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Excommunicated devs making games with AI

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Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#71

Post by andai »

tototrains wrote: post #45
Arainach wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Or is the underlying 'brainrot' actually destructive to creative potential? Creativity comes from constraints. Writing code hasn't been the hard part since the 90s. Deciding which things make for a good game and are worth spending your limited time on is where fun comes from. AI makes it easy to spit things out, but it doesn't make things fun or good at all.

Writing code is not the hard part if you're a developer. Otherwise it's an insurmountable barrier. I think it's a bit like writing a novel. Everyone's got a novel in them, but you absolutely need to know how to write to get it out. Unless you can dictate it but then... you could also hire a developer. Those without the resources to hire a developer, without the years of education and practise to code at any level of…

I don't know, isn't it easier to learn enough programming to make a game, relative to all the other skills involved?

e.g. the programming concepts needed for Pong wouldn't take you more than a dozen hours or so. See how good you are at art or music after the same amount of time!

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#72

Post by krapp »

andai wrote: post #70
makerofthings wrote: post #18

Having AI generate a game for you no more makes you a game dev than ordering a happy meal makes you a chef.

What if you get someone else to program it? By this logic, Edmund McMillen (Super Meat Boy, Binding of Isaac, Mew-Genics) isn't a game developer, because he doesn't code.

Edmund McMillen isn't a game developer per se. As listed in his Wikipedia profile, he's a game designer and artist. He still did that work, though, and human beings still wrote that code. The end result is still an expression in part of his unique talent and creative process.

He could still be called a game developer in a general sense because "game development" doesn't have to explicitly refer to programming, as the game development process is multidisciplinary and multifaceted. But of course the dichotomy here isn't between "did this person or that person write the code" but rather "does a human who uses a machine to generate content deserve the same credit as a human who puts in skill and effort and does the work?"

Arguments equating the use of AI to using a compiler or photoshop or other tools fall flat because if those were equivalent no one would be using AI, the tools allow greater control and are less expensive. The entire use case of AI is that it replicates the creative process, not that it acts as a tool to facilitate that process for a human. AI can create assets and code that a person doesn't understand, and wouldn't be capable of replicating themselves, which wouldn't be the case using mere tools.

And yet AI people come up with these strained metaphors and false equivalences because they don't want to face up to the nature of what AI is, that it isn't liberating them from "gatekeepers" or freeing their creativity, it's commoditizing them and using them to generate content and putting them in a prison of their own device.

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#73

Post by andai »

peteforde wrote: post #21
tototrains wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've build 10+ games which I am ashamed to show :) Straight JS/html/css front-end with zero dependencies works well. Ask for a node.js backend and can be instantly deployed as client/server or straight to html - multiplayer feels trivial. C# Monogame works well for something heavier. You can actually edit Unity scenes directly using the LLM as they're a readable text file which works ok, but Unity is bloatware when y…

I've had my own rollercoaster relationship with Unity over the past decade, but telling people to roll their own game engine so that they can finally make a game is almost universally terrible advice. People who want to build game engines should build game engines; people who want to build games should absolutely use Unity, Unreal or Godot in no particular order. It's no different than needing to build a web framewor…

People who are making a simple 2D web game don't need an engine, with rare exceptions. Chrome's 30 million lines is plenty of bloat to build on ;)

Besides, in this context you're already outsourcing all the code to Claude or Codex or whatever. i.e. a "programmer" who has no problem handling the engine side of things.

That being said, most enginedev is creative procrastination. Randy's recent video on this is very illuminating — "I thought if I made a really good engine, making the game would be the easy part!" So he avoided actually making a game for like ten years...

Most 2D games don't even need an engine: you can just make the game "directly", on top of SDL or Canvas or what have you. (That being said, noob friendly stuff like Processing and Kaboom is great and highly recommended!)

--

Source: made lots of 2D games and a few engines. The engines were a complete waste of time. (Even ready made engines often did more harm than good!)

If I was making 3D games, then I would probably need an engine (but js13k begs to differ!), and it would probably not be a great to roll your own (unless you're going for something 90s themed :)

--

Edit: Most of my games are very "programmer art", or very retro. If I were an artist or working with artists, then an engine would be useful for that, for the visual side of things. Flash was probably unmatched in that regard

That being said, it's not that hard to roll your own level editor, so... ;) even that argument is questionable.

Edit 2: Also the web APIs are unfortunately kind of ass, so using a library (or engine) has the advantage of letting you avoid dealing with them directly for the most part.

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#74

Post by Madmallard »

yellowapple wrote: post #57
Madmallard wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean AI art is for sure super samey and plagiarized and uninteresting stylistically It's instantly recognizable and makes most indie games that disclose it just dead on arrival

> plagiarized Unless you can point to specific works that something allegedly plagiarizes, the “plagiarism” allegation is meaningless.

not at all true

depending on what you ask for it might generate something 99% as similar as an existing artist

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#75

Post by tyleo »

tezza wrote: post #33

My latest game BossBattle[1] (html5, have a play) uses AI for graphics, some strobe effects, a C64 loading screen shader. I have decided to lean in to it and I will document all the places I use AI in the game on my blog[2]. Not everything works, notably 3D assets[3] and sound effects. There is a lot of human content… i paid for a lot out of my own pocket and have limited budget. It started in 2021 before chatgpt. LL…

This is the exact sort of thing being unlocked that inspired me to write the article.

I’m so happy folks are finding fun and creativity in this space.

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#76

Post by wernsey »

AllegedAlec wrote: post #41
makerofthings wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well as long as they keep labelling it as AI so I can avoid buying it, we’re all good.

Totally! I'm sick of not being able to see what tools they use. In fact, I feel that we should also start tagging devs that use an IDE instead of properly coding games in notepad.

Real programmers use a magnetized needle and a steady hand

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#77

Post by tyleo »

blobbers wrote: post #13

I am excited about game dev with AI, but the games you posted are kind of a joke. My kids made similar games with Claude code in js. Was hoping to see some serious indie games, but these looked pretty terri-bad. Is anyone building the next SimCity, Civilization, etc.?

I largely agree with you, but that's honestly the part I like. Just like your kids, there are folks here getting value out of something that wasn't accessible to them before. My most cherished artwork isn't the tasteful stuff, it's the crayon drawing my niece made for me on my wedding day. The low-stakes nature of this AI content feels similar; people are doing it for the sheer pleasure and aren't afraid of meeting anyone's bar. A lot of it is noise right now, but I suspect we'll see it develop into something really interesting if the pattern continues.

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#78

Post by fatata123 »

tezza wrote: post #33

My latest game BossBattle[1] (html5, have a play) uses AI for graphics, some strobe effects, a C64 loading screen shader. I have decided to lean in to it and I will document all the places I use AI in the game on my blog[2]. Not everything works, notably 3D assets[3] and sound effects. There is a lot of human content… i paid for a lot out of my own pocket and have limited budget. It started in 2021 before chatgpt. LL…

[dead]

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#79

Post by abrie »

TinyJet[1] is a game I've been working on. Left and right arrows control thrust. Pick up cargo and carry it to the terminal at the other end. It's very difficult. Almost entirely AI generated. About 1100 prompts so far with a growing collection of (vibe coded) agents and tools to facilitate development.

[1](https://fargostation.itch.io/line-of-flight)

Re: Excommunicated devs making games with AI

#80

Post by ottah »

makerofthings wrote: post #29
voidfunc wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh please, just stop being silly. Being a game dev means you're building games which means you're thinking about the mechanics of the game and what makes something fun to play. The programming is not "game dev" and offloading it to an AI agent doesn't make someone any less of a game dev.

Well as long as they keep labelling it as AI so I can avoid buying it, we’re all good.

Yeah, you don't have a right to know how art is made. You can choose to engage with it ot not.
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