Streamer says The First Descendant devs ‘stole’ his likeness in AI ads

Online looter shooter The First Descendant has been accused of faking an endorsement from a popular streamer, in an AI-generated TikTok ad.

The growing prevalence of AI continues to be a concern in video game development, especially when it comes to robbing artists and voice actors of their livelihood, but its reliance is being felt in other areas too.

In the case of online looter shooter The First Descendant, AI has crept into the game’s marketing. Last week, AI-generated TikTok adverts for the title began to circulate, which have been ridiculed by the game’s fanbase.

Reddit user iHardlyTriHard posted all the videos on the game’s subreddit, all of which they found by scrolling the ‘For You’ page on their TikTok for ‘about 10-15 minutes’. You won’t find these adverts on publisher Nexon’s official page, because adverts on TikTok are unlisted, so you can only see them while scrolling the general feed.

While all of them appear to use generative AI in some capacity (the questionable pronunciation of ‘NieR:Automata’ is particularly telling), one of the adverts has caught people’s attention for stealing the likeness of streamer DanieltheDemon.

After the adverts were highlighted on GameCentral’s TikTok page, DanieltheDemon confirmed in the comments that he hadn’t given developer Nexon permission to use his likeness.

‘I have no affiliation nor contract with The First Descendant,’ he wrote. ‘They stole my face/reactions from my most viral video and used AI to change what my mouth says and a voice that isn’t mine. I did not consent for my likeness to be used…’

Several fans have claimed the team behind The First Descendant’s TikTok account are deleting negative comments on the adverts. ‘They delete and re-upload the AI ads whenever they get too much backlash in the comments,’ iHardlyTriHard added.

The First Descendant developers Nexon have since released a statement regarding the adverts on its social media channels, claiming it stems from ‘irregularities’ with a TikTok Creative Challenge for creators.

‘As a part of our marketing campaign for Season 3: Breakthrough, we recently ran a Creative Challenge program for TikTok creators, which allows creators to voluntarily submit their content to be used as advertising materials,’ the statement on X reads.

‘All submitted videos are verified through TikTok’s system to check copyright violations before they are approved as advertising content.
However, we have become aware of cases where the circumstances surrounding the production of certain submitted videos appear inappropriate. Thus, we are conducting a thorough joint investigation with TikTok to determine the facts.

‘We sincerely apologise for the delay in providing this notice as the review is taking longer than expected. Once the verification is complete, we will promptly share an update through an official notice.’

It’s unclear if this TikTok Creative Challenge has led to unauthorised uploads of other streamers, or if Nexon is referring to something else which could fall under ‘inappropriate’ circumstances, but it’s a bizarre explanation either way.

The First Descendant is a free-to-play looter shooter in the vein of Destiny and Warframe, which launched in July 2024 across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. After a strong launch, hitting a concurrent peak player count of 264,860 on Steam, its player numbers have fallen dramatically. According to SteamDB, its recent 24-hour peak was 18,064.

This isn’t the first time a developer has received blowback over the use of AI. With Ark: Aquatica being shamed by fans for a very obviously AI-generated reveal trailer.

The team behind The Finals, Embark Studios, were also criticised for using AI text-to-speech tools to voice characters, while Activision has admitted to using generative AI for Call Of Duty assets.

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