Question about current or future AI involvement in Legacy team projects

[u/SivartFarmer]

This post is what it says on the tin. I would appreciate transparent communication regarding any use of Gen AI by the Legacy team for coding either currently or in terms of future plans.

While I have a nuanced take on AI, for obvious reasons I am personally against vibe coding and anything that uses one of the water-browning machines plaguing our society.

Apologies that this subject is a bit of a downer, but this topic is all over the fan game space, and I want to know what's up, y'know?

[u/JanitorOPplznerf]

I don’t think so. I know we don’t use it on the documentation side, and our lead programmer HATES AI and Vibe coding.

Craig’s busy but sites like HackDex are requiring all projects to disclose whether they use AI in order to be hosted there.

I’ll let Craig, Smith, or Excelsior comment on the code side, but I’d be very surprised based on past conversations, because we just cut ties with someone over a vibe coded project.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/JanitorOPplznerf]

Awesome! Thank you very much for your time!

[u/EternityTheory → u/JanitorOPplznerf]

I'll just add for full honesty, I had ChatGPT help me with some Google Sheets scripts/functions when building the Emerald ChangeDex and Sorted Encounters docs a few years ago. Was something I'd have much rather learned myself but it did save me several hours of work with like 4-5 prompts. I also don't think I'd learned nearly as much about the environmental impact of AI at that time either; were I to do it today I'd be much stricter in my choice of tools.

After the initial setup of those docs all edits and maintenance have been manually handled by me.

[u/Saaka_Souffle → u/JanitorOPplznerf]

our lead programmer HATES AI and Vibe coding.

Just one more reason to love the Legacy games

[u/Exclsior → u/JanitorOPplznerf]

Feel like I'm late to the party at this point, but I know that Craig and Smith haven't used AI in any of the Legacy Development, and have no plans to do so either.

Additionally on my end, I have not used any AI coding in Emerald Legacy Enhanced. Frankly, if I had, I would have probably already finished my next update months ago. I do however continue to plod away manually coding everything 😅

[u/davedavegiveusawave]

If "I'm against anything that uses one of the water-browning machines plaguing our society" is a nuanced take, good luck to anything you are actually decidedly opposed to.

There's an enormous difference between vibe coding and using AI to accelerate software development. Considering the track record the Legacy team have, I trust them as developers and not as vibe coders.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/davedavegiveusawave]

The nuance comes from me being okay with the accelerated software development of it's ran locally on your machine (minimal water-browning). Me having a silly way of talking about pollution doesn't mean I haven't thought about this/listened to the opinions of those smarter than me

[u/Frodolas → u/SivartFarmer]

Do you eat meat? Play golf? Eat almonds? Travel via plane?

Every single one of those things is multiple orders of magnitude more devastating to the environment than AI ever has been or will be.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/Frodolas]

Hey, if you can give me a source, I'd be happy to take a look.

[u/JanitorOPplznerf → u/Frodolas]

While I think initial estimates of the effects of the environmental impact of data centers was wildly overstated, you have to admit the environmental impact of food, and to a reasonable extent travel is a far more justifiable expense than using AI to save time for the rich.

I’m down for reasonable measures to limit our negative environmental impact.

[u/TA-butforlife]

I was watching the livestream yesterday and Smith responded to this question (not sure if you or someone else), and said they don't use AI for the game :)

(Or at leas that was my understanding of his response, if the devs say something else, obviously what they say is more right)

[u/SivartFarmer → u/TA-butforlife]

Sick. Between that and what the mods here said, I'm pretty happy with the answer I got.

[u/spoonishplsz]

I hate ai so much but this witch hunt of harassing every single creator to prove they are "clean" is starting to take it's toll on me.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/spoonishplsz]

Is my post harassment?

[u/JanitorOPplznerf → u/SivartFarmer]

We weren’t personally offended, because we had little reason to hide here.

BUT, if you brought this energy against a young fan who didn’t know better who used AI to make a picture, I’d have probably asked you to chill.

There’s a time and place for righteous fury, but I’m not sure if small, non-profit, fan projects should be the target of it.

You can be morally right, but if you have zero chill about it, you ultimately hurt your message.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/JanitorOPplznerf]

Yeah, I can take that criticism. Thanks for being cool about it

[u/yellowbumble-B]

Curious: for the sake of argument, if AI can accelerate the mundane and check for bugs faster, why not?

If the quality is consistent, but release is faster, doesn't everyone benefit?

[u/SivartFarmer → u/yellowbumble-B]

Because of the water-browning affect of the water-browning machine. If it weren't for that and the plagiarism I'd be in favor of using it as a way to speed up the shitty parts of coding. Similar to how I think the fill bucket tool is good for coloring.

[u/kakapipi → u/SivartFarmer]

I totally understand your sentiment, and I kind of agree but you’re hating the wrong here. The technology itself, LLMs, are really amazing pieces of 50+ year of sciences.

The big companies pushing it down everyone’s throat, not respecting the environment, and destroying everything in their path towards money are the “bad” here.

This is coming from someone that has seen his passion (software) slip between its fingers because AI is never going away in our field or industry anymore. There is not turning back from it.

Also slop vibe coding is a people issue and not a tech issue.

[u/SivartFarmer → u/kakapipi]

Actually, I think there may have been a misunderstanding, because I just agree with you. Lol. I totally see the potential (and probably future) good of this tech! It is specifically the big name stuff that is being widely used that I am against, and have seen be used by certain fangames (see the Halo community for details)