AI this, AI that - you can't go anywhere without something trying to force AI on you. Usually a company trying to get you to buy into what they've wasted billions on. So indie devs have begun fighting back with their No Gen AI Seal.
Not sure how to interpret this. The use of any tool can be for good or bad.
If the quality of the game is increased by the use of AI, I’m all for it. If it’s used to generate a generic mess, it’s probably not going to be interesting enough for me to notice it’s existence.
If they mean that they don’t use AI to generate art and voice over, I guess it can be good for a medium to large game. But if using AI means it gets made at all, that’s better no?
As a dev and foremost artist, I can see using AI to uprez images or to generate random slop you can use to find interesting shapes and as inspiration.
As I learn programming, AI is very useful in finding mistakes. Instead of spending days and bothering people or engaging with the assholes at stackoverflow, you can just ask deepseek what is the issue and it will say you misspelled length.
I’d argue that even if gen-AI art is indistinguishable from human art, human art is better. E.g. when examining a painting you might be wondering what the artist was thinking of, what was going on in their life at the time, what they were trying to convey, what techniques they used and why. For AI art, the answer is simply it’s statistically similar to art the model has been trained on.
But, yeah, stuff like game textures usually aren’t that deep (and I don’t think they’re typically crafted by hand by artists passionate about the texture).
I am for the most part angry that people are being put out of work by AI; I actually find AI-generated content interesting sometimes, for example AI Frank Sinatra singing W.A.P. is pretty funny. This label is helpful to me so that I know I’m supporting humans monetarily.
Like a horror game that uses an AI to just slightly tweak an image of the paintings in a haunted building continuously everytime you look past them to look just 1% creepier?
•Ok, I know the researching ability of people has decreased greatly over the years, but using “knowyourmeme” as a source? Really?
• You can now run optimized open source diffusion models on an iPhone, and it’s been possible for years. I use that as an example because yes, there’s models that can easily run on an Nvidia 1060 these days. Those models are more than enough to handle incremental changes to an image in-game
• Already has for awhile as demonstrated by it being able to run on an iPhone, but yes, it’s probably the best way to get an uncanny valley effect in certain paintings in a horror game, as the alternatives would be:
spending many hours manually making hundreds of incremental changes to all the paintings yourself (and the will be a limit to how much they warp, and this assumes you have even better art skills)
hiring someone to do what I just mentioned (assumes you have a decent amount of money) and is still limited of course.
• I’ll call an open source model exploitation the day someone can accurately generate an exact work it was trained on not within 1, but at least within 10 generations. I have looked into this myself, unlike seemingly most people on the internet. Last I checked, the closest was a 90 something % similarity image after using an algorithm that modified the prompt over time after thousands of generations. I can find this research paper myself if you want, but there may be newer research out there.
You can now run optimized open source diffusion models on an iPhone, and it’s been possible for years.
Games aren’t background processes. Even today, triple-A titles still sometimes come out as unoptimized hot garbage. Do you genuinely think it’s easy to pile a diffusion model on top with negligible effect? Also, will you pack an entire model into your game just for one instance?
I use that as an example because yes, there’s models that can easily run on an Nvidia 1060 these days. Those models are more than enough to handle incremental changes to an image in-game
Look at the share of people using an 1050 or lower card. Or let’s talk about the AMD and Intel issues. These people aren’t an insignificant portion. Hell, nearly 15% don’t even have 16GB of ram.
it’s probably the best way to get an uncanny valley effect in … a horror game, as the alternatives would be:
spending many hours manually making hundreds of incremental changes
hiring someone to do what I just mentioned
What are you talking about? You’re satisfied with a diffusion model’s output, but won’t be with any other method except excruciating manual labor? Your standards are all over the place—or rather, you don’t have any. And let’s keep it real: most won’t give a shit if your game can show them 10 or 100 slightly worse versions of the same image.
Procedural generation has been a thing for decades. Indie devs have been making do with nearly nonexistent art skills and less sophisticated tech for just as long. I feel like you don’t actually care about the problem space, you just want to shove AI into the solution.
I’ll call an open source model exploitation the day someone can accurately generate an exact work it was trained on not within 1, but at least within 10 generations.
Are you referring to the OSAID? The infamously broken definition that exists to serve companies? You don’t understand what exploitation here means. “Can it regurgitate exact training input” is not the only question to ask, and not the bar. Knowing your work was used without consent to train computers to replace people’s livelihoods is extremely violating. Talk to artists.
I know the researching ability of people has decreased greatly over the years, but using “knowyourmeme” as a source? Really?
I tried to use an accessible and easily understandable example. Fuck off. Go do your own “research”, open those beloved diffusion models, make your scary, then scarier images and try asking people what they think of the results. Do it a hundred times, since that’s your only excuse as to why you need AI. No cherry-picking, you won’t be able to choose what your rube goldberg painting will look like on other people’s PCs.
Would the feature in that horror game Zort where you sometimes use the player respon item and it respons an NPC that will use clips of what a specific dead player has said while playing count as AI use? If so, that’s a pretty good use of AI in horror games in my opinion.
It’s all virtue signaling. If it’s good, nobody will be able to notice anyway and they’ll want it regardless. The only reason people shit on AI currently is because expert humans are still far better than it.
We’re just at that awkward point in time where AI is better than the random joe but worse than experts.
The only reason people shit on AI currently is because expert humans are still far better than it.
Not it’s not! There are a whole bunch of reasons why people dislike the current AI-wave, from artist exploitation, to energy consumption, to making horrible shitty people and companies richer while trying to obviate people’s jobs!
You’re so far off, it’s insane. That’s like saying people only hate slavery because the slaves can’t match craftsmen yet. Just wait a bit until they finish training the slaves, just a few more whippings, then everyone will surely shut up.
I agree that those are reasons people give for their reasoning, but if history has shown anything, we know people change their minds when it becomes most convenient to use a technology.
Human ethics is highly dependent on convenience, unfortunately.
Most games (pre-ai at least) would use a brush for this and manually tweak the result if it ended up weird.
E.g. if you were building a desert landscape you might use a rock brush to randomly sprinkle the boulder assets around the area. Then the bush brush to sprinkle some dry bushes.
Very rare for someone to spend the time to individually place something like a rock or a tree, unless it is designed to be used in gameplay or a cutscene (e.g. a climable tree to get into a building through a window).
That’s only for open world maps, many games where the placement of rocks and trees is something that’s subject to miniscule changes for balance reasons.
One of my favourite games used procedural generation to create game “art”, “assets”, and “maps”.
That could conceivably be called (or enhanced by) ML today, which could conceivably be called AI today.
But even in modern games, I’m not opposed to mindful usage of AI in games. I don’t understand why you’re trying to speak for everyone (by saying “people”) when you’re talking to someone who doesn’t share your view.
This is like those stupid “non-GMO” stickers. Yes, GMOs are being abused by Monsanto (and probably other corporations like them). No, that doesn’t mean that GMOs are bad in all cases.
Different tools with different costs and different outcomes.
Both have replaced human labor, why are bringing up costs? No one’s mentioned that, gotta use fallacies to justify the hypocrisy? The outcomes the same. Use less human labor to make art.
But sure justify one while decrying the other, hypocrite.
What do you think grammarly is dude? Glorified spell and auto check, which people already utilize everyday. But of course new tools are looked down upon, the hypocrisy of people is amazing to see. It comes in cycles, people hated spell check, got used to it and now it’s prominent in every life, autocorrect, same thing is happening.
And now the same is happening again. If they want to claim no ai, no spellcheck, no auto correct, and no grammarly for emails. Everyone already uses “AI” everyday. But theirs is acceptable… okay…
Ok but why do you think it’s okay to use a wrecking ball for a task that requires a chisel? You’re creating low quality high cost work just because it’s fast and easy.
People ALREADY use an llm for spellcheck, and it’s acceptable, yet this crosses a line…? You say people won’t use one… yet it’s already been a thing for years, your ignorance is i ionic as shit here.
It’s always funny what people will find acceptable, but also balk at when it’s fundamentally the exact same thing.
Of these devs want to claim “no ai” and everything is human, than they can’t rely on spellcheck either. Both are automated tools no?
So, if a machine makes the ‘art’, its not art? So photographs are not art. The hubble telescope,or any space probe for that matter, doesnt produce art.
Art is something that provoke emotions and expression in its observers and not produced naturally. Machines are built by people and require non-random inputs to produce something thefore anything those machines produce is art.
Photography is absolutely art. Humans put a lot of thought and intent into what and how they photograph and how they process and exhibit the photos.
I’d say that some stuff like JWST images definitely count as art, and some such imagery is far more technical and research focused than purely emotional. Maybe some visually boring but scientifically significant images aren’t artistic to laypeople. Nuance here is totally fine.
I vehemently disagree that all machine output is art.
And whos to say generative art doesnt receive a lot of thought and intent in producing something worthwhile?
Sure, you could let the machine spit out whatever garbage purely from random inputs, and that is not art as there is zero guidance or intent. But anyone that used generative ai knows you have to guide it to get anything worthwhile out of it. And even then, very likely require manual touchups to correct mistakes.
Not sure how to interpret this. The use of any tool can be for good or bad.
If the quality of the game is increased by the use of AI, I’m all for it. If it’s used to generate a generic mess, it’s probably not going to be interesting enough for me to notice it’s existence.
If they mean that they don’t use AI to generate art and voice over, I guess it can be good for a medium to large game. But if using AI means it gets made at all, that’s better no?
As a dev and foremost artist, I can see using AI to uprez images or to generate random slop you can use to find interesting shapes and as inspiration. As I learn programming, AI is very useful in finding mistakes. Instead of spending days and bothering people or engaging with the assholes at stackoverflow, you can just ask deepseek what is the issue and it will say you misspelled length.
I’d argue that even if gen-AI art is indistinguishable from human art, human art is better. E.g. when examining a painting you might be wondering what the artist was thinking of, what was going on in their life at the time, what they were trying to convey, what techniques they used and why. For AI art, the answer is simply it’s statistically similar to art the model has been trained on.
But, yeah, stuff like game textures usually aren’t that deep (and I don’t think they’re typically crafted by hand by artists passionate about the texture).
Are GEN_AI bookshelves a slippery slope or slopp that artists want to avoid?
I am for the most part angry that people are being put out of work by AI; I actually find AI-generated content interesting sometimes, for example AI Frank Sinatra singing W.A.P. is pretty funny. This label is helpful to me so that I know I’m supporting humans monetarily.
People want pieces of art made by actual humans. Not garbage from the confident statistics black box.
What if they use it as part of the art tho?
Like a horror game that uses an AI to just slightly tweak an image of the paintings in a haunted building continuously everytime you look past them to look just 1% creepier?
That’s an interesting enough idea in theory, so here’s my take on it, in case you want one.
Yes, it sounds magical, but:
•Ok, I know the researching ability of people has decreased greatly over the years, but using “knowyourmeme” as a source? Really?
• You can now run optimized open source diffusion models on an iPhone, and it’s been possible for years. I use that as an example because yes, there’s models that can easily run on an Nvidia 1060 these days. Those models are more than enough to handle incremental changes to an image in-game
• Already has for awhile as demonstrated by it being able to run on an iPhone, but yes, it’s probably the best way to get an uncanny valley effect in certain paintings in a horror game, as the alternatives would be:
• I’ll call an open source model exploitation the day someone can accurately generate an exact work it was trained on not within 1, but at least within 10 generations. I have looked into this myself, unlike seemingly most people on the internet. Last I checked, the closest was a 90 something % similarity image after using an algorithm that modified the prompt over time after thousands of generations. I can find this research paper myself if you want, but there may be newer research out there.
Games aren’t background processes. Even today, triple-A titles still sometimes come out as unoptimized hot garbage. Do you genuinely think it’s easy to pile a diffusion model on top with negligible effect? Also, will you pack an entire model into your game just for one instance?
Look at the share of people using an 1050 or lower card. Or let’s talk about the AMD and Intel issues. These people aren’t an insignificant portion. Hell, nearly 15% don’t even have 16GB of ram.
What are you talking about? You’re satisfied with a diffusion model’s output, but won’t be with any other method except excruciating manual labor? Your standards are all over the place—or rather, you don’t have any. And let’s keep it real: most won’t give a shit if your game can show them 10 or 100 slightly worse versions of the same image.
Procedural generation has been a thing for decades. Indie devs have been making do with nearly nonexistent art skills and less sophisticated tech for just as long. I feel like you don’t actually care about the problem space, you just want to shove AI into the solution.
Are you referring to the OSAID? The infamously broken definition that exists to serve companies? You don’t understand what exploitation here means. “Can it regurgitate exact training input” is not the only question to ask, and not the bar. Knowing your work was used without consent to train computers to replace people’s livelihoods is extremely violating. Talk to artists.
I tried to use an accessible and easily understandable example. Fuck off. Go do your own “research”, open those beloved diffusion models, make your scary, then scarier images and try asking people what they think of the results. Do it a hundred times, since that’s your only excuse as to why you need AI. No cherry-picking, you won’t be able to choose what your rube goldberg painting will look like on other people’s PCs.
Would the feature in that horror game Zort where you sometimes use the player respon item and it respons an NPC that will use clips of what a specific dead player has said while playing count as AI use? If so, that’s a pretty good use of AI in horror games in my opinion.
That’s not generative, since it’s just copying player input. Feasible without AI, just storing strings for later recall.
AI SLOP! SAD!
It’s all virtue signaling. If it’s good, nobody will be able to notice anyway and they’ll want it regardless. The only reason people shit on AI currently is because expert humans are still far better than it.
We’re just at that awkward point in time where AI is better than the random joe but worse than experts.
Not it’s not! There are a whole bunch of reasons why people dislike the current AI-wave, from artist exploitation, to energy consumption, to making horrible shitty people and companies richer while trying to obviate people’s jobs!
You’re so far off, it’s insane. That’s like saying people only hate slavery because the slaves can’t match craftsmen yet. Just wait a bit until they finish training the slaves, just a few more whippings, then everyone will surely shut up.
I agree that those are reasons people give for their reasoning, but if history has shown anything, we know people change their minds when it becomes most convenient to use a technology.
Human ethics is highly dependent on convenience, unfortunately.
It sounds like you gave up and expect everyone else to do the same.
Honest question: are things like trees, rocks, logs in a huge world like a modern RPG all placed by hand, or does it use AI to fill it out?
Not AI but certainly a semirandom function. Then they go through and manually clean it up by hand.
Ah, so this kind of tool is allowable, but not another? Pretty hypocritical thinking there.
A tools is a tool, any tool can be abused.
Most games (pre-ai at least) would use a brush for this and manually tweak the result if it ended up weird.
E.g. if you were building a desert landscape you might use a rock brush to randomly sprinkle the boulder assets around the area. Then the bush brush to sprinkle some dry bushes.
Very rare for someone to spend the time to individually place something like a rock or a tree, unless it is designed to be used in gameplay or a cutscene (e.g. a climable tree to get into a building through a window).
That’s only for open world maps, many games where the placement of rocks and trees is something that’s subject to miniscule changes for balance reasons.
One of my favourite games used procedural generation to create game “art”, “assets”, and “maps”.
That could conceivably be called (or enhanced by) ML today, which could conceivably be called AI today.
But even in modern games, I’m not opposed to mindful usage of AI in games. I don’t understand why you’re trying to speak for everyone (by saying “people”) when you’re talking to someone who doesn’t share your view.
This is like those stupid “non-GMO” stickers. Yes, GMOs are being abused by Monsanto (and probably other corporations like them). No, that doesn’t mean that GMOs are bad in all cases.
I think the sort of generative AI referred to is something that trains on data to approximate results, which consumes vast amounts more power.
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Yes.
Not even.
Different tools with different costs and different outcomes.
Both have replaced human labor, why are bringing up costs? No one’s mentioned that, gotta use fallacies to justify the hypocrisy? The outcomes the same. Use less human labor to make art.
But sure justify one while decrying the other, hypocrite.
I never said I cared about labor, I only care about outcomes. You’re the inconsistent one.
Then you better give up spellcheck and autocorrect.
LLMs shouldn’t be used for spellcheck that would just be a massive waste of power.
What do you think grammarly is dude? Glorified spell and auto check, which people already utilize everyday. But of course new tools are looked down upon, the hypocrisy of people is amazing to see. It comes in cycles, people hated spell check, got used to it and now it’s prominent in every life, autocorrect, same thing is happening.
And now the same is happening again. If they want to claim no ai, no spellcheck, no auto correct, and no grammarly for emails. Everyone already uses “AI” everyday. But theirs is acceptable… okay…
Right but to detect close-enough spellings and word orders, using a curated index or catalogue of accepted examples, is one thing.
To train layers of algorithms in layers of machines on massive datasets to come up with close enoughs would be that but many times over the costs.
You would be a moron to use llms for spellchecking.
To clarify to you, not all programs are equal. Its not all different methods to do the same thing at the same cost.
A tool is a tool dude. Why are you trying to justify one over the other?
Ok but why do you think it’s okay to use a wrecking ball for a task that requires a chisel? You’re creating low quality high cost work just because it’s fast and easy.
Why do you think grammarly is a thing dude…?
People ALREADY use an llm for spellcheck, and it’s acceptable, yet this crosses a line…? You say people won’t use one… yet it’s already been a thing for years, your ignorance is i ionic as shit here.
It’s always funny what people will find acceptable, but also balk at when it’s fundamentally the exact same thing.
Of these devs want to claim “no ai” and everything is human, than they can’t rely on spellcheck either. Both are automated tools no?
That’s not art, that’s a tool. Tools can be made better through a confident statistics box.
Tools can be used in the making of art.
Humans are confident statistical black boxes. Art doesnt have to be made by a human to be aspiring.
Art has to be made by people. It’s literally not art otherwise.
So, if a machine makes the ‘art’, its not art? So photographs are not art. The hubble telescope,or any space probe for that matter, doesnt produce art.
Art is something that provoke emotions and expression in its observers and not produced naturally. Machines are built by people and require non-random inputs to produce something thefore anything those machines produce is art.
Photography is absolutely art. Humans put a lot of thought and intent into what and how they photograph and how they process and exhibit the photos.
I’d say that some stuff like JWST images definitely count as art, and some such imagery is far more technical and research focused than purely emotional. Maybe some visually boring but scientifically significant images aren’t artistic to laypeople. Nuance here is totally fine.
I vehemently disagree that all machine output is art.
And whos to say generative art doesnt receive a lot of thought and intent in producing something worthwhile?
Sure, you could let the machine spit out whatever garbage purely from random inputs, and that is not art as there is zero guidance or intent. But anyone that used generative ai knows you have to guide it to get anything worthwhile out of it. And even then, very likely require manual touchups to correct mistakes.