Shift Up recently released the official promotional music MV for “Stellar Blade: Blood Rain”. Unexpectedly, the focus of discussion was not the new characters or the new plot, but the film’s extensive use of generative AI. What’s even more embarrassing is that it’s not just anti-AI players that triggered the backlash this time. Even many “Stellar Blade” die-hard fans have publicly expressed their disappointment. They believe that the official has left its own excellent art and animation team unused, but chose to use AI to produce promotional videos. It is really unacceptable.
Officially confirmed the use of AI, players can see it at a glance!
This official MV titled “Wanna Be in Love” features the sequel’s heroine Evie as the protagonist, depicting her singing and dancing in the future city. However, after the film was released, players quickly discovered that there were many typical traces of AI generation in the character’s movements, expressions and scenes. The credits at the end of the film also confirmed that the work was produced using game materials with AI assistance, and was marked as jointly completed by Shift Up’s Second Eve Studio and AI Labs.
Is this a slap in the face of your own team?
A large number of criticisms immediately appeared on the social platform. Many players bluntly said that the video looked very cheap, and some even described it as “AI Slop (AI assembly line garbage).” Others believed that Shift Up clearly has an excellent character design, art and animation team recognized by the industry, but chose to use AI to produce official promotional content. This is simply a “slap on its own art team.”
Of course, there are also a few players who believe that as long as AI is used as an auxiliary tool rather than completely replacing creators, there will be no big problem. However, judging from the current community response, this MV obviously failed to convince most fans, and even players who were originally looking forward to “Stellar Blade: Blood Rain” were disappointed with the official promotion strategy this time.