Comment by brandall10 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by brandall10 | Hacker News Reader

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I find it funny that Take Two is dropping against this news... the company that has taken some 13 years to create a sequel to its primary franchise. Wouldn't tech that could significantly shorten the timeline back to something closer to a few years like it was 20 years ago - while at the same time massively expanding the scope of the game relative to those - seen as a boost to share value? Isn't releasing a billion dollar entry to a franchise 4-5x as quickly something shareholders should be celebrating?

It's not like someone is going to prompt up "gimme GTA7 based on what you know about all the past GTAs" and similar crazy high level instructions in a few weeks and go, "yep, that's our standard". There are almost certainly thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of little decisions that go into producing something so massive in scope. Anything that could significantly speed up prototyping, world building, character modeling, NPC behavior, etc, should be seen as a massive boon, and probably the shot in the arm the video game industry needs.

And I have the same critique of premium streaming series. Vince Gilligan likes to extoll the benefits of not using AI at all in producing his work, but then he gives us a potentially 3 year span between seasons of his latest entry... where not a lot happened, because it's almost entirely chewing character dev stuff. The idea that a 5-6 season show might take longer to complete than seeing a child born and off to college is absolute bonkers.

That's a smart take. However, the cost and time to make GTA6 is mostly baked in at this point.

What I think is likely is that the cost of many other types of games in the future will be reduced because of AI. It's an open question how useful AI will be but I think its clear that it can make a lot of tasks in game making more efficient.

>>It's not like someone is going to prompt up "gimme GTA7 based on what you know about all the past GTAs"

well....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3u1G3RZsL4

>Wouldn't tech that could significantly shorten the timeline back to something closer to a few years like it was 20 years ago - while at the same time massively expanding the scope of the game relative to those - seen as a boost to share value?

Games are already too big and too bloated. I'm not excited for anything along these lines. The best outcome would have been if ballooning game budgets required people to dial back projects and spending so that games were smaller in scope.

If this plays out, we'll see the opposite. LLMs are used to offset the costs of games while they become bigger and dumber than they already are.

I'm more of a 'patient' gamer and this is a criticism I had quite a bit in the past... even GTA5 I lost interest about 25 hours in. A couple years ago I played Stray and was wowed by the art direction and tight if fairly minimal story and playtime.

Cyberpunk has changed my perspective on this. Started last August, now 84 hours in, and I plan to do a completion-ist run of at least 120+ hours. Around hour 50 I could have completed the main storyline which snuck up on me quicker than expected, so I'm trickling in the Phantom Liberty quest-line while chewing thru gigs and side jobs, many of which add a ton of narrative impact.

I remember way back when Sopranos ended and I was fairly sullen for a few months after... similar response to The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, BCS, Succession. Don't watch TV as a rule, but I immediately stopped what I was doing when a new ep of those dropped. Felt almost like I lost a loved one when each ended.

Pretty sure I'll have the same response to this game, I'm dreading leaving this universe. After that I'll get to Baldur's Gate 3 and probably have the same experience. Then after taking a year to finish that off, will likely move on to RDR2. Maybe by then I'll be able to play GTA6 on my Mac.

Basically, my thinking is that - a premium series is going to be roughly 50-60 hours, so if the story and immersion is there... which it certainly is w/ a game like Cyberpunk, the base game should roughly give a similar playtime. The fact that there is so much bonus content that is lovingly crafted gives players the option to stay longer if they so desire is fantastic given these things are now taking 10+ years to produce.

Still, the market reaction seems hasty and hype driven. A bit wild their stocks got impacted this much. But I guess the market has short term memory.

But, I do agree a lot of things could be sped up. Animation and photogrammetry based modelling (widely used for character's clothing) come to mind. And, it should be used in cases such as these, where it is just a tool. Nothing more, nothing less.

Take Two has 13 years of sunk costs they need to recoup.

They will almost certainly do well with GTA 6, but maybe a game that can compete with GTA 6 will be coming out a lot sooner now.

We are a year away from GTA 6, presuming the HQ boiler explosion causes a delay.

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