Roblox is testing A tool that speeds up the process of building and changing objects in games by letting artificial intelligence write the code. The tool lets anyone who plays Roblox create items like buildings, terrain, and avatars, change the look and behavior of those things, and give them new auras by typing what they want to achieve in natural language rather than complex code. interactive properties.
“Let’s say I need a shiny metal sword for the experience I’m creating,” says Daniel Sturman, Roblox’s chief technology officer. “It should be really easy to create.”
Sturman showed WIRED a new Roblox tool that generates the code needed to create objects and modify their appearance and behavior. In the demo, typing “red pain, reflective metallic finish” or “purple foil, crushed pattern, reflective” into the chat window changed the appearance of the in-game sports car. You can also add new game behaviors by typing “make the title blink every time the user presses “B”” and “make it float”.
A technique known as generative artificial intelligence has attracted attention and investment over the past year, showing that algorithms can generate seemingly coherent text and aesthetically pleasing images when given brief text prompts. The technology relies on AI models trained using vast amounts of data, in the form of text or images scraped from the web, and also plays a role in the viral chatbot ChatGPT. Some AI researchers are experimenting with generative techniques for generating video and 3D content, but this is mostly in its early stages.
Generating computer code is one of the first practical applications of generative artificial intelligence, and Microsoft and Amazon are already selling tools that can automatically write useful chunks of software. But Roblox’s announcement shows how companies are adapting their coding prowess to create their own generative AI products, aimed at coders who may not have experience.
That approach holds promise for Roblox, Sturman said, because many of the games on its platform are made by individuals or small teams. “Our platform has everything from studios to 12-year-olds who come up with incredible ideas from summer camp,” says Sturman.
Roblox says the code it uses to make AI relies on a combination of internal technology and external capabilities, but it doesn’t say where. Currently, the company trains its AI using only public domain game content. Sturman said Roblox will be careful to ensure that users don’t object to having their creations fed into an AI algorithm.
Microsoft is the first to leverage the latest generation of artificial intelligence for coding through its deal with OpenAI, which uses a general language technology called GPT to power a code generator called Codex. Microsoft is enhancing Codex’s coding capabilities by making more data available from GitHub, a popular software development repository, and making it available through its Visual Studio programming application.
Visual Studio and other AI-enabled programming environments often write code in response to developer comments or when users start typing. Replit, a startup that makes popular online programming tools, recently unveiled a chatbot-like interface that not only writes code but also answers programming questions.
