Papers, Please creator Lucas Pope says he no longer reveals what he’s working on in case it’s stolen or ‘slurped up by AI’

April 7, 2026 - 03:18

Lucas Pope, the acclaimed independent developer behind genre-defining hits like Papers, Please and Return of the Obra Dinn, has adopted a new policy of complete secrecy regarding his current work. He cites a dual concern of having his ideas stolen by other developers or, more pressingly, having them "slurped up by AI" as primary reasons for his silence.

Pope expressed a growing wariness about publicly discussing any concepts or mechanics in development. He fears that revealing details could allow generative artificial intelligence tools to absorb and repurpose his creative work, effectively diluting the originality of his projects before they even launch. This stance reflects broader anxieties within the creative community about the use of copyrighted material to train AI systems without consent.

Alongside these modern concerns, Pope also acknowledged the classic pressure of following up on past success. He humorously noted the challenge of trying to "make lightning strike" a third time after the massive critical and commercial success of his previous titles. This combination of protecting intellectual property from both human and algorithmic imitation, while living up to his own legacy, has led him to develop in isolation for the foreseeable future. Fans, while undoubtedly eager for news, will likely have to wait until a project is fully realized before learning what the inventive designer has been crafting behind closed doors.