AI has been growing at a rapid rate in recent years, leading to the ability to generate massive amounts of content with little effort or research involved. As a result, the products of these AI have usually been easily identifiable and of generally low quality. Metacritic has taken a stand on this by removing alleged AI reviews for games from their site. The most notable of these recently was a review for Resident Evil Requiem, allegedly produced and published by the gaming site, VideoGamer.
A list of factors went into identifying the AI review. Most sources point to this tweet as the catalyst for widespread attention on the otherwise unnoticeable review. In it, the credited journalist for the review, Brian Merrygold, is shown to have alleged evidence that it could be a false online persona. Soon after, more individuals pointed out the typical AI patterns present and that VideoGamer had supposedly laid off most of its writing staff in preparation for a transition to AI-focused content. The overwhelming attention and negative feedback on the review soon led to Metacritic taking a closer look at the content.
Following a thorough investigation by Metacritic themselves, the review was taken down, and ties with VideoGamer were severed. VideoGamer has yet to confirm the allegation that the review or any others are produced by AI, however. Metacritic has stated and demonstrated multiple times its unwillingness to entertain AI-generated content on the website. The presence of the review on Metacritic in the first place have reinvigorated discussion on AI in journalism and review spaces, often leading to calls for better regulation and quality control.
AI is unlikely to become much less powerful or capable of producing written content in the future. It will be up to both journalists and review platforms to ensure that they are only producing and taking in the kinds of content that they want.