Valve offers to investigate AI copycat extortion threats on Steam
The company kept its hands-off policy on development tools, while urging studios to build communities and continually improve the original game.
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Valve has invited developers to report extortion emails threatening to use artificial intelligence to copy their games and launch the imitation first, after the issue was raised at a private Steam Indie Connect event in Seoul on Oct. 27.
Tom Giardino, of Valve’s Steam Business team, said the reports were the first instances of this kind he had heard about. He described them as closer to a matter for law enforcement than for a games platform, but said: “If you report such cases to us, we want to look into them and help in whatever way we can.”
The warning presented to Valve was explicit: “If you don’t pay, we’ll copy your game with AI and release it first.” PC Guide separately reported that some indie developers had received such messages. It identified Sini_Ming, a developer of the coming-soon cooking tycoon and life-simulation game “Spookitchen,” as among those affected; its developers removed a previously free Steam demo after receiving threats.
The intervention did not change Valve’s wider refusal to prohibit particular AI development tools. As our Oct. 27 report covered, Valve has rejected AI-tool bans in favour of improving how games are discovered on Steam. Giardino said the company did not want to become a gatekeeper deciding which tools developers may use.
Instead, Valve urged studios to make their legitimate releases more valuable than a clone. Its advice was to cultivate player communities and trust, and to keep adding features, personality and creativity rather than relying on a single mechanic that can be readily copied. The company acknowledged that this takes time and offers no automatic protection.
Giardino said game cloning predated generative AI, but that the technology had accelerated production. Developers at the event said AI-generated games and knockoffs were making it harder for original projects to stand out and find an audience. About 17% of Steam Next Fest demos disclosed generative-AI use last year, according to IGN, while this year’s event hosted more than 8,000 demos.
Valve said Next Fest gives games effectively random recommendations for its first two days before shifting to personalised suggestions based on player activity. Marc Wilkinson acknowledged the trade-off: lower-quality games can receive exposure, and staff are considering how to address that problem without restricting developers’ access to Steam.
A separate dispute over stolen game code led to the removal of a copycat from Steam, PC Guide reported. The outlet distinguished that allegation from the copying of ideas, which it said is not itself illegal; the case was identified as the “Needle In A Haystack” saga, a dispute involving competing accusations of copied material.