About three in ten of the 1,592 unreleased Steam pages I sampled carry an AI disclosure. Most are short ( the median is 32 words ) and most are about visuals ( 80% ). The ones I would copy name the content, say what a person did to it, and say whether anything is generated while the game runs. A template and three examples come first, then Valve’s rules, then the numbers.
I read Valve’s Steamworks documentation on 23 October 2026 and counted the disclosures with a script. Every percentage in this post is a keyword match over the 465 flagged pages, so a denial such as “no AI was used for the code” counts as a mention. The method and its limits are further down.
A template you can adapt
This follows the two kinds of content Valve asks about, pre-generated and live-generated, which the next section explains. Replace the brackets with what is true for your game, delete any line that does not apply, and keep an optional line only if it holds for every case.
Generative AI helped create [the background images / the music / the narrator’s voice lines / the translations] in this game: [specific items, for example enemy portraits and shop signs]. [Optional, keep only if you did it: This content was reviewed and edited by the developer / by our artists.] [Keep only if true: The game does not generate AI content while you play.]
If AI runs during play, say what it produces:
[Character or system]'s [dialogue / text / images] are generated by AI while you play. [What it produces and what it does not.] [Optional, keep only if true: The rest of the game was made by our team.]
Valve asks about guardrails for live generation in the content survey, and its page does not say whether that answer is shown to players. I would describe what the AI produces in the public text and keep the detail of your limits in the survey ( that is my suggestion, not Valve’s guidance ). If your game has both pre-generated and live content, use both templates.
Three filled-in examples
These are invented to show the structure, not taken from real pages. I left out sentences about what is human-made on purpose, because “all” and “original” are claims one exception makes false. Add one only if it is true for every line, and do not copy an example unless it is true for your game.
Art: “Generative AI helped create some of the background illustrations in this game. They were retouched by our artist. The game does not generate AI content while you play.”
Translation and voice: “The Spanish, French and German translations were produced with AI translation tools and checked by native speakers. The narrator’s voice lines were generated with an AI voice tool. No AI content is generated during play.”
Live generation: “Dialogue for the shopkeeper characters is generated by a language model while you play. It talks about items, prices and town gossip and is instructed to stay on those topics.”
What Valve actually asks you to disclose
Valve’s content survey has three parts. The third is called “Generative Artificial Intelligence Content”. Its scope note reads: “We are aware that many modern game development environments have AI powered tools built into them. Efficiency gains through the use of these tools is not the focus of this section.” What it is about, in Valve’s words, is “the use of AI in creating content that ships with your game, and is consumed by players”, such as “artwork, sound, narrative, localization, etc.”
It splits that into two kinds of content:
- Pre-generated. “Any kind of content that ships with your game and is consumed by players” and “that is created with the help of AI tools during development.”
- Live-generated. “Any kind of content created with the help of AI tools while the game is running.” This one “comes with an additional requirement”: you have to “tell us what kind of guardrails you’re putting on your AI” so the game is not generating illegal content.
Two more lines matter if you are writing yours. Valve says its team “will compare the answers relative to the content in your build and on your store page”, so write nothing you cannot defend. And in its FAQ it says it does not “want to ship Live-Generated AI Adult Only Sexual Content at this time.”
Players see your text on the store page, in a section headed “AI Generated Content Disclosure”, introduced by “The developers describe how their game uses AI Generated Content like this:”. I saw that on live store pages on 23 October. Valve’s survey page does not describe it. Whether AI-written code needs a mention is a question Valve’s page does not answer directly, and the FAQ at the end covers it.
What the clearer ones do, and where the rest go wrong
I judged clarity by one test: could a player tell what was and was not made with AI? These are the habits that pass it.
The clearer disclosures name the content instead of the tool. “Background images and enemy art” tells a player more than “AI tools were used”, and only about 4 to 5% name a product anyway. They also say what a person did to the output. “Selected, adapted and reviewed by the developer” is concrete, and “carefully curated” is not.
About a third ( 32% ) say a person reviewed or edited the output, about half ( 47%, on my broadest word list ) mention some human involvement, and roughly one in six say what a human made, as in “the story and dialogue were written by the author”.
They also say what happens during play. About a quarter ( 26% ) say outright that nothing is generated while the game runs, and a handful describe live generation, for example dynamic NPC dialogue.
A short disclosure is right when the AI use was small. What goes wrong is vagueness: “AI was used for some assets” leaves a player unable to tell whether the art, the music or the story is affected.
Three patterns are easy to count:
- 41 of the 465 ( 9% ) open with the same five words, “Generative AI tools were used”, and about one in five share a five-word opening with at least two other pages. A shared opening is not a defect, since those pages name as many content types as the rest.
- 5% name no content type at all ( “AI assisted.” ).
- 34% use an all-covering word such as “all” or “every”, with 8% going further with “entirely”, “fully”, “completely” or “100%”. I did not check which of those are true, and an absolute is a claim a single exception makes false, so use one only if it holds for every line.
How I counted
I took Steam’s “popular coming soon” search listing ( about 65,000 matches on 23 October ) and drew random pages from its first 40,000 positions, spread across that range so popular and obscure pages both appear. I did it twice, a smaller sample and a larger one that excluded the first, and kept them apart so each could check the other. After dropping DLC, software and pages that failed to load I had 332 games in the smaller sample and 1,260 in the larger.
A page counts as flagged if its English store page has the “AI Generated Content Disclosure” section, and the text is whatever the developer wrote there.
The limits:
- The listing is ordered by popularity, and the least popular 38% is not covered.
- These are unreleased games, so the numbers describe pages and not sales.
- The text on a page may have been written at any time. This is a picture of the pages as of 23 October 2026.
- A page with no disclosure may still belong to a game that used AI.
- The topics are keyword matches, so they are rough, and the word list moves them: visuals come out between 75% and 82% depending on the list, and “any human involvement” between 29% and 55%.
- A flag is yes or no. A page that used one tool for one texture and a page that generated its whole art set look the same here.
- In the larger sample 12 developers appear more than once, so repeated studios barely move the numbers.
How common is it?
The two samples differ by about five points ( p of roughly 0.06 ), which could be chance. Pooled, 29% of the 1,592 pages carry a disclosure ( 95% interval 27 to 31%, assuming a simple random sample ). Sulka Haro’s census of Steam releases says roughly one in three new games carries a genuine, at-submission disclosure by mid-2026. That is a different population, in a similar range.
How long are they?
The median is 32 words, and the middle half runs from 15 to 52. About 14% are ten words or fewer, and 5% pass a hundred.
Haro measured something close on released games. Among AI-flagged titles, those with at least 1,000 reviews had a median disclosure of 22 words, and those he calls flops, with fewer than 50 reviews after at least nine months on the market, had 13. Mine are longer, but I would not read much into that. These pages are unreleased, and Valve’s form changed in January 2026, which may explain part of the difference. I cannot show that.
What do they mention?
Visuals come first by a wide margin, at 80%. 22% mention code, and I did not separate uses from denials, so that number does not tell you how many developers used AI for code. Valve’s scope note makes tools built into development environments “not the focus”, and some developers mention them anyway.
Smaller numbers: 23% mention their store page or marketing assets, and 6% use the word “pre-generated”. Valve asks about live generation in a separate question, so silence in the text may just mean there is none.
What these numbers can’t tell you
They cannot tell you what a disclosure does to sales. Haro did compare wording on released games and found that flops were more often a single line of ten words or fewer ( 35% against 13% for games with 1,000 or more reviews ). That is a correlation among games that already sold or did not, and a short disclosure may be a symptom of a rushed game.
Nor can they tell you how players react. Game Oracle analyzed 9,879 games released between January and October 2025 and, as reported by Notebookcheck, found that comparable games with an AI disclosure received around 52.6% fewer reviews. It counted reviews, not sales, excluded scam and spam releases and outliers as well as free-to-play games, and compares games with and without a disclosure, not clear wording against vague wording. Notebookcheck adds that the weaker performance “cannot automatically be blamed on AI itself”, and speculates that AI may be used more often in projects with tight deadlines or budgets.
Neither study offers a wording that avoids the pattern. What you control is accuracy, since Valve compares your survey answers with your build and your store page. My sample has no outcomes, so treat the percentages as a picture of the text on these pages and not as a benchmark to hit.
If you want the page facts of flagged and unflagged pages side by side, they are in AI-flagged Steam pages, compared. The short description guide and the description writing guide are the next places to look for the rest of the page, and Steam page review: 7 ways, compared covers getting it looked at.
Before you publish
The text you write sits on your store page, next to everything else a shopper sees. Our analyzer does not grade it. It scores capsule, description, screenshots and tags, so if you want those read too, the free run is below. The store page checklist and the optimization guide cover the same ground by hand.
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to disclose AI-written code?
Valve’s page does not say whether AI-written code that ships counts. Its scope note excludes efficiency gains from tools built into development environments, and Game Developer, reporting Valve’s January 2026 clarification, says developers do not have to disclose “AI powered tools” used “for workflow efficiency”, such as code helper software. That is the article’s paraphrase, not Valve’s text.
Valve’s section also says: “If your game used AI services during development or incorporates AI services as a part of the product, this section will require you to describe that implementation in detail”. That line sits right after the one saying efficiency gains from built-in tools are “not the focus”, so the page leaves open how it applies to AI-written code that ships. If code is the only AI you used, the scope note and Game Developer’s report suggest you may not need a disclosure. If the code produces content or behavior players see, or you are unsure, ask Steamworks support and keep the reply.
What about AI inside assets I bought or a contractor made?
Valve’s wording is about content that “ships with your game and is consumed by players”, so AI-made content inside a bought pack or a contractor’s work plausibly counts. Its page does not address third-party assets directly. Ask Steamworks support and keep the reply.
Does concept art or reference that never ships count?
By the same wording, content that does not ship is outside the definition, but Valve’s page does not say so in terms. Check with Steamworks support if the line is unclear for your project.
Does it cover my store page art and trailer?
Game Developer reports that when AI creates content, the disclosure applies to the game “alongside associated material like marketing assets or the store page”. That is the article’s wording and Valve’s survey page does not repeat it, so confirm in the form. Trailers are not mentioned. Separately, Valve says its team compares your survey answers with your build and your store page. 23% of the 465 disclosures mention store page or marketing assets.
Can players filter out games with AI disclosures?
Kotaku reported on 16 October that “you cannot even filter new release lists to remove games with AI declarations.” I did not check other Steam filters.