🎮 "It must not become exploitation of anyone, anywhere." That was Masahiro Sakurai, the creator of Kirby and Super Smash Bros., talking about generative AI on stage at the Famitsu 40th Anniversary Fes on November 7, 2026. For now, he added, "we make better things by thinking for ourselves." Both lines show care for people outside his own work, and confidence in his own.

"Exploitation of anyone, anywhere"

The talk was a launch event for his new book, Sakurai Masahiro no Game ni Tsuite Omou Koto Final ("Masahiro Sakurai's Thoughts on Games: Final"), released the day before, on November 6. It collects 69 columns from his long-running Weekly Famitsu series, which ended in November 2021, plus 4 new ones.

According to Famitsu's write-up, Sakurai isn't using generative AI in his role as the person who comes up with the ideas. He doesn't use it as a brainstorming partner either. He hasn't used it in his past titles, the magazine reported, including Kirby Air Riders, released on November 20, 2025.

On AI in graphics, he said the technology "still hasn't earned trust" and that it "must not become exploitation of anyone, anywhere." Famitsu's article doesn't say who he thinks would be exploited. The Japanese word he used, dokoka ("somewhere"), seems to reach beyond any one party to people who aren't in plain view.

Abroad, that word is already at the center of the fight over AI in games. The US actors' union SAG-AFTRA walked out on game companies on July 26, 2024, demanding protection from AI. PocketGamer.biz's headline described the union's fear as "flagrant exploitation." The strike ended on July 9, 2025, when members ratified a new contract with AI protections. Sakurai didn't mention any of this.

The confidence to think for yourself

"For now, we make better things by thinking for ourselves" comes with a qualifier. Still, he has weighed the two and is betting on his own team's thinking.

On the same stage, asked what great creators have in common, Sakurai said there's no common trait. If one word ties them together, he said, it's "sensitivity." According to Famitsu, he pointed to the microphone in his hand. One person might notice how beautiful the black of its handle is; another might wonder how it carries sound. What matters is seeing what isn't there and having a point of view that's yours alone. Sensitivity, he added, "can be cultivated, I think."

In an interview with Denfaminicogamer published on October 16, 2026, he made a similar point. AI draws on "what has been made so far," he said, but cannot draw on "what doesn't exist yet." (We covered that interview in our story on the Game Designers Award.)

He's also a creator who doesn't hand off the thinking. The new book includes excerpts from his 200-page design document for Kirby Air Riders. Famitsu says it shows the finished game was already vividly imagined at the planning stage in July 2021. For his YouTube series Masahiro Sakurai on Creating Games, which ended in October 2024, he wrote every script himself and finished shooting all 256 videos between October 2021 and April 2022. It cost about 90 million yen (roughly $570,000) and earned nothing. Sakurai called it "an investment to make future games even a little better."

Still, "doing nothing probably won't do either"

None of this means Sakurai rejects generative AI. Looking at the industry as a whole, he said "making games today is just too hard." Some titles end up in the red even after selling millions of copies. Famitsu wrote that he also has a sense that clinging only to a no-AI stance could leave you falling further and further behind. So "doing nothing probably won't do either," but where and how to use it is complicated, and nothing can be said for certain yet. For now, he said, it's "a slow-paced relationship."

That hesitation goes back a year and a half. In an interview published by ITmedia Business Online on April 18, 2025, he said large-scale games now take too much work to be sustainable, and that "the only effective breakthrough I can think of at this point is something like generative AI." In June 2025, a machine-translated summary spread abroad, and many read it as Sakurai cheering AI on. Kotaku reported on June 23 that an AI translation had missed the nuance. Game translator Thomas James wrote on Bluesky that the remark "doesn't at all come across as a full-throated endorsement."

Famitsu's report quotes the stage talk in short fragments. It isn't a full transcript with the surrounding context. Pull out only "exploitation" and "thinking for ourselves," and Sakurai looks anti-AI. Pull out only "the only effective breakthrough," and he looks like a booster. Both are parts of the same person, still working the question through.

Where Japan's game makers draw the line

Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto spoke at a press conference on October 22, 2026, held after his selection for Japan's Order of Culture. He said he separates "making" from "doing the work." According to Denfaminicogamer's transcript, the more AI does the work, the more it becomes "a chance for everyone to think seriously" about what making really means. (More in our story on Miyamoto's Order of Culture.)

Capcom, in an investor Q&A published on March 23, 2026, said it will not put generative-AI assets into its games, while actively using AI to make development more efficient. (See our story on Capcom's AI strategy.) Square Enix announced on November 6, 2025, a target to automate 70 percent of QA (quality assurance) and debugging by the end of 2027. Level-5 drew heavy criticism for using AI-generated video in its September 10, 2026 online showcase, LEVEL5 VISION 2026 II, and president Akihiro Hino apologized on September 12.

Sakurai hasn't yet decided where and how he'd use it. But two conditions are already on the record: don't let it exploit anyone, and keep doing the thinking yourself.

For gamers in your country, what would be the non-negotiable condition for using generative AI in games?

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