There is no doubt that generative AI is being encouraged heavily within Battlefield and EA Sports FC publisher Electronic Arts.
During recent conversations with multiple current and former employees, Vertical Slice was told that, although the company hasn't introduced a hardline mandate, staff are being repeatedly told to leverage a variety of tools including Claude, which multiple people claim is being hoisted on engineers specifically.
Yet, despite corralling its workforce in the direction of the divisive technology, multiple current employees explained that EA is also capping its usage to prevent overspending.
"There's a budgetary cap on generative AI usage but it's opaque," said one person, who chose to remain anonymous. "They cut off your access for the remainder of the month if you exceed it."
Another current employee claimed EA is styling itself as an "AI-first company" while also intently monitoring its usage. They said managers are heralding generative AI as "the future" of video game production, before noting how a co-worker was told to stop using the technology after exceeding a monthly spending limit of $100.
"If you want us to use the technology, then why are you limiting us?" they ask.
When asked how they feel about EA's current generative AI policy, one source said they have "mixed feelings" but feel they cannot push back over fears of losing their job.
"On one level it has accelerated some of my work," they explained. "Other times it goes down a rabbit hole of bullshit. You can't just expect anyone to be able to use [generative] AI competently either. You need some degree of subject matter expertise for it to actually be useful. Ethically, I'm also opposed to generative AI generally, but I don't dare refuse to use it."
It's unclear how much bang for buck EA is getting out of the generative AI tools it has elected to use. Taking Claude as an example, pre-developer costs will vary depending on the type of plan (Pro, Max, Team, Enterprise) the publisher has purchased.
Even so, an explainer on the Claude website notes that "across enterprise deployments, the average cost [for a Claude Code user] is around $13 per developer per active day and $150-250 per developer per month, with costs remaining below $30 per active day for 90% of users."
The paradox facing EA—which claims generative AI is being used to "augment" not replace its employees (thanks, GameFile)—is not entirely dissimilar to the one facing the corporations building those tools.
In part, that's because Anthropic is struggling to contain the rising costs associated with running its business. For instance, it spent $9 billion on computing capacity across the first half of the year, which is more than it spent across the entirety of 2025.
Yet, as noted by CNET, Anthropic's own S-1 filing (a registration document filed before a public offering) notes the company has a "limited operating history in an evolving and nascent industry, which makes it difficult to evaluate [its] future prospects and may increase the risk that [it] will not be successful."
CNET also states that Anthropic's projected revenue "depends almost entirely on enterprise and power usage of Claude models at a time when businesses are feeling burned by token costs and are pulling back on AI usage."
Perhaps then, we have our answer to that headline question.
Vertical Slice has repeatedly approached EA for comment regarding its generative AI policies and its handling of the recent layoffs. We have yet to hear back from the company.
Chris is an award-winning reporter with over a decade of experience covering the video game industry. He was formerly news editor at Game Developer and is currently the founder and editor of this resplendent website.
