Cloud AI for Video Games Is Dead on Arrival, On-Device Is the Future | Hacker News Reader

Cloud AI for Video Games Is Dead on Arrival, On-Device Is the Future

atelico.studio

16 pointsmaiybe12 comments

Looking for feedback for an AI engine that runs sophisticated game AI locally instead of in the cloud, literally reducing costs to 0. Our tech demo (GARP) runs 20+ autonomous NPCs with memory, planning, and real-time interaction on a single RTX 3090 - something that previously cost $500/day with cloud APIs.

The engine is composable, modular, and integrates with major game engines. We're enabling developers to create deep, responsive game worlds without the burden of cloud computing costs or API rate limits.

Would love to hear the community's thoughts on local vs. cloud AI for gaming applications.

How much GPU memory are you using? Demanding games already use most if not all available VRAM just for rendering so there isn't a great deal of room left for big AI models. Even if you target games with simple graphics, the size of the AI model would still dictate the min-spec for it to be playable.

Under the hood, we're supporting multiple models that can be selected, but haven't optimized all the quantizations possible (the space is moving fast).

The range is 1GB - 24GB, depending on model selection, but would be amazing to push lower than that. 24GB is high end as only the NVIDIA XX90s can support those.

1-2GB might be workable if the model still performs adequately at that level, but anything more than that sounds very hard to justify for as long as the median Steam user and console baseline (Xbox Series S) only have 8GB of VRAM to go around.

Depends on the fidelity of the graphics, but I agree with you that the smaller the VRAM usage, the broader base we can support on e.g. Steam. 1GB - 2GB would be the sweet spot for all game types, which 1B parameter quantized models can hit.

There is some evidence that next gen consoles will feature AMD NPUs, and I suspect there will be more available RAM. There's definitely positive tailwinds that will change the hardware landscape over time.

Very interesting. How do we get our hands on it to try it out?

We are in closed alpha, but eager to talk with folks about what they're working on. Easiest is to reach out to: hello@atelico.studio

This is amazing... what a great team behind this company building a sustainable AI implementation into games. Cool to see how this will develop in the future as the technology scales. Great Job!

Great demo! This is going to happen outside games too. A glimpse of how AI is going to blend in everyday life.

This is super cool, I can't imagine what it costs to pay per API call in a video game with many players.

This is by far the most interesting + practical application of AI in games that I've seen. Very cool

Love this. Very positive development for all of us, it is the future.

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