UPD: so the problems appears to be in AI not being able to hear anything, thus standing still until it can see something.
Happens only in a packaged game (both ship, test and dev).
Works just fine in the editor.
4.25.3, 4.25.4, 4.26.0, 4.26.1
All the same.
The problem seems to be in that “make noise” works on “server only”.
But how am I supposed to use it in single-player game?
It’s obviously possible because it does work in the editor.