Taiwanese developer Rayark, most well known for creating the Cytus series of rhythm games, has released a statement on social media denying that they were firing their artists in order to replace them with AI.

In their statement, Rayark says that they have not fired any of their artists and that these rumors were based on mistranslations or misinformation spread across social media.

They do however also state that they are looking to research and make use of AI generation technology as well as recruit “[staff] members with AI expertise” as they are “preparing for the challenges of the upcoming era of AI-generated content”.

Regarding the discussions about Rayark’s use of AI, we would like to clarify the following:

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The rumor that “Rayark is using AI technology in its artistic works and laying off its artists” is entirely false.

Please refer to the following image for the complete public statement. pic.twitter.com/eZq4OYV5Oh

— 【公式】Rayark (@RayarkOfficial) May 27, 2023

This statement was made in response to rumors that Rayark was using AI to create art in their games. The evidence gathered over social media includes an analysis of recent key art for their game as well as a Chinese Yahoo News Article from earlier this month, May 2023.

In this article, Rayark Chief Technology Officer Zhiyuan Zhong praises AI-generated art, saying that those that cannot accept the change of AI technology may lose their competitiveness and that it is a “natural evolution” for the gaming industry.

Most who follow me do not know Korean

Basically Rayark fire all their artists and replaced with ai
Everything being put out is of poor quality now
Last pic is former employee angry at Rayark

Rayark is company behind cytus 2 and deemo
Do not buy Rayark games https://t.co/ucCB6vWZJZ

— 소금PPC 🔞미술🔞 (@SaltPPC) May 25, 2023

Despite the official statement saying that they will not be firing artists, many online users are still critical of Rayark for wanting to further research AI Art generation, believing that such actions will prompt the use of AI over real artists in the future.

“Does Rayark even understand how AI works”? asks user itsukarine in a reply comment. “Experimenting with it is still exploiting everyone around you. The data driving these plagiarizing algorithms are the very fuel for them. You cannot use AI without first exploiting creators, period”.

“We haven’t laid off any artists now, we are looking into technologies that will prepare us to lay them off later,” says user sn00zer_wfg in another reply.