At Thursday’s Independent Games Awards ceremony, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 took home both the Game of the Year and Best Debut honors, but the development team from Sandfall Interactive and publisher Kepler Interactive didn’t get to celebrate for long. On Saturday, the Independent Games Awards rescinded the game’s awards because the game’s launch version included generative AI-generated assets, even though those were quickly removed afterward.

According to the official FAQ on the Independent Games Awards website, the organization said that when the game was submitted for consideration, “a representative of Sandfall Interactive confirmed that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was not developed using generative AI.” However, “given that Sandfall Interactive confirmed on the day of the 2025 Independent Games Awards that generative AI art was used in production, this does disqualify Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.” Even though the AI-generated assets have been removed, their initial presence was enough for the Independent Games Awards to revoke the game’s eligibility and withdraw its awards.

This controversy circulated on social media amid a broader news cycle last week about comments from Larian Studios’ Swen Vincke regarding the use of AI tools in developing the new Baldur’s Gate game. Sandfall Interactive had already acknowledged the use of generative AI during the development of Clair Obscur: Expedition 3 in a pre-release interview. In June, Spanish media outlet El País published an interview conducted around the game’s launch in which producer François Meurisse admitted that Sandfall used a small amount of generative AI in the development process.

“We used some AI, but not much,” he said. “The key was that we were very clear about what we wanted to do and where to focus our efforts. Of course, the technology allowed us to achieve things that would have been unimaginable not long ago.”

The Independent Games Awards has now reassigned the honors to the next-highest ranked games in those categories. According to its website, the Best Debut award will go to We’re Closed, and the Game of the Year honor will go to Blue Prince. The developers of these games are expected to give their acceptance speeches in early 2026.

The above content is compiled by ModeZone, a fashion and entertainment magazine.