2024: Time for a next-gen game engine?
April 2, 2024
Few would contest the potentially major advancements that artificial intelligence promises to offer to our beloved video games – improved visuals, better interactivity, and more personalised experiences to keep players on their toes. But in an age of lay-offs, AI is both scary and unpopular within parts of the games community. Even Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI (creator of the GPT-4 technology) states that “…people should be happy that we’re a little bit scared of this”; so is AI itself a game to approach with caution?
Whilst current conversation – partly thanks to the explosive emergence of OpenAI and ChatGPT – revolves around Large Language Models (LLMs) and the generative elements of AI, artificial intelligence itself is not new. Machine learning has, for decades, allowed computer systems to learn, adapt and to make suggestions and predictions based on data patterns. The recent leap towards current LLM, or NLP, and image-generating diffusion models is significant, but remains an iteration founded upon existing technology, rather than an entirely new conception.
For avid gamers and fans of a deeply engaging, personalised gaming experience, AI offers tangible benefits. FPS giants such as Halo and Call of Duty, for example, have seen a marked upgrade in their NPCs’ roles and behaviours; with machine-learning equipping them with the power to analyse and learn about gamers’ habits and abilities. This means that AI-controlled enemies can then strategise and react according to players’ habits. It makes for a more tactical and exhilarating game than ever, and what go-hard gamer doesn’t want that?
And when it comes to in-game immersion, AI tools that capture and create 3D models and characters are proving key to building an impressive visual experience. The likes of Get3D, Sloyd.ai, and Luma Labs have the power to transform 2D images into “3D masterpieces”, allowing developers to rapidly construct objects that are striking, detailed, and extremely realistic.
Despite its role in creating an enhanced gaming experience, AI remains a potentially scary sidekick to the gaming world’s creators and developers. Understandably, the question of whether highly skilled humans can be wholly replaced by AI technology arises – but as with its other industry-specific applications, a more likely reality is that artificial intelligence expands and augments the capabilities of, rather than replaces, the gaming world’s best people.
Getting any game from conceptualisation to a successful launch will always need a human touch – knowing how to evoke genuine emotion from players, managing complex moral and ethical matters, and ensuring thorough testing are areas where the human brain beats that of AI – nuanced problem solving and fixing those jarring glitches are tasks where relying on the computer just won’t cut it. Not yet, anyway.
The way we see it? A job share where AI takes on the drudge work. As Steve Collins, CTO at King, says of AI; “…it’s a “tool” that’s in the hands of our level designers and our level testers, so they use that to augment what they’re able to do in those spaces. Designers at King use AI in order to initially design a level, tweak the level, and get it to where we want it to be, and then our testers come in, and they use AI to really shake the level out and see if it does exactly what we want it to do.”
As we look to 2024 and beyond, at Mission One we’ve rounded up 3 key spaces where fast adoption of AI will benefit both developers and their players. Perhaps unsurprisingly, these areas are all about maximising retention and ensuring that players are in it for the long haul:
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