Epic Games has delayed a shooter tied to Disney’s $1.5 billion investment and directed its developers to generate code and artwork with AI, GamesIndustry.biz reported on 12 October.
Key points
- The unannounced Marvel and Star Wars shooter had been scheduled for March 2027 and has no new release date.
- Developers were told to use tools including Anthropic’s Claude, with staff overseeing the output.
- People familiar with the project attributed its slow progress partly to Epic underestimating the staff and time required.
- Disney took an equity stake in Epic in 2024 as part of a $1.5 billion investment and a partnership covering multiple games.
Disney’s $1.5 billion investment and the shooter
The unannounced game features characters from Marvel and Star Wars. It had been scheduled for March 2027 and has no new release date, Kotaku reported, citing Bloomberg. Kotaku attributed the delay to slow progress and understaffed teams.
People familiar with the project told Bloomberg that Epic had underestimated both the number of developers and the time the shooter would require. The revised production approach therefore reaches a project already running behind its planned schedule.
Disney invested $1.5 billion in Epic in 2024 for an equity stake. The companies also announced a partnership spanning multiple games, with the shooter expected to come first. Its delay puts the initial game in that partnership beyond its planned March release window.
Epic said in March 2026 that it was cutting 1,000 jobs, citing slowing engagement in Fortnite in part. People familiar with the Disney project separately attributed some of its schedule problems to Epic’s assessment of the staff it needed.
Claude enters Epic’s code and art workflow
Developers were instructed to adopt an AI-first production model using tools including Anthropic’s Claude, people familiar with the project told Bloomberg. Staff would oversee the tools’ output. The instruction covers work on a game being developed for release, rather than a separate experiment with AI tools.
One of the game’s directors told staff in an internal message that there would be “no more hand-written code”, according to GamesIndustry.biz. The director also said the artwork would be “generated with full AI workflows”.
Epic communications director Jake Jones said that the company was “embracing AI-accelerated development, led by Epic developers who are the visionaries and creative drivers for everything we do”. His statement places developers in charge of the work even as the instructions shift code and art production towards AI tools.
Epic was already encouraging the use of AI across its divisions. The instruction to the Disney game’s team goes further: it applies to both code and artwork for a particular title whose development has fallen behind schedule.
Epic developers heard the change by video call
Developers learned of the change on a video call during the week preceding 12 October, people familiar with the project said. Some were stunned. The account places the new workflow decision after work on the shooter was already under way.
Staff raised questions about how errors in AI-generated work would be handled and expressed doubts that the approach would succeed, Quartz reported. Those concerns concern the output developers have been instructed to supervise.
In a 2026 GDC poll, more than a third of game developers said they used AI, and more than half considered the technology detrimental to the sector, according to GamesIndustry.biz. The Epic instruction concerns a production workflow for an entire game, including its code and art.
Google launched Playground for making browser games with AI prompts, AI Affairs previously reported. Epic’s planned use of AI concerns a shooter in its partnership with Disney, with staff assigned to oversee the generated work.
