For years, Mages has been one of Japan's most beloved visual novel developers. Titles like Steins;Gate have not only succeeded as games but also spawned anime adaptations and other media, garnering immense popularity worldwide. Although the studio hasn't shied away from experimenting with other genres—it released a rhythm game last year—public perception still firmly associates it with meticulously crafted visual novels or small-scale spin-offs of popular anime. This makes its latest release, Juggernaut, an AI-generated Quake clone, seem particularly bizarre.
The game was suddenly announced via the company's social media accounts, touting a "trip back to the 90s" and boasting "retro graphics and retro gameplay because it is inherently retro-styled." At first glance, the game looks like a bizarre hybrid of Quake and Doom, with zombie elements thrown in. The core objective is straightforward: kill 500 enemies. The distinctive, uncanny texture characteristic of AI-generated art gives the entire visual presentation an eerie feel. According to the AI usage disclosure on the game's Steam page, the company was able to easily branch into an unfamiliar genre it had never tackled before by heavily leveraging AI technology. The statement explicitly notes that 100% of the source code and visual effects, 60% of the art assets, and 50% of the sound effects were created using generative AI models.
The announcement of this game was met with uniformly negative reactions from the studio's English-speaking fans, many of whom criticized not only the game's visuals but also expressed shock at the extent of AI usage in its development. That said, Mages is not the only Japanese studio with a strong interest in generative AI—a report from last year indicated that 51% of Japanese game studios are experimenting with the technology, and companies like Level-5 have publicly showcased the use of generative assets in their titles.
However, few publishers have gone so far as to directly release a complete game generated almost entirely by AI. It's hard to imagine why players would choose this derivative imitation over the original titles that inspired it. If you're curious enough to try it out for yourself, the game is currently available for wishlisting on Steam, though no release date has been announced yet.