Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa recently addressed whether the company would use generative AI technology to create games.
A screenshot from Super Mario RPG (2023), Nintendo
If you are unfamiliar with Generative AI, Google explains on their Google AI website that “generative AI can also help us create new content. Generative AI builds on existing technologies, like large language models (LLMs) which are trained on large amounts of text and learn to predict the next word in a sentence. For example, ‘peanut butter and ___’ is more likely to be followed by ‘jelly’ than ‘shoelace’.”
Furthermore, Google adds, “Generative AI can not only create new text, but also images, videos, or audio.”
Examples of Generative AI include ChatPT, Gemini, Copilot, DALL-E, Midjourney, and Sora.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017), Nintendo
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As reported and translated by Tweak Town, Furukawa took part in a Q&A with investors and was asked about Generative AI.
He answered, “In the game industry, AI-like technology has long been used to control enemy character movements, so game development and AI technology have always been closely related.”
Next, he specifically addressed Generative AI, “Generative AI, which has been a hot topic in recent years, can be more creative, but we also recognize that it has issues with intellectual property rights.”
From there, he detailed, “We have decades of know-how in creating optimal gaming experiences for our customers, and while we remain flexible in responding to technological developments, we hope to continue to deliver value that is unique to us and cannot be achieved through technology alone.”
A screenshot from Animal Crossing: New Horizons (2020), Nintendo
While a number of outlets such as Tweak Town and Game World Observer are seemingly interpreting Furukawa’s comments as a rejection of generative AI technology at large, his comments are much more nuanced than that. He clearly does not say the company will not use generative AI. Merely, that he notes there are intellectual property rights issues with it.
Furthermore, Furukawa also indicates that Nintendo will indeed respond to technological developments such as generative AI. However, he notes that on top of responding to this technology he and the company also plan to deliver value that cannot be achieved through the technology alone, meaning they will still embrace the creativity that can only come from a God-created soul.
A screenshot from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018), Nintendo
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While Furukawa’s comments are not decisive on generative AI one way or the other, Microsoft’s Xbox committed to the technology back in November with the company’s General Manager of Gaming AI Haiyan Zhang revealing Microsoft and Xbox partnered with Inworld AI “to build AI game dialogue & narrative tools at scale.”
Zhang elaborated, “This partnership will bring together: Inworld’s expertise in working with generative AI models for character development, Microsoft’s cutting-edge cloud-based AI solutions including Azure OpenAI Service, Microsoft Research’s technical insights into the future of play, and Team Xbox’s strengths in revolutionizing accessible and responsible creator tools for all developers.”
A screenshot from Halo 2: Anniversary (2020), 343 Industries
She went on to reveal the goals that Microsoft has with the partnership, “Together, we aim to deliver an accessible, responsibly designed multi-platform AI toolset to assist and empower creators in dialogue, story & quest design.”
Specifically, the partnership is expected to create:
- An AI design copilot that assists and empowers game designers to explore more creative ideas, turning prompts into detailed scripts, dialogue trees, quests and more.
- An AI character runtime engine that can be integrated into the game client, enabling entirely new narratives with dynamically-generated stories, quests, and dialogue for players to experience.
A screenshot from Starfield (2023), Bethesda Game Studios
What do you make of Furukawa’s comments regarding Nintendo’s stance on generative AI?
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