The way The Sims does it is actually pretty interesting. The individual sims have very little behavioral coding involved. They’re basically just monitoring their individual needs. The vast majority of the objects contain “advertisements” that they broadcast, and the sims can simply look for nearby advertisements to decide on what to do.
Basically, you have a sim. They are simply listening to advertisements that are being broadcasted by the objects around them. Maybe the kitchen sink says “Clean +3” while the shower says “Clean +7”. If the sim’s cleanliness meter is low, they’ll check for local “clean” advertisements and choose one. As their needs get lower and lower, they’ll be more likely to pick stronger advertisements. So a slightly dirty sim will be likely to choose the sink, but a very dirty sim will choose the shower.
Then once they get to the chosen object, the object basically goes “okay, here’s how to interact with me”. The sim simply pulls from that pool of interactions for the specific object. There may be flags for specific interactions based on certain conditions, or certain traits that make a sim more likely to choose one object over another. For instance, if your sim is a witch, they may have specific magical interactions available. Or if a sim has the Active trait, they may be more likely to choose fitness-based advertisements.
This makes adding expansions very easy. You don’t need to do a ton of coding for individual sims, to “teach” them how to use new objects. You simply add new advertisements to the objects you’re adding to the game, and make sure your interactions are properly flagged for the various conditions that can exist. And now those objects can be dropped directly into existing save files without any fuss.
Worth noting that this advertisement system is what caused the infamous “my sim is using the bathroom sink to wash dishes” complaint that plagued the series for so long; the bathroom sink was nicer than the kitchen sink, so it had a better advertisement. The sim wasn’t looking at advertisements based on why they needed a sink. They just knew they needed a sink to wash dishes, and picked the one with the strongest advertisement.
Thats an extremely cool design for this system to be honest. But it still sounds wildly complex even with all of it shifted away from the Sim and into the advertising objects. That washing dishes in the bathroom issue seems like it could very easily become a common problem if you aren’t paying attention to assigned advertising values. Which I’d imagine if you’d just match the bathroom sink value with the kitchen it might fix some of it, but not the ones who happen to walk by the bathroom with a dirty plate. So I still see why they aren’t more common. Thats a lot harder than say a platformer or something that we see a dime a dozen nowadays.
Its not dish washing, its “Clean +4” or something. So it sounds like you’d either have useless bathroom sinks or people washing dishes in them from time to time with the decided upon architecture.
There’s more to it then that. There’s a bunch of different “clean” activities. Washing dishes, showering, washing hands, etc. Different objects can do different things. For example you can’t wash a dish or take a bath in the shower which is a “clean” object. To wash a dish they have to have a dirty dish to do so, meaning it’s a separate activity from other things you might do with the bathroom sink.
It may be that way now. But it still sounds like at first they didnt account for much differentiation between the kitchen and the bathroom sinks if that was an issue they had for a while. Admittedly I haven’t played since Sims 2. But it was a problem when I was all into Making Magic.
That’s actually exactly what they did to fix it. They now allow you to flag sinks as bathroom or kitchen sinks, which simply controls whether or not the dish washing function can be accessed.
Never heard of this game until now and looked at the trailer on Steam. It looks like a modern version of The Sims minus building houses. Everyone liked The Sims so I imagine this selling well too.
My personal issue with it was a general lack of optimisation. Granted that was the demo so things could have changed but if even the demo runs poorly, I don’t consider it a good sign.
I really wish people would stop with AI hate. So many people on steam were bitching about this, how unethical AI is and not only telling others to not buy the game, but insulting anyone who defended Krafton. My problem is that people see “AI” and shut down. Even when told that Krafton made this AI themselves using assets they either owned or were copyright-free that is run locally on your machine, people continued complaining. This was announced when the demo was out.
Also I am tired of right wingers on steam. This doesn’t relate to your comment but the second common complaint I saw a lot on the forums besides AI was that the game is “woke” and thus bad for having a non binary option. The game is bugged with not allowing homosexual relationships, this made the right wingers happy because they hate the “globohomo agenda.” I am tired of their shit. Your Zoi can be hetero, homo, or bi. Your Zoi also picks body types. Checkboxes are not oppressive, fucking assholes.
That’s great to hear about their implementation but sadly I just still cannot get behind it right now. It’s a tough one for me because I do like a Sims competitor coming out and hope they do well for other reasons. As for the woke stuff, that’s just the gaming sphere in general these days it seems.
I heard they use Nvidia ACE tech so their SmartZoi system works on a select few cards at the moment, all Nvidia. The devs plan to support AMD and such in the future. You can find info about it on reddit or their discord, sadly no lemmy communities yet.
AI Generated Content Disclosure
The developers describe how their game uses AI Generated Content like this:
Players can generate unique textures for character outfits and various items based on text input. They can also create 3D objects from image input, which can be used as interior decorations or accessories, and add distinctive motions to their Zoi using video input. Additionally, the actions and thoughts of Zois are controlled through sLM technology, enabling more engaging and intuitive interactions.
It also runs locally, which is great imo. Although it means that you need a relatively new graphics card to use some of the features. My RX 6800 for example doesn’t support it
I am opposed to genAI in its current form for a number of personal ethical reasons. I can still admit that it sounds cool, but in its current form I cannot support genAI.
In fhe same way you can voice your opinion, someone else can voice why it’s flawed, why people should look at a project like this and point out why people should just regurgitate the same old “AI slop” venom. Putting those points forward isn’t being mean-spirited, it’s highlighting the nuance around a topic and adding more to the conversation than “tis gud”/“tis bad” without being a personal attack so there’s no need to go on the defensive either.
Krafton made this AI themselves using assets they either owned or were copyright-free that is run locally on your machine. This was announced when the demo was out. Not sure if that will change your mind but I don’t see a problem with it.
Cool false equivalence. Why do you have to be snarky about someone just posting their personal opinion? I didn’t even wax poetic about why no one should get it, just left my 0.02
I remember when I first heard of Paralives. I was just some guy doing a small game as a hobby but I was listening to players feedback and promising all sorts of stuff and what was originally supposed to be a two month project had already been going on for several years.
I joined the Paralives discord and immediately realized: “they clearly have no idea how much work they are going to have to do to keep the promises they are making” - just like I was years prior - except their game was a lot more ambitious than mine.
I’m happy to see that even though I was right, they followed through with it for all these years.
I can definitely see that. I’m not really too familiar with this space of games so I can’t speak on it much, but it does feel like a passion project, and that’s not a bad thing.
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EA and the Sims monopoly on this genre needs a shellacking. I wish Inzoi the best
I’m looking forward to Paralives but the more competition the better.
Looking forward to it further down the road in development. I do wonder why these dollhouse sims are so rare, since they’re so popular.
I’ve read its hard to make one of quality, with all the interactions that have to happen between systems and entities.
The way The Sims does it is actually pretty interesting. The individual sims have very little behavioral coding involved. They’re basically just monitoring their individual needs. The vast majority of the objects contain “advertisements” that they broadcast, and the sims can simply look for nearby advertisements to decide on what to do.
Basically, you have a sim. They are simply listening to advertisements that are being broadcasted by the objects around them. Maybe the kitchen sink says “Clean +3” while the shower says “Clean +7”. If the sim’s cleanliness meter is low, they’ll check for local “clean” advertisements and choose one. As their needs get lower and lower, they’ll be more likely to pick stronger advertisements. So a slightly dirty sim will be likely to choose the sink, but a very dirty sim will choose the shower.
Then once they get to the chosen object, the object basically goes “okay, here’s how to interact with me”. The sim simply pulls from that pool of interactions for the specific object. There may be flags for specific interactions based on certain conditions, or certain traits that make a sim more likely to choose one object over another. For instance, if your sim is a witch, they may have specific magical interactions available. Or if a sim has the Active trait, they may be more likely to choose fitness-based advertisements.
This makes adding expansions very easy. You don’t need to do a ton of coding for individual sims, to “teach” them how to use new objects. You simply add new advertisements to the objects you’re adding to the game, and make sure your interactions are properly flagged for the various conditions that can exist. And now those objects can be dropped directly into existing save files without any fuss.
Worth noting that this advertisement system is what caused the infamous “my sim is using the bathroom sink to wash dishes” complaint that plagued the series for so long; the bathroom sink was nicer than the kitchen sink, so it had a better advertisement. The sim wasn’t looking at advertisements based on why they needed a sink. They just knew they needed a sink to wash dishes, and picked the one with the strongest advertisement.
So calling people who easily get influenced by ads sims is a good insult.
Thats an extremely cool design for this system to be honest. But it still sounds wildly complex even with all of it shifted away from the Sim and into the advertising objects. That washing dishes in the bathroom issue seems like it could very easily become a common problem if you aren’t paying attention to assigned advertising values. Which I’d imagine if you’d just match the bathroom sink value with the kitchen it might fix some of it, but not the ones who happen to walk by the bathroom with a dirty plate. So I still see why they aren’t more common. Thats a lot harder than say a platformer or something that we see a dime a dozen nowadays.
Just take the dish washing activity off bathroom sinks.
Its not dish washing, its “Clean +4” or something. So it sounds like you’d either have useless bathroom sinks or people washing dishes in them from time to time with the decided upon architecture.
There’s more to it then that. There’s a bunch of different “clean” activities. Washing dishes, showering, washing hands, etc. Different objects can do different things. For example you can’t wash a dish or take a bath in the shower which is a “clean” object. To wash a dish they have to have a dirty dish to do so, meaning it’s a separate activity from other things you might do with the bathroom sink.
It may be that way now. But it still sounds like at first they didnt account for much differentiation between the kitchen and the bathroom sinks if that was an issue they had for a while. Admittedly I haven’t played since Sims 2. But it was a problem when I was all into Making Magic.
That’s actually exactly what they did to fix it. They now allow you to flag sinks as bathroom or kitchen sinks, which simply controls whether or not the dish washing function can be accessed.
Best dollhouse sim is clearly Dwarf Fortress
I hate that this isn’t just not wrong, its 100% accurate.
Still waiting Inzoi mods from loverslab
Wickedzoi
Sinzoi
Thats half the reason I bought the game.
That’s interesting, as the initial reviews seemed to not like it.
I downloaded it last night and plan on playing it tonight for a while.
Give them some time. Right wingers are brainstorming ways to call this game woke. 😛
Never heard of this game until now and looked at the trailer on Steam. It looks like a modern version of The Sims minus building houses. Everyone liked The Sims so I imagine this selling well too.
I think the more important thing its missing is EA.
That too
But it is in EA.
Get out. Well done but get out and take your upvote with you.
I regret nothing! Nothing!
You can build houses!
That girl in the pic looks trans as hell and I’m here for it.
Oh, i thought it was supposed to be Billie Eilish…
Boyinaband transitioned!!! (/s)
Finding new ways to dodge the allegations
But he was never taught what laws there are!
i hope it does well im just still sad about life by you though
the only valid criticism ive seen was from satch’s video about the lgbtq experience in it
My personal issue with it was a general lack of optimisation. Granted that was the demo so things could have changed but if even the demo runs poorly, I don’t consider it a good sign.
The big game doesn’t run that much better, but in it’s defense think open world Sims 3 bul ultra realistic and a modern game
I’m sure a lot of people will enjoy…ahem…making their ideal lifelike woman.
I was totally stoked for this game until I learnt they use genAI then it was an instant no thanks from me.
I really wish people would stop with AI hate. So many people on steam were bitching about this, how unethical AI is and not only telling others to not buy the game, but insulting anyone who defended Krafton. My problem is that people see “AI” and shut down. Even when told that Krafton made this AI themselves using assets they either owned or were copyright-free that is run locally on your machine, people continued complaining. This was announced when the demo was out.
Also I am tired of right wingers on steam. This doesn’t relate to your comment but the second common complaint I saw a lot on the forums besides AI was that the game is “woke” and thus bad for having a non binary option. The game is bugged with not allowing homosexual relationships, this made the right wingers happy because they hate the “globohomo agenda.” I am tired of their shit. Your Zoi can be hetero, homo, or bi. Your Zoi also picks body types. Checkboxes are not oppressive, fucking assholes.
That’s great to hear about their implementation but sadly I just still cannot get behind it right now. It’s a tough one for me because I do like a Sims competitor coming out and hope they do well for other reasons. As for the woke stuff, that’s just the gaming sphere in general these days it seems.
One of the reviews on Steam mentioned that the AI uses NVidia tech that isn’t available on AMD graphics cards. Is that true?
I heard they use Nvidia ACE tech so their SmartZoi system works on a select few cards at the moment, all Nvidia. The devs plan to support AMD and such in the future. You can find info about it on reddit or their discord, sadly no lemmy communities yet.
Cuda? I wouldn’t be surprised, but AMD’s ROCm is much less developed (but works).
In what way are they using generative AI?
Per Steam page:
I know Lemmy hates AI in all use cases, but that does sound pretty cool to me
It also runs locally, which is great imo. Although it means that you need a relatively new graphics card to use some of the features. My RX 6800 for example doesn’t support it
I am opposed to genAI in its current form for a number of personal ethical reasons. I can still admit that it sounds cool, but in its current form I cannot support genAI.
That’s definitely a you problem. I think this is a cool use of it. It’s like the person that thought the TV was just a fad.
I literally said “personal”. Yes, that’s the definition of a “me problem” and I was open about that.
I also said I can admit this is a cool use of it also, so I’m not entirely sure what your comment meant to accomplish other than being mean spirited.
In fhe same way you can voice your opinion, someone else can voice why it’s flawed, why people should look at a project like this and point out why people should just regurgitate the same old “AI slop” venom. Putting those points forward isn’t being mean-spirited, it’s highlighting the nuance around a topic and adding more to the conversation than “tis gud”/“tis bad” without being a personal attack so there’s no need to go on the defensive either.
OK, what personal, ethical reasons do you have against an algorithm?
AI is a buzzword. It is not a thing that is smart, sentient, or anything more than a weighted computer model. (More or less).
So again what is personal or ethical about weighted math?
That actually makes me want to play it more. Solid use of technology.
Honestly, this is close to an ideal use of it, IMO
You still have human devd making the game, but if I had a specific bed spread I wanted in game, this gives me a bit of power
Ahhh shit, I see. Thanks.
Krafton made this AI themselves using assets they either owned or were copyright-free that is run locally on your machine. This was announced when the demo was out. Not sure if that will change your mind but I don’t see a problem with it.
That’s a lot more acceptable to me.
I boycott any games that make use of AI, digital art, computers, or the printing press. If it’s not carved into a cave wall I don’t play.
Cool false equivalence. Why do you have to be snarky about someone just posting their personal opinion? I didn’t even wax poetic about why no one should get it, just left my 0.02
You have an opinion. I’m making fun of it because I disagree. You posting that in a public space turns a personal opinion into a public statement.
So you just wanted to make fun of me, got it.
It’s not really my genre but this is looking far more interesting anyway and doesn’t use any bullshit AI slop:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1118520/Paralives/
I remember when I first heard of Paralives. I was just some guy doing a small game as a hobby but I was listening to players feedback and promising all sorts of stuff and what was originally supposed to be a two month project had already been going on for several years.
I joined the Paralives discord and immediately realized: “they clearly have no idea how much work they are going to have to do to keep the promises they are making” - just like I was years prior - except their game was a lot more ambitious than mine.
I’m happy to see that even though I was right, they followed through with it for all these years.
I can definitely see that. I’m not really too familiar with this space of games so I can’t speak on it much, but it does feel like a passion project, and that’s not a bad thing.
Thanks for the link, I’ll check it out.
Link to the steam page for anyone that wants to check it out. First I’m hearing of it so I did
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2456740/inZOI/
Will anyone even need this with Tomodachi Life 2 just around the corner?
Everyone that doesn’t have a switch?