Hasbro is building an AI studio
The toy giant's CEO has previously been vocal about how he wants to infuse the company with AI tools. How will fans respond?
The Gist
According to job listings and LinkedIn announcements I’ve seen, Hasbro is building an AI studio to “change how fans interact with their favorite characters.”
This comes after Hasbro announced a new initiative earlier this year called Playing to Win, with a big focus on digital gaming.
AI use in Magic: The Gathering and D&D materials has sparked outcry from fans recently, but Hasbro’s CEO has been vocal about wanting to infuse the company with the tech.
Wow, two posts in one day! That’s mainly because I forgot to publish last night, so I did first thing this morning. Tonight, I wanted to bring you what I guess I’ll call a “special report” I found very interesting. I hope you do too. Thanks for reading.
It looks like Hasbro is building an internal AI studio, after its CEO previously vocalized his intent to go all in on the technology.
Roberta Thomson, who previously served as the company’s communications chief and is now the CEO of the new studio, posted a job listing on LinkedIn for a principal AI engineer that would be a founding member of the studio tasked to “architect systems that bring magical AI experiences to life through Hasbro's beloved characters.” The link leads to a page with an API test, and describes the role further as: “Coding, prototyping, and shipping daily while establishing the foundation for a new, playful AI-driven platform.”
Thomson described the studio like this: “We’re laying the groundwork for a transformational platform — one that will change how fans interact with their favorite characters, scaling across worlds, franchises, and generations of play.”
Not exactly sure what that means, but the studio appears to be very new and has gone largely under the radar; Thomson announced her move to CEO of the new AI studio last month, and the LinkedIn listing for the engineer role was posted last week.
The “Day in the life” of the engineer role on the LinkedIn listing sheds a bit more light on the role of the AI studio. For fans/consumers, this line stuck out to me: “Bring Characters to Life: Engineer adaptive, safe, and delightful character interactions.” And then there’s this on the API-test page: “Create seamless experiences that blend physical and digital play.”
While the studio seems to be in the early stages, the above descriptions align with Hasbro’s growth initiative it announced earlier this year, Playing to Win. The company has stepped back from being involved with movie franchises based on its properties, such as Transformers, after selling the film studio eOne. Now, it’s focused on “play-focused brands” and its licensing business.
With that in mind, Hasbro talked up its focus on digital gaming, calling it a “high profit, high growth area” where its brands “have proven resonance.” One of the “strategic building blocks” of Playing to Win is Digital and Direct, which involves “Building video games, services, and e-commerce capabilities.”
So I imagine you can see where this is going. Hasbro clearly wants to modernize itself for a digital future, and gaming and AI will be a big part of that reinvention. It’s hardly the only entertainment company feeling that pressure; it reminds me of how Disney struck a deal with Epic to build a virtual universe in Fortnite based on its IP.
If you’re familiar with this newsletter, you’re probably wondering why I’m writing this. Well, I like to cover the dynamics of IP and fandom in a changing entertainment industry, and this would probably be a big development on that front considering Hasbro controls some of the most beloved IP on the planet, including Transformers, Dungeons & Dragons, Magic: The Gathering, Monopoly, and G.I. Joe.
Wizards of the Coast, the publisher of Magic: The Gathering and D&D owned by Hasbro, has already sparked outcry from fans over AI, including after AI art was used in a D&D book in 2023 and when AI was used in Magic marketing materials last year.
Despite the pushback, Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks was vocal about the company’s intentions to get more serious about AI: During an appearance at a Goldman Sachs conference last year, he said that the company had already been using AI in development.
“It's mostly machine-learning-based AI or proprietary AI as opposed to a ChatGPT approach,” he said. “We will deploy it significantly and liberally internally as both a knowledge worker aid and as a development aid."
But he admitted that he’s more excited about “the playful elements of AI.”
"I play [D&D] with probably 30 or 40 people regularly. There's not a single person who doesn't use AI somehow for either campaign development or character development or story ideas. That's a clear signal that we need to be embracing it."
And it’s not just D&D. He added that AI would be used “to streamline new player introduction” and “emergent storytelling” for its other brands.
Are you a fan of Hasbro games and IP? What do you think of AI becoming more of a component of gameplay? Let me know in the comments.
No news roundup tonight since I did that this morning. Thanks for reading!
I see the benefit in embracing AI, because if they don’t they’ll be left behind and have to lean on others who are using AI to keep up.
However, I can see why some might be upset about it, but that being said I don’t see it as a bad thing as long as it’s used in a way that enhances the immersion and experience for fans, instead of being a cheap cop out to create new stories.
Very mixed feelings about this, mostly negative. I understand why, but seems Hasbro is embracing the storytelling, “imagination” side of AI which is soulless.