Last week, there was some controversy around Party Animals, a casual multiplayer title featuring animals. Recreate Games had organized a video contest called the Golden Paw Awards.
While it was all in good fun and the event started with good intentions, this community-driven contest quickly turned sour. The developers had allowed participants to use generative AI to submit their clips, with the aim of encouraging players who aren’t familiar with editing software to join in.
This sparked a massive backlash on social media. Party Animals even received “very negative” reviews on Steam in protest. The studio ultimately canceled the contest and issued an apology.
“We would like to offer our deepest apologies to all players who have expressed concern, shared criticism, and voiced their opinions — especially to our creator community.
Following the announcement of this event, we received a significant amount of negative feedback. We have read through your comments and opinions one by one. We must admit that our consideration of the event’s conception was insufficient, the design was inadequately thought through, and our communication with the community was not up to par.
Even though our original intention was to encourage more diverse forms of creative expression and lower the barrier to entry, allowing more players who love Party Animals to participate, we mistakenly tied “lowering the barrier” together with “using AI.” In doing so, we overlooked the potential offense and harm that the ongoing debate surrounding AI-generated content could cause to our players and the creator community. We feel deeply uneasy and apologetic about this, and we sincerely accept the criticism.
After carefully considering voices from all sides, we held a vote across our major platforms regarding whether the event should proceed. Based on your feedback and our own internal review and reflection, we have made the following decision:
Effective immediately, the “Golden Paw Awards” event is officially canceled.
To the players who were troubled, disappointed, or offended by this situation, we would like to once again express our sincere apologies. To every player who voiced criticism, participated in the vote, and pushed us to re-evaluate this issue, we would like to express our most sincere gratitude.”
