Nvidia has announced its Avatar Cloud Engine (ACE), a new custom AI model foundry service for games. ACE aims to enhance video games by utilising AI natural language interactions to create more realistic and intelligent NPCs.
Developers can use ACE to create and implement custom speech, conversations and animation AI models in games and software. ACE includes various tools such as NeMo for developing language models that the creator can customise with backstories and lore.
Another tool in the foundry, Riva is a text-to-speech and automatic speech recognition tool. Also included in ACE is Audio2Face, which quickly builds animations for facial expressions to match their speech and includes connectors for Unreal Engine 5. These connectors allow developers to add facial animations to MetaHuman characters directly.
“Generative AI has the potential to revolutionise the interactivity players can have with game characters and dramatically increase immersion in games,” says Nvidia VP of vice president of Developer and Performance Technology John Spitzer. “Building on our expertise in AI and decades of experience working with game developers, Nvidia is spearheading the use of generative AI in games.”
Recently, Nvidia partnered with Convai to display how developers can use ACE to create non-player characters. Convai integrated the new AI model foundry into its real-time avatar platform. The two created a demo, Kairos, which shows NPC Jin offering realistic replies to natural language queries. The demo, which takes place in a Ramen shop, showcases the power of the new program’s generative AI as Jin’s replies all cohesively fit within the given backstory.
Convai founder and CEO Purnendu Mukherjee said, “With Nvidia ACE for Games, Convai’s tools can achieve the latency and quality needed to make AI non-playable characters available to nearly every developer in a cost-efficient way.”
Several game developers are already using Nvidia generative AI technologies to develop their upcoming titles. For instance, GSC Game World is using Audio2Face in its upcoming title STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl.
Jack Brassell is a freelance journalist and aspiring novelist. Jack is a self-proclaimed nerd with a lifelong passion for storytelling. As an author, Jack writes mostly horror and young adult fantasy. Also an avid gamer, she works as the lead news editor at Hardcore Droid. When she isn't writing or playing games, she can often be found binge-watching Parks & Rec or The Office, proudly considering herself to be a cross between Leslie Knope and Pam Beasley.
