The AI boom is "certainly not a fad," Elder Scrolls and Fallout boss Todd Howard says, but Bethesda is "being incredibly cautious" and isn't using it to "generate anything"

Bethesda big boy Todd Howard doesn't think the AI boom is a "fad" and, as such, the studio is "not fully ignoring it." However, he says that the team is "not using it to generate anything," and that he values "handcrafted human intention."

In an interview with Kinda Funny on YouTube, Todd Howard explains his and the studio's stance on AI. "It's certainly not a fad," he says. "I think the AI answer now becomes 'ask me in six months,' right? It changes so much what you're seeing out there. For us, we're being incredibly cautious."

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He goes on to explain how Bethesda is using it, and tracking its advancements for data-led tasks. "[We're] viewing it as a tool, like an analyst [to] look at the data in our games," he explains. "We can't ignore it, in terms of it's coming, it's changing. Every few months there's a new model, particularly on the tech side with code or productivity or other things.

"And I would just say we're looking at that stuff," he continues. "We're not fully ignoring it, because where it can help us get better at some big data tasks that just take us a lot of time, that we wish were done now so we can move onto the creative stuff."

However, he emphasizes that the team isn't using it for the creative side of game development, and doesn't intend to. "We're not using it to generate anything," he says. "I think there's such an element of artistic intention that is essential to what we do and others do. And if you look across [at] things outside of AI [...] go back a hundred years [to] this idea of craftsmen, I still think craftsmen, and that handcrafted human intention, is what makes things special, and that's where we want to be."

He ends his answer explaining that it is still "very, very early days" but it seems that that studio is monitoring AI's progress in the future.

Todd Howard says Elder Scrolls 6 is a return to "classic" Bethesda RPGs like Skyrim, Oblivion, and Fallout 4 after the "creative detour" the studio took with Fallout 76 and Starfield: "We do have a certain style that we like"