Ex-Mass Effect lead isn't using AI on his new Star Wars RPG: "I'm just really unimpressed with it"

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The use of AI in game development is becoming increasingly common with an apparent trajectory toward ubiquity, but that hasn't stopped a number of high-profile developers from outright rejecting the tech in favor of 100% human-made games, and you can now count former Mass Effect series head Casey Hudson among them.

Hudson left BioWare a second time in 2020 and founded the now-defunct studio Humanoid Origin the following year, and in 2025 opened Arcanaut Games, which announced a spiritual successor to Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, titled Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic, at last year's Game Awards. Hudson tells Bloomberg he's running a lean ship at Arcanaut Games as he aims "to avoid having hundreds and hundreds of people," but even so, he refuses to outsource anything to AI. Instead, he says the studio will contract out any work to co-developers that his internal team at Arcanaut doesn't have time for.

"I just find AI to be creatively soulless," Hudson says. "It's hard to imagine where it's actually helpful in the process."

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As ever, it's key to draw a line between generative AI as a means to outright displace artists, writers, and performers, and cases like PlayStation using it to automate processes that would otherwise drag out development cycles. Companies often use the tech to reduce labor costs in both instances, especially when it comes to quality assurance as we learned from Square Enix late last year, but there's a much louder stench associated with AI-generated art than with AI-assisted automation.

Hudson doesn't specify the degree to which he's rejecting the use of AI at Arcanaut Studios, but says he's "just really unimpressed with it," generally.

Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic is one of a handful of titles being backed by the newly established holding company GreaterThan Group (GTG), founded by former NetEase president Simon Zhu, who said the company "is bringing common sense back to the games industry" by giving creators like Arcanaut, Rebel Wolves, and Quantic Dreams the funding they need to bring their dream visions to life.

Meanwhile, here are the best Star Wars games you can play right now.

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Jordan GerblickStaff Writer

After earning an English degree from ASU, I worked as a corporate copy editor while freelancing for places like SFX Magazine, Screen Rant, Game Revolution, and MMORPG on the side. I got my big break here in 2019 with a freelance news gig, and I was hired on as GamesRadar's west coast Staff Writer in 2021. That means I'm responsible for managing the site's western regional executive branch, AKA my home office, and writing about whatever horror game I'm too afraid to finish.

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