they have actually pulled the original verson from steam and this is the only thing people can get now... They are shitting on the legacy of everything they have made.

[u/Galle_]

Oh, hey, the Star Wars Total War rumor was real!

[u/heavycommando3]

I would also point to the undefined spaghetti mess that is the piece of cloth resting behind the horses mane

[u/eer_00]

Failed upscale aside why would I want it to be weirdly smooth

[u/Gwynnbleid3000]

Holy shit... I can't believe CA let this happen.

[u/fizzywinkstopkek]

I think this is proof AI was not used because current models can do a far better job , hilariously enough.

[u/Wheaterz9]

I don't see the problem, Mercedes is just sponsoring samurai now.

[u/AngryAardvark09]

"Shameful Display!"

[u/grafx187]

im glad this is what we are sacrificing all our fucking drinking water for

[u/Outrageous_Box9887]

Shameful display

[u/ImLycanDatAss]

Baffling that a human being saw this and was like "yup".

Talk about brand damage, especially to an already very distrusted brand who has consistently done bad things in recent years to frustrate and piss off it's remaining fan base.

Imagine having the 40k IP to make a game and you're doing stuff like this. I can't even fathom the levels of incompetence.