Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick had a bit to say at the end of a recent investor Q&A about the use of AI in creating games. The CEO was fairly blunt about his feeling regarding not just the language in labeling AI but also very straightforward in regard to how it should be used versus depended on. It would appear that the staff at Take-Two needn’t worry about AI taking over their jobs, yet, but they also will need to strive for greatness in order to live up to Mr. Zelnick’s praise.
From Strauss Zelnick (via PC Gamer)
“As you know I’m usually a skeptic when others engage in hyperbole, [but] in the case of AI I’m pretty enthusiastic,” said Zelnick. “First of all despite the fact artificial intelligence is an oxymoron, as is machine learning, this company’s been involved in those activities, no matter what words you use to describe them, for its entire history and we’re a leader in that space.”
Strauss went on to say that while it would be nice if AI could make it easier to make hit games that simply isn’t happening and that ultimately it still comes down to the genius of human beings.
“I wish I could say that the advances in AI will make it easier to create hits, obviously it won’t,” said Zelnick. “Hits are created by genius. And data sets plus compute plus large language models does not equal genius. Genius is the domain of human beings and I believe will stay that way.”
Ultimately the message from the CEO is that AI is nothing more than another tool in a game developer’s toolbox and it shouldn’t be depended on to create the game. Recently Ubisoft said it would be using AI to generate dialog in its games and Stardock Entertainment, the developers for Galactic Civilizations IV: Supernova, have used AI to assist players in creating their own civilizations. Meanwhile, it was also mentioned that Take-Two is expecting roughly $8 billion in revenue by FY 2025, versus its most recent report of $5.3 billion, hinting at a possible release of GTA 6 and another project by Bioshock creator Ken Levine called Judas, by then.
Discussion (6 replies)
Join Discussion →Well duh... Wait are video gamr writers part of the Hollywood based writers guild? Ice noticed a few of these.. "were not counting on ai" from game studios lately.
Honestly I don’t care if the game I play was written by AI or ghosts or aliens or underprivileged minorities. I really only care if it’s fun and entertaining.
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I will never understand the EARL that Uncle Phil had spitted not so long ago - "gamers look at us to lead" WTF?!?!?!
This utopia mindset for today's gaming is a cancer and clearly, Phil is losing the battle by going off of MS latest Xbox segment 2Q results.
Phil, and the alike, needs to go... FAST!
I think there is some room for AI to help lighten the load on some of the repetitive non-creative aspects of game development, and I don't have a probem with that (provided they figure out the compensation model for artists work that may or may not have been utilized by the AI) but other than that I tend to agree. I don't see AI making a successful game story from the ground up. You are going to need people for that.
I agree with that but you could use AI to build a gameworld/levels and have them be tweaked/adapted by humans, this could possibly save a lot of time in game developpement.
AI is a game changer for game development, no pun intended. A lot of the work in developing a game is tedious and repetitive like creating hundreds of random NPCs and generic assets. AI is not just capable of doing most of the heavy lifting but also opens new previously impossible options, like in-game NPCs having spontaneous responses to the player. Even actually having a real conversation with an NPC instead of choosing from 2 canned responses to which the NPC also responds in predetermined ways. Imagine every playthrough being completely different based on your interaction with the AI driven NPCs.
Of course the outline of the main story has to be set by a human, but even there AI can be of help.
That's exactly why AI is a tool. Just as robots replaced most workers near assembly lines AI will replace most low level writers and designers in AAA game development.