Artificial Intelligence?

 2024 was a challenging year. But when pressure is applied diamonds are formed. Looking back on all that took place last year I am a bit apprehensive moving into this year. But there are blessings even in the most trying of circumstances. It is prudent to remember those gifts. Truth be told I am a far better giver than receiver. A fact that clearly needs some work.

Cyclops

Ok, so on to the accomplishments last year. We added three more sections to the storyline (chapter 2). I have never claimed to be a superior author, and it came to my attention that I have not detailed the characters in the story thus far. So, to correct this oversight, I introduced a side character Ruthwah. He is a character who is far more detail orientated, who should make up for my shortcoming on visual descriptions of the protagonists in an organic way. Who knows what will become of the beloved Roun, trusted diplomat of Canthium?

At the beginning of last year AI had been looked at for the creation of art assets. three separate programs were experimented with. They were Izea, Gencraft and ChatGPT. Each AI had a different approach to its interface and therefore led to unique methods in which to promote image generation. Interestingly enough they all shared certain handicaps. None of them were able to draw a "brutish" cyclops, or any cyclops for that matter. The program paired the term cyclops with the marvel idea for a cyclops. So it produced images of characters with red glasses, like a cornucopia of young Elton Johns.

Nearly any image produced by AI requires some altering. As the year progressed the ability to adequately alter those images improved as well. So an image was altered from a buff Elton to a usable cyclops. Centaur is another one of those images that artificial intelligences seem to struggle with. While ChatGPT was able to reference the Greek ideology of a centaur, it produced only one subpar image thereof. It then, like the other AIs descended into the imagery of an equestrian as a centaur.

When comparing the three AI's it is an easy win for ChatGPT. It produces better quality images and is far more user friendly than the other two. My favorite aspect is that I can pass it images and get a useable return. As a result of this AI interaction most of the races have updated images, the armors have been upgraded, and the combat classes have updated icons. More images for resources have been crafted. Work toward a new Races cover is in the works and a list of titles for the game has been created as well. That list will be posted on the Facebook page at the end of the year.

Iron Full-plate Armor

Another 25% of the web development class has been completed as well. It will be exciting to remake the website as this time around we will be building the pilot game into it. And that is an extremely exciting milestone. To finally see something that people can play with. Goodness I pray that I can incorporate some humor into the dialogue. Runescape 3 has done a pretty good job at doing this as has the Goblin updates for World of Warcraft. Inspiring leads to follow.

Truth be told, I had once managed a technologies review and research blog called SquiggleTech. One of the games I had researched was called Total Domination and while the graphics and gameplay were not overly impressive, the voice overs and humor lifted the game phenomenally. If done properly, these two aspects can go a long way in helping a game to rise above the sea of indie games. Humor is a human idea that I do not see AI grasping well anytime soon. Heck, many humans struggle with it!

This year will deliver some amazing completions. It is possible that the pilot will roll out this year. Polishing images and icons on the blog should be completed. And at the end of the year we will do a survey to see what our followers think is the best name for the pilot game. Renaming the Epimetheus world has been a necessity since its inception. Epimetheusworld.blogspot.com is far too longwinded and complex for the ordinary person to recollect. It isn't very catchy either. So if you are following along remember to tune in for the poll this November to vote on a name, your voice matters.

If you have any suggestions, questions ideas or would like to volunteer in the creation of this game please reach out to us at nathan.epimetheus@gmail.com.