"It depends on where AI is used": Players' attitude patterns and evaluative logics toward different AI applications in digital games

TL;DR

This study explores how players' attitudes toward AI in digital games vary depending on the context, revealing factors that influence acceptance or rejection and identifying key evaluative logics.

Contribution

It provides a nuanced analysis of players' evaluative patterns and introduces six logics that influence AI acceptance in different gaming contexts.

Findings

Players accept AI when it enhances immersion and personalization.

Players resist AI that threatens creativity, fairness, or autonomy.

Six evaluative logics influence acceptance: experiential, instrumental, reliability, agency, authorship, oversight.

Abstract

As AI becomes increasingly embedded in digital games, players' attitudes de-pend not only on whether AI is used, but also on where and how it intervenes in gameplay. This study examines players' evaluative patterns toward eight AI application contexts, including intelligent NPCs, emergent narrative, dynamic balancing, recommendation systems, review and governance, art asset generation, co-creation gameplay, and gameplay evolution. Based on 1,856 valid open-ended responses from 310 questionnaires, we conducted thematic analysis to identify reasons for acceptance, rejection, and conditional acceptance. Results show that players welcomed AI when it enhanced immersion, personalization, novelty, efficiency, or convenience, but resisted it when it threatened creativity, emotional authenticity, autonomy, fairness, system stability, authorship, or accountability. We further identify six evaluative logics: experiential enrichment, instrumental efficiency, system reliability, agency and control, authorship and compliance, and human oversight. These preliminary findings highlight the context-sensitive nature of AI acceptance in digital games.