GTA 6 may be the last big-budget game built without AI

The billion-dollar game against AI: The future choice for the gaming industry

The world's much-anticipated video game Grand Theft Auto 6 took 12 years to build. The masterpiece, which was originally scheduled to be released in November and has been postponed twice, is expected to have a budget of US$1 billion to US$2 billion-probably the most expensive entertainment product ever produced in any media field.

across multiple studios built its world the old way, manually. Rockstar's owner is proud of that. "Their worlds are handcrafted," Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnicksaid, insisting "generative AI has zero part" in the game. "They're built from the ground up, building by building, street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood. "

However, no one in the gaming world believes this $2 billion game is a good deal. On October 2, in Tokyo, Japan, a long-established industry giant proposed a way to break through.

First of all, who is Capcom?

Capcom is one of the long-standing and huge brands in video games. The Japanese company, founded in 1979 and headquartered in Osaka, has created classic works such as Resident Evil, Street Fighter, Monster Hunter, Rockman and Devil May Cry.

If you've ever held a gamepad, you've probably played a Capcom game. Currently, a new "Resident Evil" movie is being screened in theaters.

在东京举行的自家发布会上，该公司宣布将其用于构建所有游戏的系统转化为所谓的“AI生成游戏引擎”。要理解此举的重要性，你需要知道什么是游戏引擎。

为什么游戏引擎至关重要？

游戏引擎是处理游戏所需一切内容的软件——包括图形、音效，以及角色跳跃或开门的物理机制。开发人员并非从零开始构建每款游戏，而是在引擎内部进行开发。

AI不能直接制作整款游戏吗？

人们已经尝试过了。最著名的案例是Oasis，一款2024年爆红的Minecraft AI版本——这是一款没有任何代码的游戏，AI模型根据玩家的按键操作“想象”出每一帧画面。类似地，一些爆红的GTA AI重制版也采用相同原理。

但玩起来又是另一回事了。Oasis的画面模糊不清，仅为360p分辨率；当你转身时，它会忘记你身后的世界；甚至在动作进行中，它还会将你瞬移到其他地方。PC Gamer将这类作品概括为展示了“AI无限复制事物的能力，但效果更差。”

Zelnick更深层次的反对意见关乎艺术创作。他曾表示：“从定义上讲，任何AI模型中都不可能存在创造力。”他认为，AI只能回顾过去存在的事物，而真正的爆款源于尚未存在的新事物。

卡普空的唯一选择

在3月的股东会议上，卡普空声明：“我们不会将在游戏中使用由AI生成的资产。然而，我们计划积极利用其作为辅助技术，以提高游戏开发流程的效率和工作生产力。”

简单来说：卡普空游戏中永远不会出现由AI制作的怪物、面孔、音乐或艺术作品。你所见所闻的一切均由人类创造。

卡普空此前已进行过此类尝试。据GameSpark在2025年1月报道，该公司开发了一款AI工具，能够阅读设计文档并为填充游戏世界的成千上万个小物件（如桶、标志牌、家具）提供创意建议。

为何需要这种工具？技术总监Kazuki Abe以《怪物猎人》为例解释道：团队必须为单款游戏构思“数十万个独特的想法”。AI负责提供建议，人类负责决策。据报道，员工对这一工具赞不绝口。

正如卡普空程序员Sashi Ishida所指出的问题，现代游戏的细节如此丰富，以至于微小的改动也需要耗费巨大工作量。制作游戏变得既缓慢又昂贵——《GTA 6》便是这一极端例证。

整个行业正朝此方向迈进

今年的一项调查显示，36%的游戏从业人员每天在工作中使用AI，主要用于研究和头脑风暴，而非核心创意工作。

The reason behind this is money. The cost of making games is unprecedented, and the industry has experienced waves of layoffs. At a conference last October,"Dead Space" creator Glen Schofield believed AI could help solve this problem-not by replacing humans, but by allowing developers to work faster.

Industry giants are all taking action. Microsoft has built a generative AI that can train based on its own game titles to create game scenarios. Ubisoft runs an AI tool that predicts the location of bugs before they appear in code. Electronic Arts (EA) CEO Andrew Wilson once told investors that AI is at the core of the company's business. While Rockstar's parent company Take-Two, while prides itself on its hand-crafted craftsmanship, it also runs "hundreds of generative AI pilot projects" internally, but these projects are applied at the tool level rather than at the artistic level.

Wall Street estimated huge gains for this. An analysis by Morgan Stanley estimates that by reducing content production costs, the gaming industry's largest expense, generative AI could generate $22 billion in additional operating profits to the gaming industry.

Editor's Opinion

Development costs are the main factor driving the price increase of games. The price of a standard new book will remain at US$60 for about 15 years, rising to US$70 in 2020, and when Nintendo priced "Mario Kart World" in 2025, it exceeded the US$80 mark-this is the first time since the cassette era A regular version of a game has reached this price.

After fifteen years of price stabilization, two price increases have been experienced in just five years, and both price increases have been accompanied by budget expansion to the scale of "GTA 6" level. "If AI can really reduce game production costs, it is the industry's main leverage for the next $90 increase. But when making games becomes cheaper, one of two things happens: either games become cheaper, or games become more daring and innovative." said Mehab Qureshi, senior editor of TheStreet.