House House discloses AI usage in Big Walk after IGF jurors' anti-AI vote
Published 10 Nov 2026 · Games Atlas Editorial · AI Adoption Practice · Companies: House House
Games Atlas summary: House House disclosed AI usage in Big Walk following IGF juror backlash. Nineteen IGF jurors pledged to reject any game using generative AI. House House says under 0.1% of Big Walk's code involved an LLM. The studio calls Big Walk's lack of an AI policy a failure.
How to cite this page
Games Atlas — Games Industry Intelligence (2026). House House discloses AI usage in Big Walk after IGF jurors' anti-AI vote. Published 10 Nov 2026. https://gamesatlas.app/article/house-house-discloses-ai-usage-in-big-walk-after-igf-jurors-anti-ai-vote
The engineering fix behind the disclosure
- Unity URP's shadow culling only worked along the camera's forward axis.
- This bug slowed Big Walk by 50% for 20 seconds at sunrise and sunset.
- A Unity engineer said the fix wasn't possible within the engine.
- An LLM then suggested a fix built into roughly 10 lines of code.
Disclosure rules split code from assets
- Steam requires disclosure of AI-generated assets but leaves code voluntary.
- House House disclosed to the IGF only after public interest arose.
- The studio did not post this disclosure on its Steam page.
- Nineteen jurors' pledge treats any generative AI use the same regardless of scope.
Compliance risk without clear thresholds
- House House admits it lacked an internal AI usage policy for Big Walk.
- The studio calls that absence of policy a failure it will fix.
- "We have some concern that voluntary disclosures like this might contribute to the normalisation of this technology, or its treatment as 'inevitable'." - House House, developer statement
- Platforms and festivals now apply binary disclosure rules without usage thresholds.