Publisher Ubisoft is making no secret of its plans to utilise generative AI tech — at least, it certainly sounds that way in new comments from CEO Yves Guillemot.
The controversial technology has been a hot topic of discussion in the industry for a while now, and as it begins to feed into the games we're playing, it's rubbing some people the wrong way.
Games like ARC Raiders, The Finals, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, and more used AI tools to varying degrees in their production, and they're being criticised by onlookers who are concerned about the tech replacing original creative work from human beings.
It seems Ubisoft is going whole hog on the AI front. Speaking to investors, Guillemot says the publisher is "making great strides in applying gen-AI to high-value use cases that bring tangible benefits to our players and teams".
He goes on to call generative AI "as big a revolution for our industry as the shift to 3D", and it sounds as though it's being implemented in quite a meaningful way.
Guillemot brings up "neo-NPCs", AI-powered characters capable of "unique and responsive" conversations with players to deliver "fully personalized and immersive experiences".
He says this concept is now out of prototyping, so we can probably expect to start seeing Ubi's neo-NPCs in future games.
"On the production side, we now have teams in all our studios and offices embracing these new technologies, and constantly exploring new use cases in programming, art, and overall game quality," Guillemot says, essentially saying AI tech is planned to be a major part of how the publisher makes games going forward.
Whether that works out in the long run remains to be seen, of course.
It's very likely there are use cases for AI tools in the production pipeline, but the concerns from fans are more to do with creative disciplines within that; generating art, music, animation, and so on, rather than having talented artists helming those areas.
Again, we'll have to wait and see how things play out.