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Austin Wood

@woodwould.bsky.social

13-year game journalist. Senior writer at GamesRadar+. Previously: PC Gamer, IGN, Rock Paper Shotgun, Eurogamer. Email: austin(dot)wood(at)futurenet(dot)com

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Hayes Madsen@solfleet.bsky.social · 2w ago

Extremely excited to share a massive piece I worked very hard on. I talked to FFXIV’s Naoki Yoshida, Warframe’s Rebecca Ford, and ESO’s Nick Giacomini anout what the future of MMORPGs looks like - and how the live service scene has altered that, if at all www.gamesradar.com/games/mmo/ho...

"The desire for a world you can escape to is stronger than ever": How MMORPGs are flourishing in a multiplayer landscape dominated by live-service shooters

The lead developers of Final Fantasy 14, Warframe, and The Elder Scrolls Online take us through the demands and realities of running a successful MMO

gamesradar.com

Haley MacLean@haleyfax.bsky.social · 2w ago

What if I told you that all of the Publishing Agreements I have reviewed in the last 6 months (several dozen) included a no gen AI provision, wherein the use of gen AI in development is a material breach, but companies like Epic and EA are still trying to convince us the industry is cool with it

Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

He's only gone and written 2,500 more words about how game devs feel about generative AI. Latest piece quotes around two dozen different people with an indie background. When asked how they feel about gen AI, not one, but two devs responded, "Fuck that shit." www.gamesradar.com/games/it-cre...

Megan Fox@glassbottommeg.bsky.social · 2w ago

This one's still the kicker for me Unreal Nanite? AnimBP? PCG? ControlRig? StateTree? Incredible tech, saved me so much time, I miss it a ton using Godot. Epic sucks! Massively? And I'm still saying this! If GenAI were truly a time savings? You'd have to beat indies off with a stick. And yet,

The proposed upsides of gen AI may appear greater for devs with limited resources, but if anything, the independent developers I spoke to were even more AI-averse than creatives working within large teams. It's perhaps no coincidence that indies, free from the demands and expectations of big publishers and public shareholders operating under the belief that a world of finite resources will allow infinite growth, can more easily ignore AI.
Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

He's only gone and written 2,500 more words about how game devs feel about generative AI. Latest piece quotes around two dozen different people with an indie background. When asked how they feel about gen AI, not one, but two devs responded, "Fuck that shit." www.gamesradar.com/games/it-cre...

Brandon Sheffield@brandon.insertcredit.com · 2w ago

I got asked about AI in games again! I think we underestimate how, while AI use is more rampant in the East than the West, our protections against it here are dramatically worse.

From the Gamesradar article: "Necrosoft Games creative director Brandon Sheffield also highlights a cultural divide. "I think we are witnessing an attempted assassination on the very concept of creative work, especially in the West," he says. "While I'm anti AI use everywhere, at least in China and Japan people aren't getting fired with the intention to replace them with AI as that's legally difficult. There it's being used to supplement the work. I've seen Chinese companies express amazement at how Western studios are firing folks in order to have 'fewer devs do more' with AI. Why fire all your good people?" Sheffield says Necrosoft will never use gen AI. "I feel sick about it frankly," he adds, and he would love to see the tech "be treated like a pariah." In his view, "once you let it infect your studio, [it] creatively bankrupts that studio." "We've also seen that companies outside of games have had to hire back their engineers because AI couldn't cut it – or they're finding that all their tokens are getting spent by execs on 'convert this PDF to a powerpoint' which is cheaper to just have an intern do! So it may be slightly faster, and a lot worse, but it's also more expensive? Neat ... We're dismantling the entire industry in the interest of short-term shareholder gains and it's just a terrible plan.""
Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

He's only gone and written 2,500 more words about how game devs feel about generative AI. Latest piece quotes around two dozen different people with an indie background. When asked how they feel about gen AI, not one, but two devs responded, "Fuck that shit." www.gamesradar.com/games/it-cre...

Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

Reading (and writing) recent headlines re: layoffs, I want to spotlight this quote from Iconoclasts maker Joakim Sandberg @konjak.org , who, in his argument on the dangers of gen AI, also highlights a recurring, destructive mindset among the people overseeing the people who actually make games.

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Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

He's only gone and written 2,500 more words about how game devs feel about generative AI. Latest piece quotes around two dozen different people with an indie background. When asked how they feel about gen AI, not one, but two devs responded, "Fuck that shit." www.gamesradar.com/games/it-cre...

Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2w ago

He's only gone and written 2,500 more words about how game devs feel about generative AI. Latest piece quotes around two dozen different people with an indie background. When asked how they feel about gen AI, not one, but two devs responded, "Fuck that shit." www.gamesradar.com/games/it-cre...

"It creates lesser games": Indie game studios are supposed to love generative AI, so why do the 25 devs I spoke to avoid it?

"So it may be slightly faster, and a lot worse, but it's also more expensive? Neat"

gamesradar.com

Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · 2mo ago

I spent the last few months talking to over 30 game developers about generative AI. It began as a sort of interview survey but became a pretty comprehensive collection of arguments against the technology altogether. www.gamesradar.com/games/why-so...

David Gaider@davidgaider.bsky.social · last mo.

"And he does, indeed, go on." When I start a rant, there's really no stopping me, and apparently I ranted enough during my chat about AI with @woodwould.bsky.social that he was able to write an entire other article about it. 😅

Austin Wood@woodwould.bsky.social · last mo.

I'm back at work! The latest in this series of gen AI-focused articles is Dragon Age and Summerfall's @davidgaider.bsky.social mincing no words www.gamesradar.com/games/rpg/ge...