Take-Two CEO: AI Won't Be Able to Create Hits, Cites Games Like It as "the Domain of Human Beings"

Take-Two Interactive's CEO claims that AI won't make creating hit games any easier, claiming that such a feat falls under "the domain of human beings."

[shinoff2183]

Good to hear. Just stay true.

[CS7]

Lol. I’d like to revisit this article in 5-10 years.

This is the stuff of legend.

Its like Microsoft laughing at the iPhone in 2007.
Teachers protesting the use of calculators in schools.
Blockbuster saying that people love the “in person video rental” experience

He is essentially advocating for the horse over the automobile.

AI in gaming is coming. Anyone thinking it isn’t really isn’t paying attention.

Tell me this does a game world where every single NPC has unique lines and personality, they move in believable ways and never repeat the same thing twice sound appealing to you? You can have seamless conversations with anyone that changes based on what is happening in the game world/story?

What about an immersive open world where every interior is explorable, unique interiors and detailed and intricate exteriors. Planet size.

How bout an open world game that realistically models earth. In its entirety. And has an actual story and quality gameplay.

How about true branching paths in games where you actions genuinely can make a drastic difference in the story. Where no two players ever get the same ending.

All these things are practically impossible without embracing AI assisted game development. It would cost millions just in voice acting alone.

Don’t be shortsighted. AI game development is here already and getting bigger and bigger each month. Humans would still be involved but we’ll be able to create much bigger and grander things that make older games pale in comparison.

[fsfsxii]

There is a certain, 'je ni sais qoui' when it comes to developing games. Look at unity asset flip games, its always a rush job with no effort whatsoever, lacks the sauce per se.
A lot of game devs claim that theoretically, games shouldn't be possible, especially big budget ones, because essentially its a mixture of every artform into one. Its a miracle they come out with something resembling a functional product worth cultural value.

[Lightning77]

The only problem is if you want true dynamic AI NPC's and ever evolving world based off AI worlds that's changes, adapt, grows, or deteriorates based off of what the player does it'll have to be always online to feed the AI or algorithm based on player choice, preference, unlocks, story branches etc. You would 100% need to be online in order for that to work.

The only thing I can think of that comes close to what you're talking about is Elder Scrolls and Fallout games. NPC's have cycles of sleep, wake up, shop, eat then sleep or something along those lines or they'll go up to you for help. Impressive back then bit rudimentary and predictable now.

Maybe they advance those thing in Starfield but they also said they have procedurally generated content but hopefully Starfield comes close to what you're saying but I don't think so at least not at that advance level yet. Anyway the only way for that to happen you'll need to be always online. Devs feeding the AI and algorithm with info and tracking everything you do constantly in order for that to work.

[Number1TailzFan]

Nonsense, plenty of experts who actually know what they're talking about and have first hand knowledge of coding disagree.

It's just the usual "time to crap on AI" rubbish from the clueless folk.

[shinoff2183]

I'd rather not see ai come in and take people's jobs. Their ain't nothing rubbish about that. You can't even go to a store these days without having to check yourself out, guess this depends where you live but it still holds.

[Number1TailzFan]

That's exactly why the guy is against it, it will take people's jobs for certain tasks, maybe not everything. But it seems to be the common reason from those who rubbish it. And if some want to waste time instead of having their productivity greatly enhanced by AI tools in certain areas then that's their choice.

And for those who think an AI can't be like a person in a robot body, It's coming, even John Carmack thinks so.

[NotoriousWhiz]

Instead of trying to take away people's creativity, let's use AI to do the jobs others don't want to do. I want some AI drones to come cut my grass for me.

[SullysCigar]

BT - the company responsible for 95% of the landlines and much of the broadband in the UK - has just announced that they're laying off 55,000 people over the next 7 years. They also confirmed that many of those jobs are being replaced by AI.

Be careful what you wish for and understand the consequences. It's not 'cool' to be cautious of AI, it's wise.

[CS7]

What is unwise is baseless ‘caution’. What is your ‘caution’ doing.

AI is coming whether you like it or not. If we slow down, someone else would make it. The technology is here.

Either we reform society and adapt of people suffer. ‘Caution’ is not posting internet comments or making head in the sand comments like this CEO is doing.

AI games are coming and studios need to prepare.

[SullysCigar]

^ @CS7, way to bite down on a single word and completely misinterpret a point. People need to be aware that AI can cost them their employment, as per the example I outlined. I have personally been responsible for automation in the past, usually as part of a cost-cutting strategy for various corporations - but this is a different beast entirely and it's moving at an alarming rate.

I'm not a particular fan of Elon Musk, but even he has openly called for a halt to AI advancements in order that a review can be carried out and appropriate regulation can be put into place. Change is important, but it needs to be managed and carefully paced.

AI's impact could have negative ramifications, not just positive ones. That's my point. We all understand that NPCs might be more realistic or fun to interact with - and that's great - but it goes much further than that outside of gaming. Corporations will want to steam ahead, but the outcomes may not be so great for the average Joe.

[excaliburps]

No. There is so much to games than just coding. Storytelling, world building, gameplay flow, etc all are factored in.

[Shane Kim]

AI is something relativly new. You think it's going to stay stagnant? Give it time and it will probably create entire games.

[CS7]

@ShaneKim

Apparently the guys on here know nothing about AI.

Right now chatGPT can come up with anentire unique game story with characters and dialog and describe gameplay systems.

Midjourney can generate concept art in seconds that it would take humans hours to develop.

UE5 is increasingly adding AI tools.

Imagine these tools in 10 years.

AI gaming is coming and it would be a benefit to gaming. Probably the biggest paradigm shift to gaming since 3D.

[ravens52]

AI is fine for technical aspects but it'll never be able to emulate human emotions. Some of the greatest games are in that category due to the emotions it draws from the player.

[CS7]

Bro, you need to go and spend some time on 2023 AI systems.

I uses the resources of practically every written thing on the internet ever and is able to synthesize based on that.

AI can write likely a better story than you with all your emotions today. Imagine in 10 years.

[CS7]

For reference, I asked ChatGPT to write a game story for me. I told it pretend like the directors of TLOU, MGS, George RR Martin & Nolan were making a game. Here it is below. (Please imagine this technology in 10 years.

Title: Shattered Echoes

Game Type: Single-player, Third-person Action-Adventure with RPG elements, and strong emphasis on narrative, decision-making and time manipulation mechanics.

The Story:

In the year 2073, a global cataclysm known as "The Shattering" distorts the fabric of reality, creating a world where time isn't linear. This event fuses past, present, and future into a chaotic, unpredictable existence. Humanity learns to adapt to this new world, constructing makeshift societies around "Stable Zones," rare areas unaffected by The Shattering.

The protagonist, an enigmatic character named Kai, emerges with no recollection of their past. They possess an unusual ability to manipulate the "Echoes," fragments of time and reality left behind by The Shattering. This power allows them to navigate through time fractures and influence past events to shape the present and future.

Kai's journey starts in the sprawling mega-city of Avalon, a Stable Zone turned into a dystopian society controlled by a ruthless corporation called Chronos Corp. They claim to work on restoring the world to its pre-Shattering state but at a high cost for the people, maintaining control through oppressive measures.

Kai becomes entangled with a rebellion faction known as "The Eternals," who suspect Chronos Corp of exploiting The Shattering for their ends. They believe Kai's abilities can expose Chronos' true motives and free Avalon. But as Kai delves deeper into the conflict, they begin to unravel the truth about their forgotten past, the origins of The Shattering, and their connection with Chronos Corp.

Gameplay:

Shattered Echoes is an amalgamation of unique storytelling and innovative gameplay mechanics. Players take on the role of Kai, exploring Avalon and beyond, from the gritty dystopian cityscapes to remnants of ancient civilizations stuck in time-loops, and eerie future landscapes where humanity has become an echo of its past self.

Combat is intense, grounded, and strategic, with an extensive array of weapons and tools from different eras. Kai can use their Echo abilities to manipulate time during fights, creating tactical advantages or altering the course of battle.

The RPG elements come in the form of abilities and skills that can be enhanced throughout the game. Decisions made during gameplay have a direct impact on the storyline, allowing for a diverse range of narrative paths and multiple endings.

One of the core gameplay mechanics is "Time Fracture Investigations." These involve Kai using their powers to reconstruct Echoes, letting them witness past events and gather valuable insights. Depending on how these time fractures are resolved, different narrative and gameplay paths open up, giving the game a high replayability factor.

[Lore]

Are you out of your mind?? Take-Two’s CEO is literally one of the smartest individuals/executives in the gaming industry.

[DarXyde]

AI is actually the Boogeyman people are making it out to be.

If you think for a moment that corporations would not terminate as much of their workforce as possible in favor of AI that can do it for free—without needing to worry about their aspirations, families, benefits, etc.— that's misguided. If we're being honest, labour is really the only leverage people have left.

Mark my words, the rate in which Microsoft is focused on this shit, they will shift development to an AI wherever possible to keep development costs low and make Game Pass extremely profitable. At the cost of their workforce, absolutely.

One day, Sony and Nintendo may follow suit, but definitely Microsoft in the near future. AI is genuinely a threat. In a perfect world, AI works alongside people to make their lives easier and demand less crunch. But in reality, it's all about profit and those people's lives are going to be upended.

[goldwyncq]

AI won't surpass human creativity until they actually gain true sentience which isn't happening any time soon, if ever. Right now, AI is just a bunch of algorithms cobbled up together designed to imitate human response.

[JackBNimble]

Have you seen AI created art ?
And we're just in AI's infancy, give it 10 or 20 years and it will be impossible to ever know what is created by humans. Actually that time line is probably closer to 5 years

[CS7]

@Jack

These guys are stuck in the past. I dont think they understand where AI is today.

[Number1TailzFan]

@JackBNimble Indeed, and the use of reference images to create minor variations or similar art. Half the people here have probably never used or seen the AI tools spoken of, as they're likely using a phone and not a PC. I could go make an interactive visual novel/game in a short amount of time and am going to give it a go in the next couple of months as I have some experience with Clickteam products to do it.

[JackBNimble]

You must be a bot

[XiNatsuDragnel]

Great to hear this.

[Vits]

Yeah, wait and see.
Some of the most popular games out there could totally be created by an AI: Third person + Action + Cinematic set pieces + Easy to Digest Plot + Simple Puzzles + RPG Elements + Hand holding.

The recipe itself is pretty easy. Yeah also helps to reduce costs and keep the game code cleaner. So I would be really surprised if we don't end up seeing games partially or totally created by AI in a couple of years. The main question is if the publishers will tell the public or if we will just guess by the number of layoffs.

[potatoseal]

"The domain of human beings"

Well, some human beings are greedy AF... like you.

[MetalNCarnet]

I'm betting that this won't age well.

[jambola]

Thank you 65 year old man with no expertise in ai

[Nebaku]

AI is an emerging technology. Very few if anyone, could be called an "expert" at it.

[MIDGETonSTILTS17]

They could pump out shitty AC and CoD annual iterations… and people would buy them for at least 3 years before sales would decline

[staticall]

Personally, i think in the next 3 years at least nothing like that will happen. If ever.

Current AI (actually just a neural network) are amazing but very limited and only good at one thing pretty much. NN forgets what you were talking about if the dialog is long enough. They can start repeating themselves or changing characters/dialog.
You can't feed them too much information all at once (hence, they can't keep the whole plot in mind yet). You'll need editors and a lot of them. It's much cheaper to have good writers and use this "AI" to generate some texts to save time (dialog lines with heavy editing, location description with editing, etc).

What also people don't keep in mind is similarity and copyright. Copilot, ChatGPT and Codeium gave me some exact code pieces from existing libraries, without a care for copyright. That might lead to a ton of problems for a company, unless every line of code will be checked, that takes resources and time. It might get fixed later, of course, but you can never be 100% sure, it'll be a nightmare to fully rely on AI.
If you notice, 99.9% of "AI"-generated art is kinda similar looking. Mass adoption of NN in art generation will lead to same-y looking assets in games.
This will also be a nightmare to copyright and defend in court. And companies need to protect their assets. Laws needs to be adjusted and that alone will take years. If someone generates a model for a game and it turns out to be, for example, very-very similar to Geralt of Rivia from Witcher 3, guess who's going to court? Or what might happen with YouTube's ContentID if your assets look similar to other game assets? Not fun.

And data sharing/privacy concerns. Do you want your game plot to be available and re-used as learning part for other devs? Don't think so. Or someone having character model too similar to yours? It's a court case waiting to happen. And you always share your data (what you input, what you get in response) with the "AI" developers.

The only solution to all of this i see is home-trained NN. But that's a huge dump of resources - training and running your NN. Not to mention how much energy it consumes. You'll need at least a few huge dedicated team that will:
Prepare datasets
Test generation results and fix problems
Update datasets to incorporate new results
And that's a separate teams for story, images, models, code, etc. All will be separate NNs.

Does that mean that i think all "AI" is bad? Of course not! It's amazing if you're using it right. Generate some project description or resume text? Great. Make a crazy funny image quickly? Great. Add documentation to code or generate some simple piece of code? Again, it's great at that. Parsing text with NLP (searching for address in a paragraph of text, for example)? Great too.
But trying to use an AI for everything will only lead to quality drop and eventual downfall. And if the end result/quality is less than perfect, it will only lead to frustration and negativity. Like, try this new artificial support at the bank or your cell provider (or YouTube, or Google, for instance). It's a mess, they're wasting your time, repeating the same answers and going in circles, mixing up details; they're rarely helpful.
This will also happen in games (if current games quality is anything to go by).

P. S.: Sorry for the rant, it's kinda all over the place.

[anast]

AI is already way ahead of what we are being told. And obviously most gaming publishers down care about quality.

[nmbr1esq]

He's delusional...

[hotnickles]

You look at the art and architecture of centuries ago and I would say he’s right. Amazing things with intricate detail chiseled out of marble. In modern times the AI has a better chance of creating that stuff than humans do. Our architecture is “sterile prison” now and our mindset reflects that.

[anast]

This means they are going to keep the people AI can't replace and get rid of everyone else.

[Babadook7]

AI will definitely play a roll. But humans will obviously play a big roll too. When AI can literally do it all look out.

[vTuro24]

AI is coming for every job in existence. Some sooner than others. To think otherwise is just being in denial.

[anast]

The three people that down voted you are not very bright.

[CobraKai]

I know one thing. If AI generates human created things like the all the character designs and art designs, not to mention completely replacing real voice actors, I’m not buying that game. Shoot I already skip past those AI generated images.

[AmUnRa]

You al know that kids in school using AI to wright a script for making a test?
When this goes on people will get dumber and AI wil get smarter...is that what you AI worshippers want?

[The-VG-shamman]

I’m seeing many comments defending the A.I approach. And it’s honestly very sad and degrading considering these games absolutely need human input. Don’t forget that A.I was created by humans. Although it is automated and saves a lot of integrity tests, it will never operate on its own command or initiative. Also don’t forget that most content inside the A.I has been collected over time. To the new audience it might be convincing or look good. But to anyone with basic level programming its simply a gimmick. The market won’t last if we make A.I generated products the sole focus,

[sadraiden]

AI could be amazing as a tool to aid developers produce games with unprecedented scale and complexity, but an entire game made by AI? Putting good devs out of work? No thanks.