The patent called “STATE MANAGEMENT FOR VIDEO GAME HELP SESSIONS” describes multiple examples where a pop-up might ask a player to let a helper take over the gameplay for a while.
Imagine if a user were struggling to find a rare gem in an RPG; if allowed, the helper would take control from the player. They would proceed to chat and guide the user through the process of acquiring the gem.
So essentially laying the groundwork to microtransactions for video game guides?
They don’t just want the machines to create the art and music for us, they want them to consume it for us too, so that we’ll have more time to slave away at our jobs.
Wake up, babe - the stupid ass patent wars are back again, AI edition.
Oh don’t worry. Some AI boot licker will come to defend this as well. “WelL yOu SeE nOt EvErYoNe HaS tHe TiMe To PlAy GaMeS. ThIs WiLl MaKe GaMiNg MoRe EfFiCiEnT.”
First they came for our jobs, next our hobbies, now for our very entertainment ? Who could ever ask for a feature such as this !?
look, on the bright side they burn up every ressource on the planet.
Next new AI feature; an AI that can watch the series/films for you, think of all the time you can save!
They need it to do something, anything, to justify the investment. As time goes and the sunk cost gets worse, the attempts will be more desperate.
This kind of feature will be for a fee.
They are all looking for a “killer AI app”.
This is why “consciousness” is trying to be marketed as achieved. This assumes the tasks performed can be varied, adapted to, and the AI left unattended while its rich owner fucks off and no longer has to pretend to pay insurance premiums for workers.
Why even bother living. Just get “AI” to live for you, and recycle your meaningless meat form.
You exist to be exploited for the benefit of the shareholders. This allows you to work so many more hours a day.
My biggest fear with this is an arms race between puzzle developers and these solvers. I hope devs never design their games with the expectation that players will use AI
Hell I’d make the puzzles in such a way just to confuse the AI “helper”.
That is kind of same thing. I don’t want the existence of AI solvers to influence how a puzzle is designed at all
Clearly they think that gaming is the same as working.
I mean… Use the developers console or a cheat if you’re stuck with something and want to continue playing, or just quit the game. There’s no need for an AI to do this.
I do wish that more games still had cheats. It does feel a bit like a lot of newer games have foregone them entirely. You can’t type plane into GTA V, and have a plane materialise, like you could in Vice City, for example.
You’d need to mod it in.
I’m not a gamer, but besides getting stuck at one point of an otherwise great game, I read that people were paying gamers in other countries to play as them and “power up” their characters. If that’s true, it could conceivably be a “job” for AI.
On the other hand, how do people buy games that are so frustrating that you actively pay money to someone (person or AI) to play them for you? It goes completely against my idea of what a game represents.
It’s just p2w with extra steps. Pay to get stronger, or pay someone to play for you to get stronger. When games are designed to either make you play a lot or pay to get stuff to make you stronger, some people will gladly pay to either feel powerful, or just skip enough of the grind that they can focus on what’s fun.
I kind of get it, but at the point where I’d be spending hundreds or make someone play for me, I’d just look for a different game.
It’s just that games should have a balanced ‘just the story’ mode where you both feel like you’re actively playing the game but not be frustrated at the hardness. If some impossible perfectly execute or die versions of a campaign exist, then it should also have a leisurely immersive stroll. choose your own adventure movies should be an option. Like those game books that used to exist (Lone Wolf etc); some people roll the dices and play, but just going through the options is no less fun.
I can see why someone would want an AI helper to help ‘finish the game’ because there are games that are locked away by skill when all you want to see are the stories and options. but it’s the fault of developers and gaming culture as a whole if ‘games are supposed to make you feel powerful’ are the only demand that are being catered to. Why should enemies in Core Keeper get stronger in multiplayer when it’s just a local game; sometimes you just want to coop marauding through the biomes, and that’s not a vanilla option.
Elon will love this
so good
Prior art: I remember a long time ago seeing a video of a Barney (as in purple dinosaur) video game for little kids that would just start playing itself if you didn’t touch the controller for a while. It was a side scroller, probably NES/SNES/Genesis.
Wasn’t there a similar shit patent headline about sony doing that?
Oh yeah, there was, “ghost assistance”, aka “no need to look up on youtube”; something which I’m pretty sure exists as “previous art” in some game or another - https://www.gamesindustry.biz/sony-patents-ai-generated-ghost-support-system-to-assist-stuck-players
Also, bots that automate play have existed since the old MUD days, this patent must be like the many that are “something that already exists, but
on a computerwith AI”One of the mario games would have Luigi show up and play a level for you if you kept dying
Do you know which one? I would love to see that xD
Apparently it’s Mario Maker 2… so technically a Mario game, but it’s not “official” Mario levels, so take that as you will
First pay for the game, then pay for slop shit so you don’t have to play the game. Corporate big brain time at its best 😄
To be fair, the corpo slop games aren’t really worth playing, never mind paying for.
Edit: I didn’t read, I’m stupid, don’t be like me. It’s even worse than I imagined.
Not even. They’re going to sell you the idea that you’re a game dev, and sell you each piece and asset.
It’s the optimized AI version of “during a gold rush, is the people selling shovels and picks that get rich.”
“Finish” as in beat or best, not as in complete a development work to be shipped
Oh… Holy Fuck. It’s more dystopian and stupid than I realized.
I’m sorry and I hate it
Eh… Folks used to pay people to level up their characters in WoW…
That’s what I was thinking this would be used for. Leveling MMO characters, or grinding gold.
Swordsman had an bot where you would let it take control while it farmed an area around where you let it.
Then they tell publishers and game developers that more players finish their games on Microsoft’s platform than any others!
