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Artificial intelligence could play a role in the future of entertainment, and this includes video games. Electronic Arts executive Laura Miele has commented on how AI could positively impact the future of games, echoing what EA CEO Andrew Wilson said earlier this year.
Miele, who has worked at EA for almost 30 years, told Bloomberg that the company has always been a “native AI entertainment company,” going back to 1988’s original Madden. Miele pointed out that this game used AI to program the players on the other side of the ball. But in 2023, AI is now in a “new phase,” Miele said, and it could shape the future of gaming in a significant way.
“It’s definitely going to optimize what we have for tools and workflows and help our developers, and players, create better experiences. It’s also going to be a significant expander of content and frequency and how we show up,” Miele said.
She added that AI can also be “incredibly transformative” for EA’s business models and help to push the company to a new level of scale. EA already has 700 million players in its network, Miele said, and AI could help with things like content moderation.
“So the idea around moderating content for them, and keeping communities safe, AI is going to play a meaningful role for us in that transformation in our scale,” Miele said.
Before this, Miele said AI can help developers speed up “creative iteration.” Game development is an expensive and lengthy process, with developers trying out new ideas to, as they say, “find the fun.” With AI, the “velocity of content” could be sped up, Miele said.
One major concern about the growth of AI is that it will lead to job losses. EA CEO Andrew Wilson said this is a legitimate concern, pointing out that the agricultural and industrial revolutions led to major “displacement” in the workforce. Ultimately, however, Wilson observed that there might be “meaningful increases” in job opportunities further down the road.
Still, some people in the video game industry have ongoing concerns about the role that AI could play in the future of the business.
EA has been working on advanced development systems using AI for years already. In 2018, the company revealed that it had more than 1,000 people working on a ridiculously ambitious-sounding technology project called Project Atlas.
EA is not the only big believer in AI in the tech space. Microsoft partnered up with ChatGPT and reportedly invested $10 billion into the AI company. Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer believes AI will be a positive, additive force in gaming. Strauss Zelnick, the head of GTA parent company Take-Two, believes in AI as well, but he doesn’t think a rival developer could use it to make a genuine GTA competitor anytime soon. PUBG creator Brendan Greene’s new game, meanwhile, is using advanced machine-learning to create massive open worlds.
