Elon Musk is 'full of crap' for claiming xAI will make an AI-generated game in a year, says Glen Schofield: 'I want to actually say that to him'

Dead Space creator and former Striking Distance boss Glen Schofield is an advocate for AI use in game development and is not shy about it. During a keynote speech at Gamescom Asia x Thailand Games Show titled 'Ten Ways I Come Up with Ideas', Schofield championed generative AI as a brainstorming tool in game development, especially Midjourney.

During the discussion he described how he uses Midjourney to experiment with visual ideas in the pre-concept phase, and also how he uses generative AI chat to brainstorm. Schofield—who was speaking during the business-centric part of the convention—says AI's growth in gamedev is basically inevitable.

"History has shown us that every major technological leap creates whole new industries, opportunities, and specialists," he said. "AI is a technological leap—it's like the PC, internet or cellphone, and just like those it's going to create another wave. It'll change the way we work and the way we do things. Yes, some jobs are going to shift, they may go away, but new ones—millions of them—will be created over the years.

"Learn some AI that makes you better, faster and more efficient," he continued. "That's how you're going to make yourself indispensable. Now is the inflection point."

Of course, without a time machine it's impossible to say whether Schofield is right, but it increasingly seems obvious that AI use will continue ramping up. But he's relatively pragmatic, clear-eyed even, compared to others. In an interview after his keynote chat, I asked Schofield what he thought of Elon Musk's claim that xAI will release a completely AI-generated game by the end of next year.

He hadn't heard about Musk's claim but was unequivocal. "A year?" He said, visibly shocked. "In one year they'll be able to make a game? No, he's full of crap."

He continued: "Here's some of the problems I see: you have AI companies making these AI tools and saying 'this is for world building' and 'this is for videogames', and I'm like: can you tell me, did you have any [game] developers help you? Did you have input from game developers? Because one thing game makers hate is when somebody outside the industry makes a tool and then we get it and it's so screwed up because they don't know how to make games. That has to happen first. I know a couple of companies that are [making AI-centric gamedev tools], but that has to happen first.

"Making a game in a year? I mean look, somebody's going to do it, right. But I don't think it's going to be great yet. He's full of crap. That's what I believe. I want to actually say that to him."

While Schofield's AI discussion was focused on the technology as a brainstorming tool, I asked him what he thought it might be good for in five years, or further afield, when it came to active game development. He mentioned world buildings and character building, "maybe taking it from a concept and building it out", but conceded that both "are still problematic" on the level of execution, citing the difficulty of nailing 3D character movement.

Schofield spoke at length about using Midjourney to create early visual ideas that he would then hand over to an art director. He described taking old drawings of his own and splicing them together towards strange results, or just prompting bizarre specimens ("give this monster spaghetti hair, that's spiked"). Some 80 pieces of his (non-AI) art were exhibited at a gallery in San Francisco last year.

While AI image generation draws from countless millions of images already on the internet, Schofield doesn't think it should be an ethical obstacle.

"This is just my own thing: I don't use other people's art. Now, artists are gonna go 'alright [generative AI image creation] is stealing art'—but it's not stealing art. I said to a couple of them: OK you have AI right here and you don't want to use other people's art, I get that. But: you photo bashed for the last 10 years. You're using other people's work: How is that any different?

"'Well, I'm using my own style' [they might say], or something like that, and I think that's BS too. Because when you're an artist learning to draw, you're copying other people's stuff all the time, you're taking pieces. So what I would like to get out there: put this legal stuff behind you. Some of it's ethical, and everybody's got different ethics, so work with your own ethics, but do not ignore AI."