The remake of PS1 game Front Mission 3 has replaced its 2D artwork with generative AI images, that have made a mess of everything.
Even before the first Front Mission remake came out, Polish publisher Forever Entertainment committed itself to also remaking the second and third games for the Nintendo Switch.
This was a big deal, since the first two games had never seen a European release (the second game never even left Japan), while Front Mission 3 hasn’t been re-released since the original PlayStation version in 2000.
The first two remakes were fine enough updates, albeit skin deep and just as old-fashioned as the originals, but any excitement for the third has evaporated due to what seems to be AI generated artwork.
The Front Mission 3 remake only launched today but screenshots have already been making the rounds on social media, comparing the remake’s visuals to the original game.
These screenshots come courtesy of RPG Site and when shared side-by-side with the original version, it does appear that a lot of 2D artwork wasn’t simply upscaled to be less blurry but outright replaced.
Aside from background art, photos from the Network (an in-universe web browser that provides extra worldbuilding and lore) have been recreated and the results are frankly horrendous.
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Even without comparisons, a lot of these photos simply don’t look natural, like one man’s bizarre hand gestures or the example at the top of this page, of a soldier holding an already weird looking gun like a camera.
Some of the new images don’t even accurately depict the original illustrations. One especially egregious example is of what’s meant to be a crashed Wanzer, a type of mech in the Front Mission series, being turned into a parked helicopter.
Everything points to the original art being fed into an AI algorithm and, since the originals are blurry and pixelated, creating hallucinations and things that were never there to begin with.
At least we hope that’s what’s happened, because if these were designed by actual humans, with no AI involved, it’d be extra shocking they were ever approved.
There’s no mention of generative AI being used for the remake’s development in the credits and we can’t recall ever spotting AI art in the first remake when we reviewed it. Although that was based on a SNES game, whereas Front Mission 2 and 3 are PS1 titles.
As you can imagine, fans are not happy, with CheeseGX on X describing it as a ‘a new all time low when it comes to video game remakes.’
‘It’s a damn shame to see that the remake team apparently used s***** AI art upscalers to replace a lot of the lower resolution 2D art assets with completely bizarre looking people, tech and landscapes. Definitely won’t be buying this!’ says JCP Designs on Bluesky
‘This isn’t even AI upscaling like I assumed, they went and gen AI’d wholly new images using the originals as a base. Legit worst case scenario outcome for this game,’ adds Matt B on Bluesky.
We’ve contacted Forever Entertainment for clarification on whether any generative AI was used and will update this article should we hear back.
Despite enthusiasm for using generative AI for game development amongst some companies, including Microsoft, it remains an extremely contentious subject with gamers.
Just yesterday, it was discovered the new Everybody’s Golf game, which launches this in September, is using generative AI for leaf and tree textures, which is enough of a dealbreaker for some to swear off buying it.
The upcoming Jurassic World Evolution 3 came under similar fire for advertising the use of AI generated scientist portraits, but fans must’ve kicked up enough of a stink because those portraits will now no longer be included.
‘Thanks for your feedback on this topic. We have opted to remove the use of generative AI for scientist portraits within Jurassic World Evolution 3,’ reads a statement from developer Frontier Developments on the game’s Steam community page.
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