Japanese Online Game Developers Ditch ChatGPT for Gemini and Claude

One hundred percent of Japanese online game companies now use generative artificial intelligence, and the most widely used tool is Google Gemini, not ChatGPT. That is the finding of the annual report from the Japan Online Game Association, published on July 10, 2026, which shows how the pecking order of AI models used in Japan's game industry has shifted within a single year.

New Leader in a Year

The Japan Online Game Association has been surveying Japan's online gaming market continuously since 2004, making this year's edition the 22nd in the series. The survey covers only games that run online, regardless of device, excluding console titles, PC productions, and offline modes in mobile games.

Just a year ago, ChatGPT was the most frequently cited AI tool among Japanese studios, with 59 percent of responses. In this year's survey, the OpenAI model no longer ranks among the top three, having been replaced by Gemini, Claude, and GitHub Copilot. That kind of reshuffling rarely happens so quickly in the market for AI tools used by developers and game creators.

How Studios Use AI

According to the JOGA report, generative AI at Japanese gaming companies is used above all for analytical tasks. The most commonly cited application is analyzing player preferences and predicting their behavior, which directly informs design decisions around gameplay, monetization, and user retention.

Some studios also turn to AI for repetitive tasks and data tracking, aiming to free up human teams for creative work. The report does not indicate that AI is being widely used to directly create graphics, music, or game scripts, which sets the Japanese market apart from some Western studios experimenting with generating assets.

Player Concerns

The JOGA report also includes a survey of players themselves, who report unease about AI's growing role in game production. The most frequently cited concerns are the risk of copyright infringement in games made with generative AI, and the fear that future titles will grow increasingly similar to one another if studios come to rely on the same models and similar prompts.

Global Context

The scale of AI adoption in Japan fits into a broader trend in the gaming industry. Jack Buser, the Google Cloud executive responsible for the gaming sector, has pointed out that discrepancies between various surveys stem partly from companies' reluctance to publicly admit they use AI.

Nine out of ten developers said in last year's survey at Gamescom that they were already using it - Jack Buser, Google Cloud's gaming director

The JOGA ranking is one of the first surveys this precise, showing not just the fact of AI adoption but also which specific models are winning the industry's internal competition. Unlike many self-reported surveys, the Japanese report provides concrete percentage shares for individual tools, making it possible to track market shifts year over year.

The broader takeaway is that similar reshuffling could affect any industry using AI tools, not just gaming. A year ago, ChatGPT was the default choice for many development and creative teams; today, competitors like Gemini and Claude increasingly win out on cost and quality comparisons, especially for analytical tasks and integration with existing cloud tools.

The JOGA report does not specify exactly how many companies took part in the survey or what sampling methodology it used, which limits direct comparison with global market studies. Still, the overall direction, a shift away from ChatGPT toward Gemini and Claude within a single year, matches signals from other markets, where pricing and cloud integrations are starting to influence AI vendor choice more than brand name alone.