Clint Hocking (클린트 호킹), a former director of Ubisoft's historical action-adventure open-world stealth game franchise 'Assassin's Creed', said he used ChatGPT while learning to code but the experience fell short of expectations. He said generative AI could be somewhat helpful as a learning aid, but errors and debugging problems repeated during actual development.

On May 26, local time, IT outlet TechRadar reported that Hocking disclosed his experience using generative AI in an interview in the latest issue of Edge magazine, which looked at the trend of AI use in the game industry. Looking back on the period when he used ChatGPT to learn coding, he described it as "a grueling process".

Hocking said, "ChatGPT was kind of bad," adding, "It didn't seem to really understand the code and almost everything was broken." He said he had to spend a lot of time modifying and debugging AI-generated code, especially when he had no coding knowledge.

He said he tried AI-based coding study for about 18 months. He later stopped using ChatGPT and switched to learning JavaScript. Hocking said he learned coding "in some ways despite ChatGPT," and said he saw generative AI as a limited tutor-like tool rather than a complete solution.

The remarks also tie into debate over how much generative AI can replace actual development work. Code generation using AI and the adoption of automation tools are expanding rapidly across the IT industry, including the game industry, but skepticism is also growing on the ground over the accuracy of outputs and maintenance issues.

Hocking said AI integration itself was a difficult trend to avoid, but at least in his experience there were limits to a novice developer relying on AI for the entire learning process. He stressed that even if AI-generated results looked plausible on the surface, there were many errors at the execution stage and resolving them ultimately required user understanding.

The interview is also drawing attention as it intersects with Hocking's recent career change. He was originally the creative director of Assassin's Creed Hexe, but left the company as Ubisoft formed a new subsidiary, Vantage Studio, based on Tencent funding. It was reported that Jean Guesdon is currently in charge of the project.

Ubisoft also disclosed plans in a recent financial report to expand major franchises over the next several years. The company said it is preparing a large content pipeline centered on the Assassin's Creed, Far Cry and Ghost Recon series. It has been reported that this includes the Assassin's Creed Black Flag remaster project and the mobile game Assassin's Creed Jade.

Hocking's remarks are seen as an example showing the gap between market expectations for AI tools and actual user experience. While generative AI is recognized for its potential to raise development productivity, it has again been highlighted that human verification and understanding are still essential in practice.