The Witcher voice actor Doug Cockle has expressed caution and frustration at the growing presence of artificial intelligence within the video game industry, calling it "inevitable" but "dangerous".
Damn. You just made me realize some of the scope of background interest - that’s the sort of thing that Skyrim, GTA V, and Cyberpunk 2077 like to claim about NPC’s existing in a living breathing world on their own schedules.
You ever think about all the lives of the individuals next to you on the freeway? How all their lives are as complicated as our own? We don’t have that in games right now because it’s so complex and needlessly complicated for so little return.
But man, imagine a Shadow of Mordor connected NPC world. Friend groups, rivals, coworkers, bar patrons, they all have individuality that could affect other elements of the social game.
And yeah, current tech isn’t exactly good enough to propose a… David Cage roguelike, or whatever. Or GTA: Dwarf Fortress. Having those systems running all the time would be ridiculous, and worse, boring. But offline LLMs are definitely good enough to backfill details for any characters you do interact with. Like how Shadow of Mordor opportunistically promotes generic NPCs to rivals. Someone you drive past once doesn’t need a whole backstory and social network. But if you run them over, the game can give them a whole family, made-up on the spot. That part’s pretty easy. Making it interesting is the trick - and even if motives and consequences are shallow dice rolls, a modern chatbot can dress them up convincingly.
Damn. You just made me realize some of the scope of background interest - that’s the sort of thing that Skyrim, GTA V, and Cyberpunk 2077 like to claim about NPC’s existing in a living breathing world on their own schedules.
You ever think about all the lives of the individuals next to you on the freeway? How all their lives are as complicated as our own? We don’t have that in games right now because it’s so complex and needlessly complicated for so little return.
But man, imagine a Shadow of Mordor connected NPC world. Friend groups, rivals, coworkers, bar patrons, they all have individuality that could affect other elements of the social game.
“Sonder” is the two-dollar word.
And yeah, current tech isn’t exactly good enough to propose a… David Cage roguelike, or whatever. Or GTA: Dwarf Fortress. Having those systems running all the time would be ridiculous, and worse, boring. But offline LLMs are definitely good enough to backfill details for any characters you do interact with. Like how Shadow of Mordor opportunistically promotes generic NPCs to rivals. Someone you drive past once doesn’t need a whole backstory and social network. But if you run them over, the game can give them a whole family, made-up on the spot. That part’s pretty easy. Making it interesting is the trick - and even if motives and consequences are shallow dice rolls, a modern chatbot can dress them up convincingly.