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Larian Studios Says It Won't Use Generative AI to Create Divinity Concept Art

Larian Studios Says It Won't Use Generative AI to Create Divinity Concept Art

Larian CEO Swen Vincke had sparked controversy last month after confirming that the studio was experimenting with AI tools in game development.

Written by Manas Mitul | Updated: 12 January 2026 12:00 IST

Larian Studios Says It Won't Use Generative AI to Create Divinity Concept Art

Photo Credit: Larian Studios

Divinity was announced at The Game Awards 2025

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Highlights

Larian Studios said that it won't use AI tools in concept art development
The studio said that GenAI could help it in other departments
Divinity is set to be Larian's largest game ever

Baldur's Gate 3 developer Larian Studios has clarified its stance on generative AI use weeks after CEO Swen Vincke admitted to the company utilising the new technology in game development. The Larian boss confirmed that there would be no GenAI art in the studio's next game, Divinity. Vincke said that Larian would not use generative AI tools during the concept art development process.

The Larian CEO and creative director's clarification on AI came in a recent Reddit AMA thread over the studio's next project, Divinity. In a response to a question about the studio's stance on AI use in game development, Vincke clarified that there would be no GenAI-created assets in Divinity.

“So first off - there is not going to be any GenAI art in Divinity,” the Larian boss said. “I know there's been a lot of discussion about us using AI tools as part of concept art exploration. We already said this doesn't mean the actual concept art is generated by AI but we understand it created confusion. So, to ensure there is no room for doubt, we've decided to refrain from using genAI tools during concept art development. That way there can be no discussion about the origin of the art.”

Baldur's Gate 3 Maker Larian Studios Faces Backlash Over Generative AI Use

Vincke's clarification comes weeks after he sparked backlash with his comments over Larian's policy on generative AI use in game development. In an interview with Bloomberg in December, he had said that the studio was using AI tools to experiment with ideas, create concept art, and placeholder text, among other things.

The interview led to Larian facing criticism online over its policy on generative AI use. Vincke later responded to the backlash and clarified the studio's use of AI tools while creating concept art.

“I was asked explicitly about concept art and our use of Gen AI. I answered that we use it to explore things. I didn't say we use it to develop concept art. The artists do that. And they are indeed world class artists,” Vincke said at the time.

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Divinity was revealed with a trailer at The Game Awards 2025
Photo Credit: Larian Studios

Larian Says AI Could Help in Other Departments

In the Reddit AMA, Vincke confirmed that the studio would refrain from using AI tools in the concept art development process altogether, but said that generative AI could help the studio speed things up in other departments.

“Having said that, we continuously try to improve the speed with which we can try things out. The more iterations we can do, the better in general the gameplay is,” he said.

“We think GenAI can help with this and so we're trying things out across departments. Our hope is that it can aid us to refine ideas faster, leading to a more focused development cycle, less waste, and ultimately, a higher-quality game.”

Vincke also noted that Larian could end up using AI-generated assets in its game if the AI model was trained on data the studio owns.

“The important bit to note is that we will not generate “creative assets” that end up in a game without being 100% sure about the origins of the training data and the consent of those who created the data. If we use a GenAI model to create in-game assets, then it'll be trained on data we own,” he said.

Generative AI has become a contentious issue in the games industry since the technology skyrocketed to prominence with the release of OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot in 2022. Several companies have recently pushed for more GenAI use in game development to cut costs and shorten development timelines.

Recent popular releases like Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 and Arc Raiders have utilised AI tools to create in-game assets and voice lines, respectively.

Larian's next game, Divinity, was revealed at The Game Awards 2025. The studio has said the RPG will be its largest game ever.

Divinity

KEY SPECS
NEWS

Genre RPG

Platform PC: Windows

Modes Single-player

PEGI Rating 18+

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Further reading: Larian Studios, Divinity, Generative AI, AI, Baldurs Gate 3

Manas Mitul

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In his time as a journalist, Manas Mitul has written on a wide spectrum of beats including politics, culture and sports. He enjoys reading, walking around in museums and rewatching films. Talk to Manas about football and tennis, but maybe don’t bring up his video game backlog. More