Ubisoft Caught with AI-Generated Artwork in Anno 117: Pax Romana – Promises Fix After Fan Outcry

Ubisoft’s latest city builder, Anno 117: Pax Romana, launched with an embarrassing twist: a glaringly obvious, AI-generated loading screen image made it into the final release. Players were quick to spot the telltale flaws; misshapen faces, bizarre proportions, and missing limbs, broadcasting screenshots and frustration all over forums and Steam reviews.

Ubisoft has now confirmed that the image was meant as a placeholder and shouldn’t have shipped with the title, promising to patch it out in the game’s next update. But the backlash is bigger than one ugly loading screen: angry fans and negative reviews accuse Ubisoft of relying on AI tools across both visual assets and translation, despite the publisher’s size and resources.

Ubisoft Responds: “It Slipped Through”

The debate started with a single loading screen image. Instead of a custom piece, players noticed the art had all the signs of cheap AI generation: disturbing facial structures, misplaced body parts, and a sense that no real artist was involved.

One player wryly commented, “If they are going to go with cheap tools in their game, I will wait till the game is cheap,” while another left a scathing Steam review: “I don’t want to live in a future where every big studio… chooses to steal from artists by using AI generated images. AI tools are bad for the environment, bad for the job market, on top of that the images look awful, genuinely an eyesore in a[n] otherwise beautiful game.”

Even after Ubisoft released a “touched-up” version of the image, the controversy didn’t die down. Fans argued it didn’t matter whether the art was cleaned up, it was still rooted in AI instead of real creative work. The community wanted an answer.

Speaking with Kotaku, Ubisoft acknowledged the mistake: “This image was a placeholder asset that unintentionally slipped through our review process. The final image is attached here and will replace the current version of this artwork with the upcoming 1.3 patch.”

The studio went on to insist that Anno 117: Pax Romana is their “most ambitious Anno yet,” involving “the largest team of artists ever for the franchise.” Ubisoft admits its artists use AI “for iterations, prototyping, and exploration,” but stressed, “Every element players will experience in the final game reflects the team’s craft, artistry, and creative vision.”

Accusations of AI-Generated Translations Follow

The AI debate doesn’t stop with just the graphics. Players have uncovered what they say is sloppy, machine-translated in-game text, particularly in the German localization. Reddit user u/Taubenangriff highlighted numerous clunky, awkward phrases, complaining, “Nobody who has ever played an Anno before was let near translation work, and it is still AI generated slop to a large part. They got six million euros cultural (!) sponsorship from the German state, but the result is outright disrespectful to the German language.”

This isn’t a new issue. The same player flagged these translation problems two months before release, raising questions about Ubisoft’s QA and localization pipeline. Despite warnings, the release version still contains language mistakes that feel unmistakably machine-generated.

These accusations hit especially hard because Anno 117: Pax Romana isn’t just another indie experiment. It’s a flagship title from Ubisoft Blue Byte, the team behind a beloved economic city builder series. The game transports players to ancient Rome, promising a grand scale and attention to detail on both PC and consoles. But for many fans, the presence of AI-generated content breaks the immersion and undercuts the artistry they expect from a top-tier publisher.

The controversy has reached the point where Anno 117’s Steam page now carries an AI Generated Content Disclosure, the first time Ubisoft has labeled a game this way. Still, for many angry players and artists, that’s not nearly enough. They’re demanding guarantees that Ubisoft will respect both its creative teams and its audience, and avoid sidestepping human skill in favor of AI shortcuts, especially for a game that wears its historical detail and production values on its sleeve.