Valve Shifts AI Clone Burden to Developers at Steam Indie Connect
Valve representatives Tom Giardino and Marc Wilkinson addressed concerns about AI-generated game clones at the Steam Indie Connect event in South Korea on October 27. Rather than implementing platform-wide bans or protective measures, Valve advised developers to build strong communities and continuously update their games to make them harder to copy. Giardino stated that Valve does not wish to act as gatekeepers for AI tools, while Wilkinson explained that Steam’s visibility algorithms prioritize sales and playtime over wishlist counts. The response follows a trend of AI-driven extortion and cloning, including the viral case of 'Needle in a Haystack Simulator,' which has been replicated so frequently that the original is difficult to identify.