In New Years Letter, Square Enix President Takashi Kiryu Reveals Plans To Expand Use Of AI Despite Backlash
by Michael Betar IV
'Crisis Core' (Image: Square Enix)
At the start of the year, Square Enix President Takashi Kiryu released a letter addressing the company’s goals for 2024 with a notable focus on Artificial Intelligence (AI) for game development. In his letter, he writes that he believes that the new technology will “not only reshape what we create’ but can ‘change the processes by which we create.”
This interest in AI has come from the notable advances in programs such as ChatGPT becoming more used by several people in different industries, especially in writing and translation. which Kiryu speaks about in his letter. Although acknowledging the moral debate on the use of AI, the president of the publishing company has stated the intention to be “aggressive” with Square Enix’s use of the technology.
Kiryu also notes that they will be continuing to research and implement the blockchain, Web 3.0 and cloud services into their projects, continuing the mission set in 2022 by the company’s former president, Yosuke Matsuda. Last June, Kiryu replaced the former Square Enix president of ten years.
The company is not a stranger to using new technology as earlier last year, they released a text adventure game, The Portopia Serial Murder Case, a remake of the original Japanese game released in 1983 that uses AI to respond to players’ text commands to solve a murder case. This experiment was not commercially successful as its reviews on Steam only have a 15% positive rate, with most players noting that the AI was vague and simple in its writing.
Despite this, Kiryu is hopeful about the future of AI and other controversial technologies as he writes at the end of his letter that Square Enix will have a “challenger’s mindset” moving forward. Later this year, the company will be releasing a new DLC for Final Fantasy XVI alongside other projects relating to the company’s most popular franchises like Dragon Quest and Kingdom Hearts.
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