BuBa Games, the two-person Istanbul studio behind open-world crime game Cartoon Crime, used AI assistance for some pre-generated 2D artwork, text editing, localization and development support, Burhan Doygun of BuBa Games told AIGamer in on-the-record email answers on November 12. He named some menu images and UI icons as art examples, and said creative decisions about the game's world, atmosphere and gameplay stayed with the team.
Cartoon Crime was fully released on Steam on November 3 for $2.99, after an Early Access launch on August 26, according to its Steam page. In the Windows sandbox, players can flip between third-person and top-down views mid-game, take cars, hire bodyguards and evade police, alone or in online co-op.
Doygun said each AI result was only a starting point: the team reviewed it, edited or resized it when needed and compared it with the game's art, and some attempts never made it in. He had no cleared before-and-after example, and no reliable estimate of time or money saved, to share.
The studio built its own engine in C++ and OpenGL. Doygun said the hard part was making missions, interiors, weather and the world itself work together, such as switching from third-person to top-down mid-chase while vehicles and police keep moving. AI helped with development in general, he said, but the team doesn't "have a specific engine component we can attribute to an AI tool."
On disclosure, Doygun said the team wanted its Steam statement to tell players which parts of development had AI help and who checked the results. The store disclosure lists the same four areas and says the developer reviewed, edited and approved all AI-assisted content before including it. "The game doesn't generate AI content during play," he wrote.
Why it matters: Steam asks developers to describe their AI use in their own words, so the level of detail is up to each studio. BuBa's disclosure names the kinds of content involved and the human review step, and Doygun's account matches it, a concrete example for other small teams.
Caveat: the team size, location, custom engine and review process are Doygun's account. AIGamer has not played the game or checked how individual assets were made, and he named no specific AI tools.
In a Steam post on November 3 marking the full release, BuBa Games said it will keep fixing bugs, tweaking the game and adding content.
