Epic Games has reportedly told developers working on an unannounced Disney shooter, one featuring both Marvel and Star Wars characters, to build the game using an "AI-first" approach, leaning on generated art and code instead of the hand-made stuff. According to Bloomberg, the game was originally due out in March. It's now delayed with no new date in sight.
Bloomberg's sources say an internal message from the game's director put it bluntly: "No more hand-written code," with all art meant to come from "full AI workflows" instead, built around Anthropic's Claude and similar tools. Epic hasn't confirmed or denied the specifics, but communications director Jake Jones sent a statement trying to soften the framing, saying Epic is "embracing AI-accelerated development, led by Epic developers who are the visionaries and creative drivers for everything we do." Disney hasn't said anything at all.
This fits a pattern for Epic. The company is baking generative AI into the next version of Unreal Engine, already used it to pump out that AI Darth Vader voice that got unions riled up, and CEO Tim Sweeney has been publicly grumbling about Valve's AI disclosure rules on Steam. Meanwhile, Fortnite's engagement has reportedly been sliding, and Epic laid off over 1,000 staff earlier this year, its biggest cut since the 2023 metaverse fumble.
Bloomberg also notes that staff have been joking about just prompting Claude to fix its own mistakes, which doesn't exactly scream confidence from the inside. Given Epic's last big swing (turning Fortnite into a "metaverse") didn't pan out, the herd might want to keep expectations low on this one landing smoothly.
