Zelnick says AI game cloning isn't a money problem for Take-Two, it's a creative one

Insider Gaming has a piece up where Strauss Zelnick got asked about AI companies cloning games, and his answer is basically that he's not losing sleep over the finances. His worry is the creative side, and he wants AI outfits to respect everyone's IP, not just their own.

Which is a pretty measured take for a CEO whose company is about to ship the biggest thing in the industry. I figured he'd be angrier. But he's been hammering the IP angle for a while now, so this tracks.

why this lands differently with GTA 6 weeks out

Think about what a GTA clone even means in 2026. People have been trying to make one since GTA 3. Nobody's managed it. The thing that makes Rockstar's stuff work isn't the formula, it's the sheer amount of handcrafted nonsense packed into every block. You can't prompt that into existence, at least not yet.

So yeah, Zelnick might be right that it's not a financial threat. The creative point is the one that stings. If AI tools start churning out derivative open world games, the industry gets flooded with stuff that looks like GTA but plays like nothing. That's a culture problem more than a revenue problem.

He wants AI companies to protect everyone's intellectual property, not just their own.

That's the line that stuck with me. Every AI company out there is very protective of its own models while being pretty loose about what went into training them. Zelnick calling that out is fair, and it's not just a Rockstar thing either. Smaller studios get eaten alive by this stuff.

the timing is funny though

He's saying all this while his company is about to drop a game that'll set sales records. Easy to be calm about AI clones when you're sitting on Leonida. Still, I don't think he's wrong. The money follows the craft, and the craft is the part AI can't fake yet.

I'd rather hear him talk about this than another round of release date speculation. At least it's a real conversation about where the industry's headed, even if the answer is basically "we're fine, ask us again in five years."

---

Source: Insider Gaming · Curated content.