The collective industry has been reckoning with expanded usage of AI for the last several years. We've seen generative AI used in various capacities across multiple blockbuster releases, and more recently, the tech in Nvidia DLSS 5 has created a whole frontier of discussion. Hideo Kojima's own Death Stranding 2 got caught up in the latter, and it put a bad taste in his mouth regarding the usefulness of these tools.
"As a creator, I have mixed feelings about this technology," he explains on the Koji10 podcast. "AI is good at bringing old photographs to life or adding color to them, right? I think we might stop doing remakes one day. People still restore old films in 4K by hand, for instance. AI could do that easily."
But where AI can certainly make those processes easier, it can't understand artistic intention, making the use cases limited, at least for anything the Metal Gear Solid mastermind is involved in. "As the person who made the original, I wouldn't want someone changing it too much," he states. "There was a reason I chose a particular lighting setup. It would be different if AI understood those intentions."
Going by the results of Nvidia DLSS 5, and any other examples I've seen of AI upscaling, we're a long way from that happening. Death Stranding 2 was caught in the whirlwind of DLSS 5, and that seems to have given Kojima pause on what this tech can actually offer Kojima Productions.
"I wouldn't like that," he says, when it's suggested AI can "make changes" of its own accord. "Unless I was controlling the AI in my own work, that may be different. I don't know, though."
He concedes, "this will probably become standard," at least to some extent. Remastering music and restoring old movies still requires engineers and production teams, who incorporate AI to help streamline the projects.
"Maybe AI will eventually do all that automatically," he says. "In a hundred years, the resolution may be even higher. But I don't much like the idea."
Me neither. But so long as we have creatives like Kojima who're maintaining perspectives like this, I believe there's hope. There's little chance of seeing any of these elements in OD and Physint, and they'll be better games for it.
