Much like it was for the movie business, 2022 was a blockbuster year for the global gaming industry. Gaming fans the world over were treated to powerhouse titles like Elden Ring and God of War Ragnarok.
New realms of creativity were revealed in games like Immortality and Stray. Meanwhile, the likes of Pentiment, Sift and A Plague Tale: Requiem presented a stylish new vision of future-proofed video games. And that’s to say nothing of the gaming tech advancements that dominated the year, with the arrival of cross-platform play and the global expansion of eSports being top of the list.
The numerous highs of the past year were dampened slightly by the scarcity of next-gen consoles like the PS5 and the delays impacting a number of big-name gaming releases. However, supply-chain issues and studio hold-ups mean that there’s now plenty to look forward to here in 2023. What else does the gaming industry have in store for us this year?
The Rise of Generative AI
Photo editing apps like Lensa and ChatGPT’s startlingly coherent output have pushed generative AI into the spotlight during the past few months, but for the most part, its role in gaming development has been somewhat unclear.
As 2023 progresses, things will become a lot clearer on the AI front. We’re already beginning to see how AI can be utilised in game production thanks to EA making excellent use of machine learning to amp up FIFA’s real-time animation. What’s more, programmes like Midjourney and even ChatGPT could make their way into the game design and development process.
Village Studio, a new Web3 gaming venture from veteran game designer Will Luton already utilises Midjourney as part of its concept art workflow. The speed at which it can generate ideas, colour pallets and styles has been invaluable in freeing the company “from designer’s block”. ChatGPT, meanwhile, has enormous utility as an ideation tool, since the programme can suggest and refine designs for everything from gameplay features to content.
Crypto Gaming Levels Up
The cryptocurrency and blockchain gaming sectors have been booming in recent months, having seen a $5 billion funding increase since Q4 2021. Blockchain games like Axie Infinity and The Sandbox have soared in popularity to the point where they’ve even infiltrated the traditional video gaming sector.
The evolution of GameFi will take crypto gaming to the next level in 2023, with players being able to dive into Bitcoin video poker, earn NFTs in exciting new gaming projects, and potentially play crypto games from high-profile gaming companies.
The play-to-earn (P2E) model, in particular, has become increasingly relevant to both the gaming and crypto industries. Rewarding players for their time spent playing games with non-fungible tokens is not just an effective way to boost the profile of a particular gaming title; it also encourages more global consumers to take an active interest in the blockchain and crypto markets.
It makes sense then that several traditional western gaming businesses are diversifying into the space, hinting at high-profile public launches from Ubisoft as the year goes on.
Intelligent NPCs
To the uninitiated, NPCs (non-player characters) crop up throughout video games and give predetermined answers and dialogue as a means of facilitating the storyline. The term itself is now a staple part of meme culture, but NPCs have their origins in old-school role-playing games. The recent advancements being made in AI are likely to impact the role of NPCs, and we could begin to see intelligent, conversant non playable characters make their way into gaming titles before the year is out.
Several university-based gaming research and development teams have already begun to experiment with generative language models to create conversant NPCs, with some even making up dialogue as the day progresses. In a fully-realised title, this would create an unreliable narrator effect and throw up technical and design challenges that developers would need to overcome. One way around this would be to create games based on making NPCs talk, building on the concepts of forgotten gems like Rockstar’s LA Noire, which was largely interrogation based.
Gamers Will Take Control
In 2023, the collaborative relationship between video game developers and their creative fan communities will be more prominent than ever before. Fan communities have long contributed to the narrative universe of their favourite games through stories, artwork, and fan-made spin-offs.
However, this year will see several games that put player-generated content at the forefront. One such game is Meet Your Maker, a first-person building-and-raiding game where players design levels and missions. The following twelve months could also see the relationship between games and gamers undergo a significant shit, as players will be able to go beyond simply using in-game tools to impact gameplay.
With development tools like the Unity game engine becoming more accessible to people from all walks of life, gamers themselves could soon be taking control.
