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The use of artificial intelligence in the development process of games is a possibility that we might see soon, as a lot of time and effort goes into making a game, and studios are more than willing to share some of their load with AI.
The use of generative AI would be most helpful with one-liner NPCs, as a lot of time and energy goes into specifically going through each character, which usually bottlenecks the development process. Larian Studios faced a similar roadblock during the making ofBaldur’s Gate 3. This made Swen Vincke, the founder and director of Larian Studios, more open to the idea of working with AI in the future.
Swen Vincke shares his thoughts on the future of AI
Vincke has a grounded approach toward the use of AI in the video game industry, but he sure is open-minded about finding the right balance between human effort and AI for a collaboration to take place between the two without making AI the boss.
Larian Committed a Mistake in Baldur’s Gate 3 Swen Vincke Has Vowed to Not Make in the Next Game
He is a big advocate for keeping AI away from creative endeavors and shares his thoughts on its potential use in the future, reflecting on the problems they faced duringBaldur’s Gate 3’sproduction. He said:
So, we certainly don’t see it as a replacement for developers. But we do see it as something that allows us to do more stuff. So there are things like – I talked about the quantity of cinematic notes that we had to handle [in the GDC talk]? We had this thing for the one-liner NPCs.
There’s not a lot of creative accomplishment to be had by putting the camera on a singular NPC that only has a couple of notes – I’m very happy for AI to handle that. We’re not going to do that for the very complicated scenes because there, the artistry is going to shine through.
He wishes to use it only to complement what’s already present and believes with all his heart that it will never be able to take over the creative aspect of development. He said:
It is a tool that we use to help us do things faster. We have so much work that we’re happy to take assistance from anything. I don’t think it’ll ever replace a creative side of things and I can put money where my mouth is.
Vincke has a modern and practical approach toward AI; as opposed to the traditional viewpoint of discarding AI altogether, he sees in it an opportunity to make games faster and help decrease the unnecessary workload of his employees.
The visionary outlook of Vincke
When asked about all the things he would like to do with AI in the future, Vincke said:
Where I see use it for is – but this is really not there yet – is to augment the reactivity and dialogues. So you would, for instance, have writers and a scripter and cinematic designer, and everybody that goes with it, you would have them make their entire scene, and then you would augment some reactivity into it, to things that you’ve done before.
So it is about, for instance, let’s say it’s a guard talking about a murderer that is free in the city. We don’t have to foresee all of the possible people that you could have killed in the NPC[‘s lines], but they could be talking about that, right?
And say if it’s like multiple people, they could say, “Oh my god!” and it’s like, literally a serial killer. And then if you arrive there as a player, that would feel good, right? But you would still lace that into your overall web.
In another interview with IGN, addressing the same question, heanswered:
I think you can have reactive games and that’s where it can have a place. So you can compliment what’s there already. So that’s the thing that we should be exploring because how we’ll make better RPGs. So what I think is, in the future, I don’t buy the full NPC being generated, but most likely everything will feel the same.
So I buy more that there’s going to be something that’s crafted, and then you’ll have AI that plugs into it to augment it. And it should be done in such a way that it’s invisible, so you don’t know that it’s shifting around. So I think that’s the thing of the future. At least the short to midterm future. Long term, I don’t know.
What the future holds for AI in the video game industry is still not completely transparent, but some visionaries like Vincke already have plans to use it to their advantage without hindering the purity and creativity of making a game.
Swen Vincke’s Baldur’s Gate 3 Morning and Evening Routine Was So Obsessive It Would Have Broken Anyone Else
AI, if used as an efficient tool to work over already-established things and labor-intensive tasks, can do wonders for the industry by helping developers work more smoothly and freely, which can sow the groundwork for more creativity to flourish.
Anupam Lamba
Articles Published :574
Anupam Lamba is an avid gamer and film lover. After completing his bachelors in Mass Communication he started working as a writer in the Indian film industry before his love for gaming made him venture into the lanes of Fandomwire and he started working as a gaming writer here.
