The CEO of Stellar Blade's development team asserts that artificial intelligence is crucial for smaller countries as they strive to compete with the substantial workforce resources of China and the United States

Shift Up, the creators of games like Stellar Blade and Goddess of Victory: Nikke, led by CEO Hyung-tae Kim, suggests that nations such as South Korea must embrace artificial intelligence to stay competitive against major players like China and the United States.

During South Korea's 2026 Economic Growth Strategy event, Kim expressed that while Shift Up cannot match the workforce numbers of Chinese firms, AI could bolster their effective workforce and preserve jobs by enhancing the skill set of developers in AI technologies.

According to Kim, the studio allocates about 150 employees per game, whereas Chinese companies invest between 1,000 to 2,000 individuals. This was documented by GameMeca, with insights featured by Automaton via machine translation.

Kim adds that while the topic of AI use is contentious, leveraging generative AI is a potential means for countries like South Korea, which face challenges in content quality and volume, to enhance the efficiency of their developers.

Meanwhile, Belgian game company Larian Studios has indicated they will not utilize generative AI for concept art in their forthcoming role-playing game, Divinity. This comes after co-founder Swen Vincke faced criticism for proposing AI use in the development process. He later clarified that Larian Studios would not replace human concept artists with AI, though they have explored the technology for other purposes.