The announcement of Halo: Campaign Evolved at Halo World Championships 2025 was met with mixed reactions among fans of the IP. While some players are extremely excited about Halo finally coming to the PlayStation 5, others were entirely underwhelmed by the fact that multiplayer won’t be included. But the announcement has also sparked a debate over the game’s use of AI, and recent statements from Halo Studios have some players deeply concerned.

In a Rolling Stone interview with Halo Studios regarding the release of Halo: Campaign Evolved, developers offered clarification about their use of AI in the game, stating that “people make games,” but that generative AI “should be additive to the creation of a game” and “the boundary lines can get a little fuzzy.”

The statement has sparked a wave of backlash and confusion among players (via Reddit), with some players like aphilipnamedfry saying, “I dont see what the problem is,” while other players like gravityabuser speculate that “this vagueness means they absolutely used more than the Photoshop autofill tool.”

Halo: CE Remake’s AI Use Sparks Debate Among Fans

The announcement of Halo: Campaign Evolved at Halo World Championships 2025 was one of the most hyped-up events of the year, with rumors swirling earlier this week that the legendary IP would finally be making its way to the PlayStation 5. Players had largely mixed reactions to the announcement, from sheer excitement to complete disappointment over the lack of a multiplayer feature.

But in a Rolling Stone interview with Halo Studios, developers offered up clarification regarding rumors fueled by Rebs Gaming (via YouTube) that AI would be heavily used in the development of all future Halo projects. Halo Studios offers a somewhat nuanced argument about its use of AI, making sure to highlight that humans are at the center of the creative process.

However, when asked if content “players would see or hear in the game was made with generative AI,” Halo Studios’ response has sparked doubts among the player-base. Players such as Iggy_Slayer argue that when the studio could have offered up a simple Yes or No response, they instead responded with the following:

“It’s a tool in a toolbox, but some of that gets very challenging when we look at how integrated AI is becoming within our tooling. We use Photoshop. There’s generative fill, for example. The boundary lines can get a little fuzzy… [but] it really is about that creative spark that comes from people and improving just overall workflows.” —Halo Studios

The statement raised more questions than it provided answers, so much so that Xbox reached out to the interviewer again to clarify that, “there is no mandate to use generative AI in our game development, and that includes Halo: Campaign Evolved.”

Fans Aren’t Sure If Halo Studios Is Doing Anything Wrong

AI Is A Complex Issue That Can’t Be Generalized As A Bad Thing For Video Games

The use of AI in Halo: Campaign Evolved is a complicated topic, and the debate really is more about the general use of AI in video games across the board. Halo Studios’ messaging on this issue in the Rolling Stone interview isn’t exactly superb. However, as evidenced in discussion of the interview, many gamers understand that AI cannot be generalized as a universally bad thing, and in fact the use of AI at some level is inevitable.

Ultimately, it doesn’t appear that Halo Studios is using generative AI to replace human creative work, which is what most people think is happening when they hear the Halo: CE remake is relying “heavily” on AI. Much of this backlash is rooted in a misunderstanding of how AI is used in practice during the development of games. Halo: Campaign Evolved is sparking an important conversation about AI in video games, even if that wasn’t Halo Studios’ intention.