Is AI the future of Indie RPGs?

[PompiPompi]

I am not sure you guys are aware the amount of trashy games pushed out there, mostly by indies. But not only.
And those games make a lot of sales, because they appeal to some new gamers that are more bored.

But people who like quality games, can't find almost anything to play.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

Yeah. The problem with AI is that it exacerbates the existing race to the bottom. For all the brokeass devs it helps, it still brings down the quality of games as a whole. There are so many game concepts I’d love to make but lack the skillset to do so, but I hate AI on principle and refuse to sell my soul.

 

[PompiPompi]

Yeah. The problem with AI is that it exacerbates the existing race to the bottom. For all the brokeass devs it helps, it still brings down the quality of games as a whole. There are so many game concepts I’d love to make but lack the skillset to do so, but I hate AI on principle and refuse to sell my soul.

It's not entirely true though.
There are things that make sense to use assistane.

You could claim that motion capture also ruins the integrity of a game, because it's not an animator who animated the animation.

Even in old 3D game they would use real world textures for things like finger prints, and details that are just too tedious to let an artist do.

AI can assist you, but you always need to have the watchful eye of the artist and designer.

It's like, in Skyrim you had voice acting that was way worse than what AI would do.


The issue is with big games, it becomes increasingly impossible to create all the art assets required for a game.

Why would you hand paint a million trees or flowers, when you can buy 3rd party assets.
What if AI lets you create a million flowers, but every flower is unique?

So I won't entirely disqualify AI.

But bad use of AI will certainly look worse than programmer art.

 

[The_Sloth_Sleeps]

The parts in my game that use AI in that video, is the soldier's portrait, the frame around him, the X button, and the text to speech of the text(that I wrote).
Is it really bad?

I am pretty sure a real voice actor would be a better job, and a less generic AI looking portrait would look better too. But is it really bad looking as is?

And yea, majority of games now suck IMO.

You can tell if someone is a quality player if he used to be a gamer, but now can't find almost anything worth to play.

The voice itself wasn't terrible but you need someone who is proficient in English to help write the dialogues.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

It's "good enough" for certain tasks.
When you are a 0 budget solo dev, AI can be useful.

Did you notice the AI in my video?

But yea... AI "Art" is not great.
The thing is... most indie developers just copy each other or other games, and even then people buy their games.
So there are more people consuming trash food than actual quality.

The guard video? I mean, yeah, flat tone. The banal writing didn’t help either.

Interestingly enough, if it were an actual human, even if it’s a bad voice actor, it would have been better because it has personality.

If that’s your game, I would suggest doing it yourself, using a voice changer or something. Own up to the “low-quality voice acting” because you’re a solo developer - people know how to judge games properly based on what’s presented to them and the effort taken to make the game.

Then again, I think indie games should avoid triple-A production tropes, such as voice acting.
It seems to me that a lot of indie games, especially those inspired by other games, are inspired too heavily.

They’re trying to recreate the other games when they should be creating something new. They’re “trapped” by creating something complex when they lack the skills and resources to do so. I think they should try to make something simple and short.

 

[what am i doing]

AI art just seems "good" to some people (artistically stunted). Honestly, I wasn't a big fan of the pixel art I saw above - physically hurt my eyes that shit was.

It's "good enough" for certain tasks.
When you are a 0 budget solo dev, AI can be useful.

Did you notice the AI in my video?

But yea... AI "Art" is not great.
The thing is... most indie developers just copy each other or other games, and even then people buy their games.
So there are more people consuming trash food than actual quality.

I'm of the opinion that generative art (and voice, and so on) can be decent as a tool for small/zero budget teams or individuals when it's just being used to fill in the details of a larger, handmade product. When it's just some fag sharing a random piece of generative art they prompted, by itself, it is obnoxious and pointless. It's like showing off an asset store asset that you bought - and imagine that the Internet got flooded with retarded pajeets showing off the (very low quality) asset store assets they bought, day after day after day. I think that's where most of the frustration about generative art comes from. But in the context of a larger work it's ok, in my opinion. Your video, for example - the quality's not great, but it's not terrible either, and my main complaint there would be that the audio for the guard's voice sounds like it's in a large, echoing room rather than outdoors - it's way too loud and booming, reminds me of Tyrael from Diablo 2. Which seems like more of a mixing or configuration issue, which could be corrected.

 

[The_Sloth_Sleeps]

A well written dialogue without audio goes much further than an awkwardly worded dialogue and stilted voice (perfect example of both dialogue and "AI" done badly in the prior video).

Finding a way to use "AI" that does not detract from the game, as well as adding value AND saving time to justify its use is not clear.

Background, portraits, are a common one. I am not really convinced with these to be honest. I think it can save time and money but it sort of taints the final product. Which in many cases may be just fine, if you are producing a $5 game. Despite all these supposed improvements nobody has proved me wrong yet, what I said years ago. Nothing has changed.

 

[PompiPompi]

It's "good enough" for certain tasks.
When you are a 0 budget solo dev, AI can be useful.

Did you notice the AI in my video?

But yea... AI "Art" is not great.
The thing is... most indie developers just copy each other or other games, and even then people buy their games.
So there are more people consuming trash food than actual quality.

The guard video? I mean, yeah, flat tone. The banal writing didn’t help either.

Interestingly enough, if it were an actual human, even if it’s a bad voice actor, it would have been better because it has personality.

If that’s your game, I would suggest doing it yourself, using a voice changer or something. Own up to the “low-quality voice acting” because you’re a solo developer - people know how to judge games properly based on what’s presented to them and the effort taken to make the game.

Then again, I think indie games should avoid triple-A production tropes, such as voice acting.
It seems to me that a lot of indie games, especially those inspired by other games, are inspired too heavily.

They’re trying to recreate the other games when they should be creating something new. They’re “trapped” by creating something complex when they lack the skills and resources to do so. I think they should try to make something simple and short.

It was actually kind of a test, I wasn't sure I liked it too. Can't tell if you don't try. But I wanted to try it out.
I did the Orc voice acting myself lol.
But, voice acting is super hard, you also need a good equipment so it won't sound like crap, which I don't really have.

And people do notice the quality of audio, I don't think they like audio that sounds like you recorded it in the toilet.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

But, voice acting is super hard, you also need a good equipment so it won't sound like crap, which I don't really have.

Which is why you shouldn't, in my opinion.

I think better writing would help the game a lot more than Voice Acting.

 

[PompiPompi]

But, voice acting is super hard, you also need a good equipment so it won't sound like crap, which I don't really have.

Which is why you shouldn't, in my opinion.

I think better writing would help the game a lot more than Voice Acting.

Well... there is a limit how much text you can throw at the player.
At some point it becomes tedious to read.

I believe in more short texts, similar to old RPGs.

And also, if the text does not have a voice acting, the player is less likely to read it.

 

[Bohrain]

Just be concise when writing dialogue. If you look at film scripts proper dialogue tends to be sparse. Age of Decadence comes to mind of a video game that did it well.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

the player is less likely to read it.

That is true, which is why you should make it short simple/concise - and interesting.

For me personally it's combination of Good Dialogue UI, good font and good writing.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

The existence of visual novels proves that games can be text heavy with minimal voice overs and still be successful.