In the Imperial City Arena District, you can see an Argonian male and a Redguard Female fighting each other. They are not in combat but in a script where has them train each other in hand to hand combat at specific times of day. Watching them for a bit gives you +5 boost to your hand-to-hand combat skills; such attention to details and interaction with the world is rare in video games.
When people talk about video games outside gaming, it still seems to be in a time warp of the 1980s. Most of the media newsmongers have no understanding of video games or even seem want to care about it. There is so much potential in the medium, yet it seems to be ignored, which I think it is sign of how video games have retained their renegade status. While men in suits attempt to continue monetizing it, video games are similar in a sense to Gladiatorial games in Ancient Rome. In comparison with chariot racing, Gladiatorial games were not as popular but had more of a cultural impact that the elites did not want to admit. Video Games linger in the shadows of the more acceptable entertainment of Television and Movies. However, it’s in video games where we see the future of storytelling going towards, beyond the linear and static movies of the past. While movies have a place, the medium is so stagnant that there is little in feature films which can change. It is in video games where you see real change.
The change is in the graphics and more recently in the AI.
With all the hype surrounding AI or Large Language Models (LLMs), gamers saw the first salvo in the spreading of AI throughout our societies.
The Radiant AI in Oblivion and Skyrim were quite competent here. They are still in the early stages of showing us what is possible in video games. The cities and villages have more life than anything you see in Cyberpunk 2077, which for me was a big step down from we saw with the Witcher Games.
You can see the influence of Radiant AI in GTA VI’s ambitions.
Seeing the Argonian and the Redguard train in the arena was just the preview of how AI can transform games as much graphics were able to do so in the 1990s. We will have more than just games but living simulations.
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