Mojang Rejects Generative AI, Emphasizes Creativity in Minecraft

Minecraft developer Mojang has firmly stated its stance against incorporating generative artificial intelligence (AI) into its game development process. Despite the growing trend of using generative AI in the gaming industry, as seen with Activision's use of AI-generated art in Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 and Microsoft's development of Muse—an AI tool for generating game ideas—Mojang remains committed to traditional human creativity.

During a recent event attended by IGN, Minecraft Vanilla game director Agnes Larsson emphasized the importance of human creativity in the game's development. "Here for us, just like Minecraft is about creativity and creating," Larsson explained, "I think it's important that it makes us feel happy to create as humans. That's a purpose, [it] makes life look beautiful. So for us, we really want it to be our teams that make our games."

Echoing Larsson's sentiments, Ingela Garneij, executive producer of Minecraft Vanilla, highlighted the unique human touch required for Minecraft's distinctive style. "For me, it's the thinking outside of the box part. This specific touch of: what is Minecraft? How does it look? That extra quality is really tricky to create through AI," Garneij said. She further elaborated on the challenges of remote collaboration, noting that face-to-face interaction is crucial for understanding the game's values, principles, ecosystem, lore, and overall scale. "I mean creativity is... you need to meet like this as a person, as a human to really truly understand the values and principles and the ecosystem, the lore, everything. It's so massive Minecraft, it's a planet, it's massive."

Mojang's dedication to human-driven development continues to pay off, as evidenced by the game's record-breaking sales of 300 million copies, making it the best-selling game of all time. The studio is also set to release a new graphics update titled Vibrant Visuals in the near future, further enhancing the game's appeal. Despite its age of 16 years, Minecraft shows no signs of slowing down, and Mojang remains steadfast in its decision to keep the game a paid experience rather than shifting to a free-to-play model. Additionally, the developer has no plans to create a "Minecraft 2," focusing instead on continuously improving and expanding the original game.

For more details on upcoming updates, check out everything announced at Minecraft Live 2025.