Recently, the Game Developers Conference (GDC), known as the "global game technology vane", was held in San Francisco, USA. Nvidia, Microsoft, Unity, Ubisoft, Tencent, NetEase and other domestic and foreign manufacturers exchanged and discussed hot topics in the industry such as AI, engines, game narratives, and game business models.
Founded in 1988, GDC has been held for 36 sessions and has become the most authoritative and influential industry summit in the global game industry. This year, Chinese manufacturers such as Tencent, NetEase, miHoYo, and ByteDance participated in the conference, and participated in nearly 30 topic sharing.
Among them, Shenzhen-based enterprise Tencent participated in as many as 15 sharing sessions focusing on AI, rendering, cross-terminal game development and other content, and Tencent's overseas studios Riot, Supercell, Digital Extremes, etc., also brought nearly 10 theme sharing, aiming to bring better product experience to gamers around the world.
AI is the biggest hot topic of this GDC
From the perspective of the GDC agenda, AI is the biggest hot topic. In the summit session with the highest gold content alone, a total of 16 AI theme sharing sessions and 14 machine learning theme sharing sessions were set up, covering multiple aspects of game development and operation. According to GDC's official "2024 State of the Gaming Industry Report", 49% of game developers say that generative AI has been applied to their work scenarios.
During the conference, NVIDIA showcased several AI tools such as NVIDIA Avatar Cloud Engine (ACE) for speech and animation, NVIDIA NeMo for language, and NVIDIA RTX for ray-traced rendering, and Unity introduced its AI assistants such as Unity Sentis and Unity Muse.
In terms of Chinese manufacturers, Tencent AI Lab released its self-developed game AI engine GiiNEX at GDC. It is reported that GiiNEX is based on generative AI and decision-making AI technology, and supports multi-scenario applications from AI NPC creation, plot content generation, R&D testing, and simulation gameplay.
This release showcases GiiNEX's progress in 3D city generation, UGC level generation, and MOBA game teaching, among which many AI capabilities have been implemented in Tencent game products to help improve R&D and operation efficiency and innovation.
At the same time, Liao Shiyang, head of the AI team of Tencent Interactive Entertainment Rubik's Cube Technology Center, was invited to share her experience in applying reinforcement learning technology to fighting games at the AI Theme Summit. It is reported that Tencent's "Naruto" mobile game began to apply reinforcement learning technology in 2021, which is the world's first fighting game to apply this technology and an important milestone in the commercial application of machine learning. Tencent's overseas studio, Digital Extremes, was also invited to share at the summit how AI technology can efficiently produce rich, diverse and lifelike AI enemies in the open world to optimize the entertainment experience of players.
NetEase showcased a number of technical achievements, such as a machine learning anti-cheat system based on "CS:GO" game replay, and a high-performance basketball AI robot applied to "Streetball All-Stars". ByteDance shared ChatAvatar, a multi-agent enhanced 3D character generation technology applied to Planet: Reboot.
The global game development GaaS trend is emerging
In addition to AI, as the global gaming industry enters a new stage, both game product design and business models are changing. More and more overseas manufacturers are no longer limited to a single platform and develop game products with the traditional business model of selling copies, but have begun to explore more cross-platform development and Game-as-a-Service (GaaS) business models. Based on this, long-term operation, cross-terminal development and other related issues have attracted increasing attention.
Chen Xinghan, a well-known game producer and CEO of Thatgamecompany, introduced the design concept of the sustainable operation game behind his masterpiece "Light Encounter" to developers at GDC's F2P Summit, and made player interaction more friendly through specific rule design, creating a "friendly" "large social chat room". At present, the game has been downloaded more than 260 million times.
In terms of cross-terminal development, Tencent's first product for mobile games, PCs, and consoles, "Operation Delta", was also unveiled at GDC, and the relevant technical team presented "Operation Delta World Creation: Cross-platform Development of Art Pipelines and Tools" As the theme, this paper introduces a set of cross-platform development art pipelines and tools developed by overseas developers, which can create high-precision terminal game graphics while ensuring mobile performance, and has the potential to become a new art pipeline and process standard for cross-terminal game development in the future.
The annual GDC is an important platform for global game industry practitioners to exchange ideas and discuss technological innovation and applications, and it is also a window to get a glimpse of global technological development trends. In recent years, Chinese manufacturers represented by Tencent and NetEase have frequently appeared in GDC, and have gradually become a force to be reckoned with in the global game industry. Chinese manufacturers are fully integrated into the global R&D process, and based on their own precipitation, they have exported experience for the development of the global game industry to help the development of the industry.
(Author: Shenzhen Special Zone Daily reporter Zhou Yumeng text/photo)