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PC Gamer
PC Gamer
Andy Chalk

Square Enix, Bandai, and other Japanese studios demand OpenAI stop using their content without permission, drop a not-too-subtle hint about legal trouble if it doesn't

Sam Altman, chief executive officer of OpenAI Inc., during a media tour of the Stargate AI data center in Abilene, Texas, US, on Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025. Stargate is a collaboration of OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank, with promotional support from President Donald Trump, to build data centers and other infrastructure for artificial intelligence throughout the US. Photographer: Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg via Getty Images.

The Content Overseas Distribution Association, a Japanese industry group whose members include Square Enix, Bandai Namco, FromSoftware parent Kadokawa Corporation, and Cygames, has issued a formal notice to OpenAI demanding that it stop using its members content to train its Sora 2 video generation tool without permission.

In a way, it feels like this was bound to happen. The day after Sora 2, the latest iteration of OpenAI's text-to-video technology, went live, PC Gamer's Jess Kinghorn described the system as capable of "spitting out all of the soulless, AI-generated Studio Ghibli-style animation one could ever want." Just a few days later, someone posted a Sora 2-generated video of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman standing in a field with frolicking Pokémon, saying, "I hope Nintendo doesn't sue us."

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