Venture capital firm a16z believes we are experiencing a new transformative shift that could go on to be the most impactful yet. The VC has now led a $7.9 million seed funding round for Series AI, a new startup that’s developing AI-powered game authoring tools.
Series AI plans to use this newly secured funding to develop its Rho Engine platform, which it believes will help game developers throughout the game development process by making games faster and easier.
The Rho Engine is a tool that combines generative AI with a game editor. The generative AI can then automatically create game assets, such as characters, environments and levels. The game editor will also allow developers to customise and refine these assets, helping them save time and effort on repetitive tasks.
Pany Haritatos, Series AI CEO said, “We now know that in the hands of expert game makers, purpose-built generative AI editors can rapidly architect, shape and build new games and game worlds. A mature toolset will allow our team to explore brand new game systems, themes and mechanics in almost the same amount of time that it would take to describe them.”
Simplifying the game creation process
“We are building the Rho Engine, a game-authoring platform that is designed for innovation. In the hands of our expert game makers, we believe this technology will enable new category-leading products without the compromises inherent in traditional game development,” Haritatos added.
The company’s Rho Engine is designed to be used by both novice and experienced game developers. It can also be used to create games for a variety of platforms, including PC, consoles and mobile devices, with a public beta set to release in the coming months.
According to a16z in a blog post, “The generative AI revolution in games will cause the price of content to drop dramatically, going effectively to zero in some cases. This revolution will democratize the industry, enabling smaller teams to release category-leading game experiences more rapidly, all without compromising on quality/fidelity, immersion, or feature sets.”
The seed funding round also received participation from BITKRAFT, F4 Fund, and the Siqi Chen Access Fund.
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.
