Tencent and Ubisoft are up next for jumping on the AI craze

It looks as if Tencent and Ubisoft are the latest companies to go all in on AI, as both companies recently announced they and were mentioned as key adopters in the . The tools, specifically (Avatar Cloud Engine), are supposed to help these companies accelerate the creation of complex NPCs. But it’s already raising a few eyebrows at a time when this sort of thing is still highly controversial.

Certainly, it's a bit of an odd move from Ubisoft, especially when one of their more recent games, Watchdogs: Legion, was (the game's titular 'legion' and main selling point was drawing on a huge background cast to play as, rather than one central character). However, they have already said they’d be going full force on the AI front with the use of a tool .

For Tencent, it’s a bit less unusual, as they’ve always been looking for the biggest and most notorious ways to enhance their output, especially with how cutthroat the mobile gaming market one of their biggest . The company boasts dozens of studios including substantial investment in League of Legends creators Riot Games.

And Tencent clarifying its position, and positivity towards AI and its use in game development. It’s also going to be a bit concerning for anti AI proponents, as the information given on what data their models are ‘trained’ on is oddly vague; in reply. Just take a look at the hot water Midjourney another famous AI pushing company .

I guess if some of us felt that the output from Ubisoft and Tencent was getting a bit samey it’s not going to be changing any time soon… Tencent especially should only look as far as one of their chief competitors, MiHoYo, in order to see how well the ‘human touch’ aids their revenue. Whatever your opinion on the game Genshin Impact has undeniably connected with a wide, dedicated and paying audience.

But would it have done the same if NPCs, whether minor or important, had been made by a computer instead? According to some reports, however, now. But hey, we could talk about what could go wrong until we’re blue in the face. I mean we wouldn’t because this is being written down, or typed if you want to be technical, but you get the metaphor.

Could this go well for either company? Well, in the ideal scenario, this sort of tech would alleviate the burden of designing hundreds of unique NPCs to populate the vast worlds of games like Assassin’s Creed, allowing designers to focus on the central characters more and fully flesh them out. Of course, even with human designers a game like Watchdogs: Legion fell flat that attempted to simulate vast swathes of the real life city of London.

AI’s got that big price tag and huge dreams attached to it sure, but it’ll still have to do what even a bespoke system struggles to accomplish make something that feels real. But for players on mobile, what does that mean for us? Well, most games we play don’t boast hundreds or even dozens of random NPCs on walkabout.

So wouldn’t the benefit be negligible? Well, it may be a negligible benefit but it may be a noticeable difference for better or for worse. For games, especially gacha or RPG titles where they live and die by how enjoyable their characters are, even in simple ways, trying to automate the process runs a risk of losing out what makes them fun in the first place.

Even if this change is months or years down the road, when it does come you can be sure that the side by side comparison will be what players are keeping an eye on, not the number of faces in a crowd. But while you’re here, and probably thinking about the design of mobile games, why not check out our list of Don’t feel you need to sacrifice visual fidelity or great design just because you’re on a smaller screen and check out these dazzling games!.