PUBG Is Using Nvidia’s Most Powerful Tech To Do Something Pretty Basic

Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds [PUBG] helped kickstart the battle royal genre that Fortnite took to new heights. Now, the Krafton-developed title is looking to kick off an entirely new trend that will help those down a squadmate get the help they need to make it in this competitive game of skill, preparation, and survival.

During the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas this week, South Korean publisher Krafton announced that the influential battle royal shooter will be one of the first games to use Nvidia’s ACE technology. Nvidia’s ACE is a suite of generative AI tech developed for creating digital entities with discerning, reactive behaviors. For gaming, Nvidia has touted that ACE can be used to create in-game characters that allegedly behave more realistically than traditional gaming AI. Krafton will use ACE to provide players with an AI-controlled squad mate who works with and reacts to the player's dialogue like a human player would.

Dubbed the Co-Playable Character, these AI characters will be able to handle tasks such as looking for ammo or particular items in nearby locations upon request. They’ll also provide covering fire against other players when the action heats up, spot enemies in the distance, receive directional orders to engage in flanking maneuvers, or even drive vehicles to cover large distances in the game’s massive open maps. Players will be able to trigger all of these behaviors seamlessly through voice chat, according to the trailer for the new feature.

PUBG will be the first of two games to implement ACE. The other is Krafton’s Sims-inspired life simulator inZOI. In inZOI, ACE will power what the game calls “Smart ZOIs,” non-playable characters who will react to the game world and commit actions in the same way human players would. From what was shown in the trailer for inZOI’s ACE implementation, it will basically automate dynamic events and behaviors throughout the game world that would typically have to be handcrafted by developers.

“Collection of these unique Smart ZOIs guarantees a city that is vibrantly diverse, fostering unpredictable social interactions that create a rich and dynamic story-driven simulation,” a trailer for the feature says.

It’s hard to deny that Nvidia’s tech is impressive. And as divisive as generative AI in game development is, this is probably the best-case scenario for its use. Implementing dynamic AI behaviors into non-playable characters in a The Sims-type game is a quick and easy way to make things feel more alive. And the fact that Krafton is confident enough in the tech to implement it into its multiplayer hit without concern that it would break the game says a lot.

But I can’t shake the feeling that this isn’t something that couldn’t be accomplished through traditional development of strong AI. As cool as it is to see in-game characters going about their day all around you in inZOI, NPCs who have daily schedules and unique behaviors are something that dates back to the earliest of open-world games some 25 years ago. Hell, even enthusiast developers, like the modding team behind the recent Liberty City Preservation Project handcrafted more than 4,500 unique scenarios and pedestrian behaviors for players to stumble upon around town, all to make the city feel more alive than it did 17 years ago.

When it comes to PUBG, the option to team up with an AI squadmate is an impressive feat so long as you forget that games have done this before without the need for generative AI. In 2008, Tom Clancy’s EndWar implemented voice commands directly into its real-time strategy gameplay. Zipper Interactive’s SOCOM: US Navy SEALS, a 2002 PlayStation 2 game, allowed players to give squadmates commands on the fly via a headset.

While none of these older games allowed the AI to improve over time, they also didn’t require the massive, well-documented resource drain of generative AI. And though it's true most of these games were probably less complex than the massive scale and simulation of something like a PUBG, they also didn’t risk leaving player's data and biometrics up in the ether.

Whether its implementation is a boon to PUBG and inZOI remains to be seen. But they both won’t be the last we see of it, according to Krafton. The publisher has plans to implement it into its martial arts-based battle royal Naraka: Bladepoint. WeMade, another South Korean developer, has also shown off a boss character whose AI will be driven by Nvidia’s tech. No timeline has been give on when any of these games will get ACE support.