AI and the Future of Game Development

    On the surface, Game Development seems like the perfect field for AI takeover. Programming and the Arts have long been in discussion about AI job loss, and those are key pillars of Game Design. Still, I’m more hopeful that AI can’t replicate what developers put into games, at least not currently.

    AI is getting much better at coding and can write it much faster than humans can. According to Forbes, the programming field is being threatened by drastic change in the short term and potential job loss long term. For Video Games, while I have seen it can write an individual feature fairly well, what happens when systems have to be combined? There’s no guarantee the dialogue system I ask AI for will be compatible with my preexisting movement systems, for example. Additionally, when game designers give up writing their own code, they lose a lot of control. Game design is incredibly iterative; we go through many different versions until the game feels as good to play as possible. It is incredibly difficult to have AI fine tune the feeling of a game in the same way.

    Generative AI has also been increasingly used to generate writing and art, both very important for game production. As any teacher would know, AI writing…isn’t all that, at least right now. AI trains itself off writings and creates based on what it’s seen. This means that what it makes tends to have already been done before, and individual writing style is usually averaged away. Visual art is similar, but could be argued to be of higher quality. Still, visual art (and the industry generally) are resisting AI altogether. Recently, the Indie Game Awards retracted its Game of the Year award from Clair Obscur for it’s use of AI generated placeholder textures. While the AI is encroaching into the arts, I don’t expect developers to embrace it, at least not in the short term.

Privacy Problems

     For my entire life, I've been extremely weary of what I do online, because it feels like everyone has access to everything you put out there. But as more schools and businesses require online communication, submissions, and applications, it feels impossible to entirely avoid putting some of your information out there.

    In a personal sense, this can greatly hurt communication, as staying connected with high school friends and my family must be online. If we want to, say, play a game together online, we have to accept that these websites may have access to our information. Even outside of fun and games, it also affects our schoolwork. Gathering information from journal and news articles puts us at risk as well. Considering how hard it can be to find multiple reliable and relevant sources, it's incredibly likely you'll run into cites demanding your data. This data allows individuals to scam you, companies to more easily manipulate you with targeted advertising, and can put you in physical danger if they find your location. This is especially concerning considering the recent ICE controversies. This and future administrations could feasibly round up swaths of people based on race, religion, political views, and more. Scary stuff.

    The most efficient solution would be for the government to step in and create new laws to limit the gathering and storage of personal information. This would be precedented, as previous Supreme Court decisions establish privacy as a right established in the Constitution. A law forcing websites to discard your data after a month, for example, would greatly limit how much of a person's information is widely available. Other laws to prevent the selling of your personal information would also be welcome. Lastly, forcing transparency from companies would be excellent. Terms and Conditions are often absurdly long and full of legal jargon, meaning it is inevitable that some customers will not fully read and understand it.

    As for what we can do, the most important thing is to vote. It is not in the government's interest to stop collecting our information, nor to stop the companies that fund politicians' campaigns. Pressuring politicians using the power of our votes is the best way to ensure they're working four our best interests, not theirs. Additionally, and much harder, we can try to be more conscious of where and what information we put out there. Yes, reading terms and conditions and conditions or pausing before accepting cookies is annoying, but when faced with the alternative, I'll take it.

Eight Values of Free Expression

     Freedom of Speech is established in the First Amendment of the Constitution, and that isn't a coincidence. Our speech is how we represent ourselves, so our democracy would be impossible without the protections of the First Amendment. Even beyond politics, free speech is vital for sharing ideas, expressing ourselves, and seeing other perspectives. All of the core Eight Values of Free Expression have embedded themselves into the inner workings of both our country and our lives, though here I focus on...

5. Check on Governmental Power 

    This is the principle that we, the public, have the power to use our votes as a response to abuses of power in the government. Alongside a responsible press, we can hold politicians accountable to uphold their voters' best interests and ethical standards. The most prevalent historical example of this is Watergate, where President Nixon was involved in wiretapping and stealing documents. According to the Pew Research Center, around 83% of Americans heard about the scandal, and his approval ratings dropped by 20% in just three months and continued to fall. Thanks to widespread media coverage, voters pressured Nixon into resigning, and had he not resigned, Congress would have been pressured into impeaching him. These principles of accountability are how we leverage our free speech to keep the government honest.

Modern Effects and Implications

    I chose this principle because I see it being threatened all around us. The internet has created a see of misinformation, as journalists often value clicks and revenue over honesty. To find unbiased reports with the facts, the public has to filter through so much bias. This makes it difficult to unite the public on anything, as people can get very different understandings of the same issues. Additionally, news sources are being influenced by the government by either retracting funds, suing for defamation, or even just the pressure of these. While it is not clear whether these are attempts at manipulating public information or not, it's concerning to see the power the government has over the media.

    It doesn't help that our two-party system has created a climate where politicians and voters are heavily loyal to their party. Other countries have systems like ranked choice voting to prevent this issue, but citizens here often vote for the lesser of two evils, to make sure the other side loses. Our power to vote feels much less useful when neither option is appealing. Because of this, politicians are representing their constituents less and less. Another large factor in this is the amount of money being used to influence politics. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas had a controversy in 2023 regarding undisclosed luxury trips paid for by a republican megadonor. Individual donors spent millions of dollars on both sides funding the 2024 election. This kind of money can have a huge say in both who is elected and what they for in office.

    I believe this to be a genuine danger to our democracy, one that too many people are overlooking. While historical example of the people's power comfort older generations that have seen it work, I have a bit less faith, especially as the government takes bolder and bolder actions. The Biden Administration had its mask mandates and vaccine requirements for federal workers. The Trump Administration now has armed ICE agents going into cities that don't want them there, causing violence and protest. There was also the recent bombing of Venezuela and the and the seizing of their president. Regardless of the legality and morality of these examples they are all controversial and extreme measures. I sincerely hope the power of the people's votes will be enough to dissuade the government anything more drastic.

My Top 5 News Sources

            These days, current events move at a mile a minute, and most "news" sources sensationalize and present events in the way that will get them the most traffic, not to best inform the people. It's very important to have news sources you can trust, which can be hard in a sea of misinformation. Here are my Top 5 News Sources, in no particular order.

1. Various Social Media

               Take your pick as to which specific social media you use, with just a bit of searching, it’s not hard to find people talking about current events. Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit are a few examples, but which specific one isn’t important. The reason I chose to include them here is because this is the best way to tell how larger groups of people feel about a current event. The discussions in comments can have people presenting multiple perspectives, and comments can also provide a place to readily call out misinformation (unlike many official news sources). Just make sure you aren’t falling into a social media echo chamber.

 

2. My Parents

               My parents work hard to get multiple perspectives on issues and aren’t incredibly committed to a specific political party, so discussions with them are very interesting. They can help me get a deeper understanding of topics I don’t know much about. They are also great at respecting my beliefs while still holding firmly to their own. It isn’t always easy to find good faith discussions, but my parents are it!

 

3. AP News

               A news source recommended to me by my parents, and for good reason. They advertise themselves as an unbiased news source, and they largely succeed, especially compared to most other official news sources. Being a non-profit gives me some reassurance that they aren’t just giving the flashiest headline, plus their website even has its own section for correcting misinformation.

 

4. Game Design Friends

               As a Game Design major hoping to stay in the know about the industry, I don’t like using regular news sources. I find that most news sources don’t really understand what the video game culture is like, and they feel very superficial. I find that my real-life friends often have both a better understanding of current happenings and can provide a variety of opinions that I trust to be at least decent.

5. YouTube

               I put YouTube on its own, separate from the other social media because of its unique longform content. While it also has some of the same functions of the other social medias, longer content gives creators much more room to explain the issue, the context, and the implications. While you have to avoid misinformation in the same way, the more information being provided, the easier misinformation is to spot. News articles don’t like to go so in-depth because long articles are difficult to digest, but a video format is much better for this.