I feel the largest danger to our creative works is not AI but corporate greed. AI is a tool we can harness, but I don’t believe it will ever truly replace humans in creative endeavors like game design, programming, writing, or art; at least not at the highest levels. Yes AI can be used to handle tasks juniors can do, however, even then I feel it is not as good.
Please note: This post is a little different from my usual writing style. I’ll be linking to several YouTube videos that I found informative and entertaining on the topic I want to discuss. I encourage you to review them because I do not plan to discuss them in depth here, they will just be used to illustrate the points I wish to make.
AI Didn’t Take Your Job Corporate Greed Did
I want to look at two opposing takes on where the Games Industry is from a creative’s perspective.
First, they took our jobs by Game From Scratch over on Youtube.
Second, Developers Just Exposed Who’s Really Killing Games from Veteran Joystick on Youtube
On one hand you have the blame placed on AI for taking the jobs from game developers. On the other hand you have the corporate overlords who are pushing this unproven AI to take over.
Microsoft does seem to be having employees train AI and then using that AI to replace some of those employees, I don’t think this is a shock to anyone. I just want to be honest here, as fun as some people may find it developing new candy crush levels is more of a mechanical issue not a creative one at this point. The problem has been solved so well and so many times with hundreds of levels that it is the perfect task to automate. However, the AI is not what took those jobs away. Microsoft has been reporting increasing profits. But, as the video points out, what they’re not seeing is growth in these areas. This is the corporate (read investor) greed at play. Investors are not satisfied with steady income, they have to have infinite growth which is just not possible. So when you have a successful business that is making money what do you do? Well you cut the staff so it looks like you are making more money because your profits go up. However, this is a dangerous game. While I feel that the candy crush levels are something that AI can automate, I am not sure it should.
Let’s switch and look at DuoLingo, once again I am linking a video for context as not to rehash what he said better.
The problem is while AI can do a passable job at these tasks, it lacks any depth or humanity in what it does. So can it create candy crush levels? Probably, will it do as good of a job as the humans? Absolutely not.
The danger is that you will see a drop in quality, and other games hand crafted by real craftsmen will once again rise to the top. We have seen this before…
Exploited Talent and Broken Promises
Then you have the Subnautica 2 Lawsuit covered here by Bellular News
Here you have an indie publisher bought out by a larger publisher. From all accounts currently it seems the publisher may have been doing everything they could to ensure they did not have to pay out a quarter billion dollar bonus. As was stated in the Veteran Joystick video above this has been a trend in the games industry for years. This doesn’t just affect games, think of your favorite brand that went out of business. Toys R Us, Joannes, maybe Sears? So many great brands that were bought out by investment groups who did not understand why they were successful companies, then set unrealistic goals for them to pay back the investment.
The Indie Uprising
However, thankfully we are not fully at the mercy of these corporate interests. As we have seen in games like Baldur’s Gate 3, Space Marine 2, Stardew Valley, and many many more indie games are alive and well. Thanks to Itch.io, Steam, GOG, and Epic games there are markets they can be sold on easily. In todays world it is also fairly easy to sell your games on your own website if you so desire.
Many of these indie games have AAA level quality and scope. They are not tied down to corporate interests. Also, more and more these studios are resistant to being bought out. There was a time when names like EA and Blizzard rose to the top because they were created by gamers for games. The leadership loved games and it showed. Now they are owned and controlled by people who are not gamers and do not game. The only skill these people have is being able to milk every ounce of profit from an idea until it is a dried out husk. These are the studios who brought you beloved hits like WarCraft… who have none of the same leadership, designers, or developers left who originally brought you those masterpieces.
Taking a Stand as a Player
My personal opinion is I have taken studios that I feel are abusive like EA, and Krafton who do not hold up the values I want to see in a game studio and I block them on steam. I refuse to buy any of their games and I focus my attention on more indie games. While I am not saying I will never buy or play a game from one of these studios again… mistakes happen and sometimes you take a chance hoping things have gotten better… you can take a look at my steam profile… Apocalypse Theory. Currently my gaming looks like this…
My Recent Steam Activity
We should all be supporting independent studios be it a single person or a 100 person company as long as they are independent and not backed by investment bankers who only care about profits.
