Horizon Dev Promises It Isn't Trying to Replace Aloy Actress with AI

AI is here to stay and will only get more popular. Make sure that your career has nothing to do with intelligence unless you want to be replaced.

@heavyartillery56 This is the new truth. People don't know what's coming. The whole world as we know it is about to change forever and there's no going back.

Seriously anyone who isn't informed about AI and where it is going really needs to do some research.

A quick search on YouTube for the 10 levels of AI would be a good start.

@heavyartillery56 "Make sure that your career has nothing to do with intelligence" so any career?

@Bagwag82 That's why it's so important to regulate it from the get-go. There are many awful things that exist that can be mitigated through the proper regulations being in place.

She has some great points. That tech demo obviously wasn't very polished and sounded nothing like Aloy. But it's not that far off, and the fact that they're experimenting with it should be a massive red flag. I hope the actors get some sort of protection from AI through the strikes.

Taking humanities classes should be made mandatory for anybody studying in the computing field these days. The sheer lack of understanding of the human condition coming from new graduates in fields like AI is a major root of the issue, they believe that humans are replaceable in every situation. Voice acting is give and take, the actors often pour just as much of themselves into the role as they’re provided by the director, which AI text-to-speech cannot do. Our souls are reflected in the art we produce and it’s horrifying to see the glee which advocates of AI show as they push for the enshittification of every single good thing humanity touches.

@Bagwag82 The reality is late stage capitalism encourages constant growth, which combined with the semitruth of unlimited free labour will create mass unemployment as companies race to the bottom. Except the DWP has been replaced by an algorithm and case workers are now an overly chipper chat bot that sends emojis as your claim is denied during the one day of the year that the service isn’t down for maintenance. If the rapid adoption of AI in the workplace doesn’t actually benefit anybody except shareholders and leaves everyone below middle management out of work then we don’t have to do it. Just because we can doesn’t mean that we have to. What is it all actually for. It needs to be stamped out with zero tolerance or everything will burn down eventually anyway, you can’t train a workforce quickly enough to pivot to other roles maintaining these systems. It’ll be the mines closing but for literally everyone.

Why gets Horizon a unique (?) orange theme on PushSquare?

@nessisonett Well we need growth and progress. And nothing does that better than capitalism. Even the Chinese hopped on the train. If the west don't adopt AI someone else will and it will be them that rule the world.

@heavyartillery56 It’s hard to even respond to such a simplistic view of the world. I’m not sure what you even mean by ‘ruling the world’ for starters; while espousing capitalism as a driver of ‘growth and progress’ (two vague terms with little meaning here) would then imply that ‘the West’ cannot actually adopt AI, only specific megacorporations within the West that governments would have no control over in your strange fantasy. If ‘the West’ was to adopt AI then that would really be a socialist policy involving government intervention in private business and some sort of centralised rolling out of a state-sponsored AI model. Of course, this is implying that you understand anything beyond Western exceptionalism and the slightly tragic faith that wealth would trickle down from the three quadrillionaires on Earth created by such a dystopia.

@nessionett Oh, a capitalism discussion! We are back again to the discussions of the 70s, where robots in car manufacturing were supposed to make most of the workers obsolete. It realised, but nobody would go back to the time when workers did the welding, because machine-welded cars are much better now. The work for the man mainly focuses more on complex stuff, and here the interesting thing: The product designers also adapt to this, and they make the products more complex and therefore better!

Most of the assets in games are kitsch, not art, and they can easily be created by AI. Even better, they can created in realtime, adapted to the situation. Most people in Cyberpunk 2077 are zombies, with no human behaviour, wandering around and saying only one or two sentences. THEY can be made more human, and the world gets much more credible.

I would bet that classical (voice) acting for important characters will not get replaced, because customers don’t want it. You buy no bad products, right? It’s as easy as that.

Some people are terrified of progress and it shows. Change is coming and I’m sorry it means that you are going to become irrelevant but that’s just how things go sometimes - learn new skills and adapt or be left behind.

Almost everyone is replacable. That was the case before AI and will continue to be.

Games companies in the future won’t use an actors real voice to create games. They’ll create computer generated voices so they don’t need to pay anyone anything.

Established franchises will pay to use a current actors voice until they move on to another character model (like a series reboot) but long term voice actors are finished in this industry

Ashley i hear you but your hair is a mess.

This trend towards AI in everything is why I'm going to get out of programming. It tends to produce low quality, unoriginal stuff. My avatar was generated with it and you can see the errors in it. It's going to be a depressing future if things continue the way they are. There was a good book about Spotify and how it is pushing AI generated music in their playlists to reduce money paid to real artists. That's the real reason AI is being pushed so much, more money for shareholders and screw everyone else.

@bluemage1989 something tells me that certain people don't see an issue with it unless it directly affects them and their livelihood. As long it's everyone else's, "it's just an inevitability".

@nessisonett as someone who comes from the field of humanities, I seriously couldn't agree more.

@nessisonett It's not simplistic. People were saying just 3 years ago that you can't take over more land with force, but those people are quiet now. They got reminded how the world really works and has worked since day1.

@heavyartillery56 The constant push for 'growth' is one of the great myths of economics. Politicians talk about it constantly, 'we must have more growth', but we live on a finite planet with finite resources and a world population that is beginning to show significant decline in numbers. Growth is not sustainable, disproportionately benefits a very few oligarchs, and AI seems like it will turbo charge this situation. The ultimate disruptive innovation.

@TimeDelayedGamer Without progress and growth there is only inevitable stagnation and death. One of the few redeeming qualities of the current US administration is that they are restarting their interest in space exploration. If you want to guarantee a future of our species: that is it. There is nothing else.

@naruball I couldn’t care less about other peoples livelihoods just as I’m sure they couldn’t care less about mine and you would mad to think almost anyone else is any different.

@bluemage1989 at least you admit it.

"I’m sure they couldn’t care less about mine and you would mad to think almost anyone else is any different"

Sure, buddy. Just because you lack empathy, doesn't mean the rest of the world is the same.

@heavyartillery56 That's a bit of an extreme evolutionary viewpoint. The shark has been perfectly adapted to its environment for millions of years and has got on fine without stagnation and death (at least until humans came about).

I'm hoping that best-case scenario, the human race in conjunction with AI will reach some sort of equilibrium where material and energy needs will be met and we can forge forwards on our own terms when it comes to advancement.

But that's science fiction just now. In the meantime, I completely understand the concerns of the voice actors and other people worried about their livelihoods, and agree with those speaking about that indefinable spark that makes us human, the soul that is greater than any collection of parts, being lost.

And remember, this is not just about people losing their jobs. This is also about copyright and the human rights of individuals: the right to your own image, and your own voice. That's a real, personal thing that on an individual level goes way beyond big ideas like 'growth', 'stagnation', or 'evolution'.

I personally prefer human works but tech advance is inevitable. So sooner or later AI gonna replace human VA. Just like when you see in the factory or restaurant where a lot of human workers got replaced by robots / machine...

So - there's a lot to unpack... as I and others have said - why would you use a principal (player/voiced) character for this - and why do it for something that actually adds no intrinsic value. I also understand that the video may have been taken out of context (it was apparently a sprint-style tech demo.. but at the same time, this is your IP and credibility you're working with).

Unfortunately - I think it is just a matter of years (and not many years) before the majority of characters are voiced by AI. And motion-captured through AI. Because.... they can, and what they can do, corporate drive means they must do. Especially once someone else does it.

I am the first to say, Aloy's characterisation didn't work for me - but I will also be the first to say that actors should (under direction) provide the human representation in games. Not bots. Whether we love them or not - it's meant to be a human experience... especially for games purporting to be narrative heavy games.

Edit - oh - and the really horrifying thing about this is that the real voice/performance actors are still on strike. Seriously - whoever leaked this video was either an idiot, or really wanted to do Sony (or the gaming industry) harm.

They've been on strike for 8 months now... that should tell you how sensitive the industry is to AI.

As an aside... reading through the comments - I don't think a lot of the people leaving comments are either adults, or have had serious jobs, or are creative, or perhaps don't mind dropping out of the human race. Indeed... there's a lot of comments that read more like AI-master-race-bots than anything. This isn't about "advancement"... AI isn't about better (by and large) - it's about cheaper and quicker. At what point are you prepared to give up quality and meaning?

A lot of people use AI to assist their work... the point is - this isn't about assisting anyone - other than the bottom line. There are other ways to address things (for example move the industry to less expensive parts of the US - rather than the MOST EXPENSIVE PARTS). And if this actually ends up with a broader workforce - rather than an LA-SF centric workforce, then I'm all up for that.

In fact... I'd be all up for a lot more Canada-based studios (as an Australian even).

There are multiple point of views to the discussion. We can question what gives art its soul and could or should it ever be replaced by AI? Something i’m definitely not in favour of.

However, since technology progresses exponentially in most cases, we are only at the beginning of what AI can produce. What if in the future (even thinking decades and centuries from now), can produce art that is more profound and awe inspiring than any human could have ever produced, even if it’s made by AI. Should we still stop it?

But there’s also the fear and real possibility of general AI taking over, making us second class citizens, and thats if they would be benevolent. So should we even proceed developing general AI?

Pragmatically speaking, you could also see it as a tool, it is progress. And like any other technology, it might make some jobs obsolete. And people in these industries will just have to adapt to it. Same as some factory workers needed to adapt when automatization came , or any types of jobs that were lost due to new technology.

The opposite side of the coin, would be that human art is forever lost, and it would lose it’s soul if it was produced by AI.

I think for better or worse, AI is here to stay.

@nessisonett Time to transition to a resource based economy, where the system doesn’t necessitates infinite growth by mindless consumption and production

@LogicStrikesAgain I'm sorry... not sure how good your history is - automation didn't lead to factory workers being re-trained. It meant a lot of factory workers had to find new jobs. I'm not anti-automation per se; but I think people need to stop rose-colouring the view.

Edit - and what exactly do you mean by a resource-based economy.... I'm curious what you think that means.

@heavyartillery56 I think you are encapsulating your ideology very well.

Do you want Art or Content?

@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare My ideology is based on history and events that repeat constantly.

@heavyartillery56 what does that mean in this context? I know i will regret asking, but I suppose I should try.

@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare “Same as some factory workers needed to adapt when automatization came , or any types of jobs that were lost due to new technology.”

I didn’t say they were retrained, i said they had to adapt to the new situation. As in, they needed to work on new skills and find other jobs in new industries. I’m not saying i’m in favour of that btw, i hope you understand i’m merely describing multiple viewpoints to the discussion. (I edited that part, to hopefully make it more clear what i was trying to say.)

To answer your question. A resource based economy is an economy based on the resources we have on earth and a system that uses science to equally distribute resources to humans, specifically looking at the amount of resources and it’s rate of depletion and sustainability.

If you’re interested, the Zeitgeist: Addendum and Zeitgeist: Moving Forward are wonderful documentaries to start with. It breaks down the essential mechanisms of capitalism and our monetary system and shows how we can use the scientific method to create a better economic system that is not based on endless growth and consumption, and by extension the endless depletion of resources. Which is a pretty crazy system to still use, in a world consisting of finite resources

@LogicStrikesAgain that's not adapting... you understand that's being laid off. The way you talk is like it was a rewarding experience... they got upskilled?

Ok... if you're trying to convince people on how capitalism works through unending technological advancement... I think you're maybe on the wrong site. This is about games. I'm not going to get into politics, but I think I'm picking up what you're laying down. I don't need to talk about this more..

@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare Dude, what? I wasn’t even reacting to you with the capitalism part, i was reacting to nessisonett because he was talking about capitalism. You asked me what i meant with a resource based economy, so i explained. Don’t ask me anything if you don’t want to hear an answer. And by how you “summarized” my explanation i highly doubt “you are picking up what i’m laying down”

And no, i don’t mean they got upskilled. When jobs become obsolete due to new technology people also need to adapt to the new situation. It has happened many times in history, i was merely giving an example. When automated driving becomes mainstream, truck drivers will need to adapt to the reality of a new technology that might make their jobs obsolete. I mean adapt here in the sense that people will have to change or become adjusted to changing conditions and circumstances. It’s a perfectly normal word to use for what i was trying to describe.

And just to be clear to everyone, i’m not saying i’m in favor of this, in fact nothings saddens me more than art losing it’s human touch. But i’m merely trying to illuminate multiple views of the discussion. I feel like i had to clearly mention this, since some people can’t see the difference between discussing a point of view and with agreeing and endorsing a point of view

@bluemage1989 Empathy starts to develop in children aged 7.

I hope you are never in a position where you have to rely on someone else for help. Good luck.

These arguments are so tired and have been recycled ever since ancient Greek philosophers railed against the art of writing. The exact same argument was pushed when synthesisers and drum machines came on the music scene in the early 80s, that it was doing drummers out of jobs. But music didn't die and new generations all over the world successfully created revolutionary fresh sounds with the new tech. Technology can't be uninvented, it really is what it is and you have to adapt.

@Jey887 At age 8 they learn that it can be easily exploited. Good luck!

@Silenos @Oz_Who_Dat_Dare Rule #2: “Adapt, react, readapt, apt.” - Michael Scott (Founder of Michael Scotts 10 Rules of Business)

@PcTV yes exactly. Regulation is needed. It may not be able to keep up with the fast paced but having any kind of regulation is definitely needed

@nessisonett exactly and this is part of what I was trying to get at when I said the majority of people are blind to it all and don't understand it all either.

Games are living pieces of art. Expression of human thoughts. I'm interrested in this.

AI is made to kill, steal, rip off, torn to pieces and sew together someone's work. Only because of human lazyness to make it themselve. I'm not interrested in this dead frankenstein thing.

I think people should not be only informed where AI was used, but given option (defaultly declined) to contribute to AI by any form.

@heavyartillery56 you aren't wrong. I've advised my nephews to get a trade - be it an electrician, carpenter, plumber etc.

Most Western countries and in particular the UK have a crippling housing crisis with the population exploding by the day.

That's where the jobs will be in the future and they will be very well paid.

Learning to code on the other hand, or even voice acting has no future. The managers and directors will still be needed to extract their vision from the AI, but that's about it...

@Jey887 I am capable of looking after myself unlike a lot of these VAs it seems.

@naruball ”Something tells me that certain people don't see an issue with it unless it directly affects them and their livelihood. As long it's everyone else's, "it's just an inevitability".

This is poetry! Truer thing has not been said about the current state of the world in general.

I’m gonna make this same argument here, that I made on another thread a few months ago. It seems to me the same posters who are absolutely fine with AI taking certain people’s jobs, are the same people who weren’t fine with certain “other“ people taking those same people‘s jobs. Apparently a robot taking the place of a non-minority actor is perfectly fine. But when a minority actor gets a role, it’s a completely different reaction. Hmm…

@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare 8 MONTHS!?!? Wow, I only read about it yesterday, or the day before, in the previous article, and I follow this stuff. This is the world's worst strike. Or wherever the strike is taking place. Is it worldwide or just the US or someplace else? If it's been 8 months you aren't on strike, your basically retired.😩

AI may suck now, but I've played enough JRPG, watched enough anime and martial arts movies from the 70s and 80s to know that human voice acting can suck just as hard. I think they hired randos off the street for Arc Rise Fantasia on the Wii. Do I think it's up for star roles now? No. Do I get taken out of a game experience where half the people are voice acted and half aren't? Yes. Are the Nintendo voice noises the worst thing to ever happen to video games? Yes, yes they are.

Aloy was a very bad choice though. Whatever happened to random old creepy guys like the PS4 launch? Unknown is better, no preconceived notion of the voice.

If there's anyone I can trust with the knowledge of the creative process of game development and creative production as a whole, surely it's Push Square commenters! Right...?

Coders, musicians, artists, writers, etc. are going to hit hard times going forward. Won't be long before large creative works are LARGELY the products of artificial intelligence, with just some people overseeing things in the background. It won't be perfect, but it'll be good enough to satisfy most people, and we're going to be seeing such a huge increase in output in areas that used to reflect human artistry.

More salt of the earth trades will be fine. AI isn't replacing electricians, plumbers, nurses, mechanics, etc. any time soon.

I expect the emergence of more production houses and publications that explicitly advertise the 'novelty' of human-produced art, though. Smaller ones, but they'll give creatives places to go.

There's no way to really stem the tide of this fundamental transformation of human life going forward. Some people will try, and regulations will be put in place once the public notices how obsolete humans are becoming in a variety of fields and freak out, but this is only going to move in one direction, and it won't be toward less automation.

Living in the future is FUN, innit? <3

The issue with AI isn't so much AI itself its more how its used. Corps don't want AI to help improve things they want as a way to replace people to cut costs.

Well... I have yet to hear an AI that isn't completely bonkers and broken in some way.
Sure, with perfectionioning it might get better. But, I have doubts it will resonate with audiences.
Also, to improve said AI will require lifting up the work of many others and I can see legal issues with that.
In the end what an AI does is gather up lots of examples of what you want done and create an average approximation. Is that really original work or plagiarism en-masse? 🤷‍♂️

Without real artists adding to the data pool will AI keep being able to come up with new pieces of art? It's certainly not a great spot to be in. I can see it getting stale and repetitive fast.
Actually, I already see it in art AI bots. They are all very samey with what they draw. They aren't capable of originality.

@Bagwag82 True, I didn't take the tech seriously a few years ago when it started to be pushed on us, but now, after a just few years, I'm seriously blown away by it. Interesting times ahead.

@naruball Agree. If only there was some form of AI to replace/threaten corporate big wigs and other people pushing for this.

@jorel262 I'm sure one day this will happen as well and then they'll suddenly have an issue with it.

@rjejr So SAG-AFTRA - the gaming specific actor union (basically VA/motion actors) went on strike around the same time (a bit after) screen actors... but when screen actors union was settled, all the attention dissipated... leaving the non-screen actors kinda in limbo.

The issue isn't whether AI will improve - it will - but whether we need it to replace jobs that can be perfectly done by humans. I will contend, a big problem is that much of the software/games industry has centred around high-cost location (because there's a myth that talented people wouldn't move outside their desired locations for jobs). That's a theory put about by people that want to reinforce the LA/Seattle mythos.

The idea that you need to employ just worse VA is wrong... are we saying there's only really 5-6 VA in all of US (Troy, Ashley, Laura, Nolan, Ashley, Jennifer?)... clearly there's more. I'd personally want to hear a broader range of VA, rather than listen to Troy do the 100th different game chareacter voice.

I'm not going to go on a political rant - but the point is - AI in gaming is about maintaining sustainability for a core group of people's life-styles... and they will increasingly peel off the most outside (cheapest) layers to ensure that the core people live their best life-style. It's not about making Voice Actor's lives easier.

I'm not ever spending a dime on a game that replaces real acting with AI slop. Not ever. I've been an avid gamer for almost 30 years. But this industry will lose me and many others forever if they don't do the right thing going forward.

@Oz_Who_Dat_Dare I think you're right. A lot of the pro AI folks probably are really young and don't yet realize that the industry doesn't have their best interests at heart. Us older folks have all learned that eventually. With charging for online play. Day one DLC. Microtransactions. Loot boxes. We've lived through so many "advancements" in tech that have made the industry worse. So we know AI is going to be just another one. I think a lot of younger folks don't yet realize that advancements in technology don't necessarily make games more enjoyable.

@Ralizah I disagree. I think the actual market for AI created works is probably going to be incredibly small to nonexistent. People like Kendrick Lamar and Taylor Swift. People like Kazuo Ishiguro. People like Robert Eggers. People like Hideo Kojima. People like things created by other people. People want that human connection. That's why names are so important in the world of art. I don't think anyone seriously wants art to be humanless.

I've been saying this for years. But most seem to be deluded when it comes to AI and how it's going to take millions of jobs away from real people. It always gets defended on this site. I work in the automotive industry and it's been encroaching on my workspace for years. When companies start using AI to write a dumb game review maybe then people will care.

@HotGoomba Get morse sense in the comments than you will in the articles.