DOOM creator keen on "ethical" uses for AI, but worried about AAA-style "homogenisation"

rockpapershotgun.com:

The conversation/free-for-all around the role of automated "AI"-based game development continues with a few thoughts from Tom Hall, co-founder of id Software and one of the creators of the original DOOM, who says he's (Commander) keen on the prospect of "ethical" uses for such tools in gamedev, but worries that reliance on them "will homogenize games, sort of like AAA games are now".

Speaking to Sektor.sk, Hall said he was "excited" by "how AI could be used ethically to be more of a core element of the game, so it's almost like a game that you're playing and it's playing you, in a sense, or it knows what you want. It could generate things for you, or enable different gameplay, it can adapt much more seamlessly to what you're doing, or just sensibly create more game content."

But he added: "I don't want it to just willy-nilly be procedural, everything AI, and just not have any crafting to it, because that will homogenize games, sort of like a lot of AAA games are now. They're just kind of like I attack the monster, oh, it's attacking, I'll roll out of the way. It's all kind of the same stuff. And that's what I don't want to happen to games because of AI. I want it to enable us to make cooler things, and more amazing things, but there still needs to be a sense of craft."

The current generation of "artificial intelligence" or machine learning tools - ranging from language learning models like ChatGPT to image generators such as Midjourney - continues to divide developers, with many pointing out that the latest crop of AI tools are 1) far from the magical labour-saving devices they're billed to be (perhaps because each "AI creation" actually represents the labour of thousands of low-income workers), and 2) essentially