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Stellar Blade: Blood Rain music video roasted for being “AI slop”
Shift Up has released an AI-generated music video for “Wanna be in Love”, promoting the forthcoming Stellar Blade: Blood Rain, and it has drawn strong criticism from fans. Viewers have described its poor lip-syncing and uncanny visuals as “AI slop”, while the controversy reinforces wider unease about generative AI’s ethics, environmental cost and possible effect on creative jobs.
The developer disclosed that the video’s sound or visuals were altered or fully generated with AI. It also appears to include references to KPop Demon Hunters and Sony, although it is unclear whether these were authorised; Shift Up, rather than Sony Interactive Entertainment, is publishing Blood Rain. The reaction follows earlier criticism of the game’s sexualised depiction of protagonist Evie, and comes amid concern that AI data-centre demand is contributing to higher RAM and gaming hardware prices.
In short
- Shift Up’s AI music video has been widely mocked by Stellar Blade fans.
- The video includes potentially unauthorised references to Sony and KPop Demon Hunters.
- It adds to wider concerns about AI’s impact on games and hardware prices.
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The case for
Companies exploring AI-assisted content creation face genuine resource constraints, and transparency about AI use—as Shift Up demonstrated—represents responsible adoption of emerging technology. Early adoption of any new creative tool inevitably involves quality issues as capabilities mature, and restricting experimentation would slow beneficial development across creative industries. Smaller studios particularly benefit from these efficiency gains, allowing them to produce promotional materials they couldn't otherwise afford, whilst market feedback naturally guides developers towards better implementation.
The case against
This release exemplifies the harms critics warn about: it displaced human creative workers, relied on training data likely gathered without proper consent, consumed substantial environmental resources, and produced demonstrably inferior output that damages the game's reputation. The unclear authorisation of other companies' intellectual property compounds these ethical concerns, suggesting the developer underweighted the consequences of its approach. Rather than enabling sustainable creative work, this normalises a race-to-the-bottom mentality that prioritises corporate cost-cutting over artists' livelihoods, environmental responsibility, and the genuine ethical considerations that innovation requires.
Explained simply
Shift Up is a South Korean video game developer. Stellar Blade is its action game starring Evie, and Blood Rain is a forthcoming follow-up; Shift Up is publishing it, while Sony Interactive Entertainment published the original game.
Generative AI can create or alter images, video and sound from prompts and training data. Its use in entertainment has prompted debate about consent, energy use and how it may affect people working in creative jobs. The new video has also renewed discussion among some fans about how Evie is portrayed in the series.