🔍 Read the full analysis: AI Game Cloning Raises Questions About Intellectual Property on ThorstenMeyerAI.com
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TL;DR
Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said AI companies should protect others’ intellectual property as well as their own, responding to a question about Anthropic’s rule against recreating specific games with Claude Code. He said game cloning was a creative concern, not a financial threat to Take-Two; no specific cloned Take-Two game or public response from Anthropic or OpenAI was identified in the source material.
Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick said AI companies should protect other people’s intellectual property as well as their own, after an interviewer asked about Anthropic’s rule against using Claude Code to recreate specific existing games. Zelnick called the prospect of AI-assisted game copying a creative concern rather than a financial threat to Take-Two. The interview also discussed piracy and the company’s upcoming release Grand Theft Auto VI.
In a phone interview published by IGN on November 9, 2026, managing editor Wesley Yin-Poole asked Zelnick whether he welcomed Anthropic’s new restriction and wanted OpenAI to adopt a similar measure. Zelnick replied: “I think all companies should be protecting intellectual property, their own and everyone else’s.” He added that it seemed “ironic” for companies in the intellectual-property business to “stomp on someone else’s IP and hope that yours is protected.”
The exchange does not identify a particular AI-generated game, a Take-Two title that has been copied, or a specific act by either company. The discussion echoes Anthropic’s limits on game cloning. The question named Anthropic and OpenAI; Zelnick did not describe a product or case, and did not specify whether his criticism concerned what users make with AI tools or how AI models were developed. The interview’s preceding question described hackers using AI to clone games and asked about an unofficial PC version of GTA VI. Zelnick said he did not see that as a financial threat to the business, but did see a creative concern.
Anthropic’s Claude Code instruction, introduced in version 2.1.317 on November 2, tells the model not to create a recreation of a specific existing game using its name, characters, art, music, levels or overall look, even if the result is renamed or presented as original. Anthropic grounds the restriction in its usage policy against infringing third-party intellectual property. OpenAI’s published usage policies also prohibit attempts to infringe others’ intellectual-property rights, but the source says it found no game-specific instruction in the open-source code of OpenAI’s Codex CLI agent.
AI coding agents and existing games · as of Nov 14, 2026
Prompt in, game out: where the line runs
Three example requests (illustrative, not real cases) and what each vendor’s published rules say about them.
- Example request
“An original racing game with my own art”own idea, own assets
Claude Code (Anthropic)AllowedRule text: build original games and games from the user’s own designs and assets
Codex / policies (OpenAI)No objectionNothing in the published usage policies against it
- Example request
“A heist game with mechanics like [a named hit]”a game named as a reference
Claude Code (Anthropic)Allowed since v2.1.317Builds an original game in that genre, per Anthropic
Codex / policies (OpenAI)No game rule foundNo game-specific instruction in the Codex CLI code
- Example request
“Rebuild [a specific game], just rename it”a copy under a new name
Claude Code (Anthropic)Not allowedCovers its name, characters, art, music, levels or look; offers to build something similar
Codex / policies (OpenAI)General IP banUsage policies bar attempts to infringe IP; no game-specific rule found
Outside the tools: Take-Two says it relies on its own “technical defenses” and “legal activities”. Copyright and trademark law apply whichever tool writes the code.
The requests are our own illustrations. The rows summarize published rules, not tests of how the tools behave. ChatGPT’s and Codex Web’s server-side instructions are not public.
Sources: Claude Code program text, versions 2.1.317 to 2.1.325, and Anthropic’s statement of Nov 4, 2026 (via Tom’s Hardware); OpenAI usage policies, version effective Nov 20, 2026 (Internet Archive copy of Oct 28, 2026); Codex CLI repository on GitHub, checked Nov 14, 2026; Take-Two fiscal Q2 2027 earnings call, Nov 9, 2026.
Graphic: Powered by Thorsten Meyer AI
How Game Cloning Could Affect Publishers
The issue involves two related but distinct matters: copyright and other intellectual-property rights, and the ability to reproduce or distribute a playable game without authorization. A coding agent’s instruction can set limits on what the tool should help produce, but it does not by itself determine whether a particular output infringes a right or how that restriction is enforced.
AI tools may enable users to imitate recognizable game elements or undertake projects that previously required more time and technical skill. Zelnick described the concern as one involving the creative experience, including the experience developers intend players to receive. He also said Take-Two did not consider game cloning a financial threat to its business. His comments describe the company’s stated position and do not establish that copying has caused measurable losses.
The comments raise questions about whether AI companies apply their intellectual-property rules consistently. Both companies’ published policies contain broad protections, while the available material describes a more specific game-recreation instruction for Claude Code than for Codex CLI. That comparison does not establish how either system responds in every use or whether its policies prevent infringement in practice.
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The Interview and Existing Rules
The IGN interview was published the evening Take-Two reported results for the quarter ended September 30, 2026. The discussion began with piracy and the prospect of an unofficial GTA VI release on PC. Zelnick said Take-Two had historically been protected by factors including game file sizes, piracy’s technical complexity and connections to company servers. He also acknowledged that piracy would become “more of a challenge”.
On the company’s earnings call that day, Zelnick said Take-Two was “enhancing our technical defenses and enhancing our legal activities appropriately.” Those remarks address the publisher’s response to piracy risks generally; they do not confirm that a particular AI tool has been used to copy one of its games.
The source distinguishes Anthropic’s rule from the interviewer’s description of it as a measure against reverse engineering. The published Claude Code instruction is about making a recreation of a specific game. It does not expressly refer to reverse engineering or decompilation. The interview and earnings-call remarks therefore cover overlapping but different issues: AI-assisted recreation, piracy, and technical attempts to reproduce games.
“I think all companies should be protecting intellectual property, their own and everyone else’s.”
— Strauss Zelnick, Take-Two Interactive chairman and CEO, in an interview with IGN published November 9, 2026
What the Remarks Do Not Establish
The source reports no public response from Anthropic or OpenAI to Zelnick’s remarks as of 21:30 UTC on November 14. It also does not establish that either company’s products were used to clone a Take-Two game, or that any such copy has reached players.
Zelnick did not define what he meant by “stomp on someone else’s IP.” The phrase could refer to user-generated outputs, the development or training of AI systems, or another issue; the interview does not resolve that point. It is also unclear how Anthropic’s instruction is enforced in practice, how comparable requests are handled by OpenAI’s tools, and what legal analysis would apply to any particular game-inspired output.
Finally, the interview’s references to cloning, reverse engineering and decompilation should not be treated as interchangeable. Anthropic’s cited instruction specifically concerns recreating a named existing game and its distinctive elements. The source provides no technical evidence that it blocks reverse engineering or decompilation more broadly.
Publisher and AI Policy Responses
Take-Two has said it is strengthening technical defenses and pursuing legal activity as piracy becomes more challenging. The source does not give a timetable for those steps or identify a new policy or legal case prompted by the interview.
Further developments to watch include any public clarification from Anthropic or OpenAI about their game-related safeguards, and any additional detail from Take-Two about how it addresses AI-assisted copying. Until then, Zelnick’s comments remain a general statement about intellectual-property protection, not an allegation tied to a named game or a confirmed incident.
Key Questions
What did Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick say about AI game cloning?
He said companies should protect their own and others’ intellectual property. He described AI-assisted cloning as a creative concern, not a financial threat to Take-Two.
Did Zelnick accuse Anthropic or OpenAI of cloning a Take-Two game?
No specific accusation appears in the reported interview. Zelnick did not name a cloned game or identify a particular act by either company; the interviewer introduced the companies in a question about their policies.
What restriction did Anthropic add to Claude Code?
The instruction tells Claude Code not to make a recreation of a specific existing game using elements such as its name, characters, art, music, levels or overall look, even if the recreation is renamed or described as original.
Does OpenAI have a game-specific rule in its coding agent?
OpenAI’s usage policies prohibit attempts to infringe others’ intellectual-property rights. The source says it found no game-specific instruction in the open-source code of Codex CLI; that finding alone does not establish how the tool handles every request.
Has Take-Two confirmed that an AI tool copied one of its games?
No. The source does not identify a confirmed AI-generated copy of a Take-Two game or report financial losses from such copying.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
