Square Enix president Takashi Kiryu has already ruffled feathers in the new year by reaffirming the company’s desire to use artificial intelligence technology in its upcoming games and projects.
In the president’s annual New Year’s letter, Kiryu expressed that the company intends to “be aggressive in applying AI and other cutting-edge technologies to both our content development and publishing functions.”
“In the short term, our goal will be to improve our development productivity and achieve greater sophistication in our marketing efforts. In the long term, we hope to leverage those technologies to create new forms of content for consumers, as we believe that technological innovation represents business opportunities.”
Kiryu also praises technologies such as ChatGPT, which, in his words, “made it evident that the applicability of generative AI was in no way limited to text, and the following months saw a rapid succession of launches of new services and content that expanded generative AI into a variety of domains with close ties to digital entertainment, including images, videos, and music.”
It’s worth noting that Kiryu wasn’t specific about how exactly Square Enix will leverage AI technology in its upcoming titles, including the highly anticipated one. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. He also avoids mentioning that generative AI platforms are suspected of training with data created by writers and artists without their permission. Incidentally, this is the focus of an ongoing lawsuit against platforms like Midjourney and Stability.
Of course, artificial intelligence has always been a staple of the medium when it comes to the more technical side of things. This is how we even have NPCs to fight in single-player games. More recently, it has been usefully used in technology such as Nvidia DLSS, which leverages artificial intelligence to improve resolution and frame rates with negligible impact on overall game performance.
It is the mention of the use of generative AI for “images, videos and music”, as Kiryu highlights, that has people on social networks concerned. Last year, Square Enix also worked on projects involving Final Fantasy 7 NFT trading cards and plans for a blockchain-based RPG; None of which were particularly well received by the company’s fan base.
With the new year right around the corner, you might be looking at a whole new list of games to play. Our guides for best ps5 games and best nintendo switch games We are here to help you make your decisions.
