Once it starts fortnite If you start looking through the game’s vast amount of user-generated content right now, you’ll quickly notice a strange pattern. Many of the user-created maps and modes include his AI-generated artwork of a large, shirtless, smiling man holding food. . Some of these images also contain crude and racist depictions of people.Still, thousands of players around the world Fortnite”platforms are playing these modes, but Epic doesn’t seem to be aware of the situation or intervene to remove the disturbing images that flood the game.
Fortnite”s The popular battle royale mode was released in 2017 and became a huge success for Epic Games within a few months. 7 years later, fortnite It’s more than just a battle royale.The game includes other games such as fortnite festival, rocket racing, and Lego fortnite. It also includes a powerful content creator that allows players to build new maps and games inside. fortnite Whether alone or with friends.Can also be used by the general public UEFN, fortnite– A focused version of Epic’s Unreal Engine for creating new content for the game. In many ways, this is part of Epic’s plan; fortnite First and foremost, it’s no longer a battle royale game. Instead, it has become a free-to-play video game platform with millions of players participating via console, PC, and cloud streaming.
As a platform, fortnite We give creators everywhere a free way to create content and distribute it to millions of players. If any of those pieces are a big hit, you get paid. But having easy access to a large audience hungry for new content inevitably means fortnite The platform becomes full of garbage, overrun with copycats and clones looking for the latest trends and exploiting them.
fortnite Filled with terrifying AI-generated art
The biggest trend these days is using AI-generated racist caricatures of large, shirtless men to try to extract money from Epic shooters.I tried using both official versions. fortnite Websites and third party sites fortnite.GG Explore thousands of user-created maps. He was able to record over 120 of her AI-generated images of large men and women promoting user-generated maps.
Scroll through the user-generated content and you’ll quickly find a huge number of maps with names like “ARAB ZONEWARS”, “Niger ZoneWars”, “Nigerian Zonewars”, “AFRICA ZONEWARS”, “CHINA Zonewars”, etc. .IFinding images is surprisingly easy Featuring a Middle Eastern man holding a bomb, black man eating fried chickenand Mexican man wearing a sombrero and eating tacos.
Most of these maps only have a few active players, but some are very popular. In fact, the user-created game that seems to have helped start this trend —jamaica zone wars—Over 35,000 active players hit on January 5th. Depending on the context, this can roughly range from: Top 40 on SteamDB As of this writing, games like the one above Tekken 8, Stardew Valleyand Red Dead Redemption II.
The Jamaica Zonewars thumbnail featured an AI-generated image of a large, shirtless black man dressed in green, yellow, red, and black. And as the game became more popular, it seems other creators decided to copy its formula.
Since Jamaica Zonewars launched on December 30th, there has been a flood of counterfeit products. Many have expanded to other countries, but Jamaica remains a popular theme Fortnite”platform of. You’ll find nearly 100 of these copycats in Epic’s battle royale. Some add extras like fried chicken, cannabis, and monkeys.
Players are frustrated by Epic’s lack of moderation
thing have it got very bad Now you can do it regularly Find players on Reddit and elsewhere Ask openly why Epic would allow this type of content to flood them. fortnitecreative maps and modes.
Most players believe that Epic’s moderation team is small or non-existent. Some have suggested that since some of these titles are doing so well on the platform, Epic may be inclined to keep them alive to attract more players and money.
Updated: January 30, 2024, 4:35 PM ET: Epic then sent this statement Kotaku This article has been published:
Discriminatory content, regardless of how it is created, has no place in Fortnite and is a violation of our island. Creator rules. Creators who violate these guidelines face legal action, including permanent account and monetization bans.
Our human moderation team reviews all content before publishing and actively updates the Island Creator rules and moderation training program to minimize the number of violating maps reaching players. I am. We encourage players to: report If you discover an island that may be violating our rules.
Many of the islands referenced have already been removed and the authors have taken action.we already has addressed and will continue to address over 100 islands with content violations that use this similar thumbnail format.
In the past, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney has claimed that his company considers itself on “both sides” of society. Art generated by AI conversation, tell pc gamer in March 2023:
“We are creators ourselves. We have a lot of artists in our family. We are also a tools company. We support a lot of game developers. Some use AI. For example, some people may dislike AI. We want to be a trusted, neutral intermediary that does not hinder the development of the industry, but also does not snoop on everyone’s art data. .”
It is impossible to say with certainty whether all art is generated by AI. fortnite right now was created using stolen and “fabricated” data. But these creators are most likely not training their own AI tools based on their art to create these racist images. And ignoring the issues with AI imagery and generation, it’s worrying that Epic doesn’t seem concerned that its platform is filled with such deeply offensive art.
.