While OpenAI‘s ChatGPT was expected to be a simple Language Model that can be integrated into search engines, NetEase has announced that it will integrate ChatGPT into its upcoming MMORPG game Justice Online Mobile.
Daniel Ahmad, director of research and insights at Niko Partners shared the news on Twitter, adding that the AI will, “Allow players to chat with NPCs and have them react in unique ways that impact the game.”
NetEase is looking, “To scale the use of AI to support task generation, content creation, character customisation and more.”
The move will see NetEase become the first video game company to integrate the highly talked about ChatGPT into a game. Once integrated, players can communicate with enhanced NPCs in the game which will alter their overall gameplay experience, especially for an MMORPG game.
And although there’s no official release date for the upcoming MMORPG, the move to integrate ChatGPT into the game will likely see it amass more players as a lot of people (even non-gamers) would be keen on learning how the popular AI performs for the first time in a video game.
With Generative AI being all over the headlines these days, NetEase says it'll launch launch the first game version of ChatGPT in Justice Online Mobile, its upcoming MMO title.
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) February 16, 2023
It'll allow players to chat with NPCs and have them react in unique ways that impact the game. pic.twitter.com/JBiFy3J5dV
The future of video games
The metaverse is currently tipped to change the meaning of video games entirely once it is perfected because we will not be controlling the video game characters, but we become the characters themselves.
However, AI is now gradually making its way into gaming, which means there’s a very good chance we’ll be playing games with AI-powered NPCs long before the metaverse reaches global adoption.
If successful, NetEase’s move to integrate ChatGPT into Justice Online could see more game developers follow the same strategy and integrate AI into their games as well.
Artificial intelligence, while it is undoubtedly a revolutionary invention, still has a long way to go. And although AI research and deployment company OpenAI appears to be ahead in the AI race, behemoth tech companies such as Google and Microsoft aren’t far behind as well.
Google recently announced it is working on 20 AI products and is looking to bring AI features to its search engine. Microsoft however, recently announced its AI-powered Bing search engine which is not going entirely well for the Windows company.
Isa Muhammad is a writer and video game journalist covering many aspects of entertainment media including the film industry. He's steadily writing his way to the sharp end of journalism and enjoys staying informed. If he's not reading, playing video games or catching up on his favourite TV series, then he's probably writing about them.
