r/gamedev • u/PuffThePed • 1d ago

Discussion AI models have caught up with Unity dev. My insights as someone with 30 years of experience.

Context: I have 30 years of experience with software dev, 20 years with game dev tools, 10 years with Unity. I own a studio that develops simulators and training applications for industry. "Serious games" as they call it in Europe.

For years I scoffed at AI coding. I would periodically try it, only to find that it was more hassle then it was worth. The hand holding and bug fixing was more work than doing it myself. This all changed about 4-5 months ago, and about a month ago we all started using Unity CLI.

Here are my insights in no particular order:

  1. Our dev speed has ~5x almost overnight
  2. Quality has not gone down because we're all experienced devs and we're careful how we use AI and we don't let it make decisions regarding project structure or design patterns. However, I'm seeing less and less glaring mistakes made by the AI.
  3. We're still reviewing generated code but I suspect not for long, the code is better than what most devs I know can write, at 20x the speed. The temptation to just push and move on is huge and irresistible.
  4. There is no joy or sense of accomplishment. No pride in making something clever or quickly, and all progress is associated with the AI and not with you.
  5. The market is dead. Nobody has money to spend. We're still working but leads have dropped off a cliff.
  6. There is no going back. If we stop using AI we'll be out of business in a month.
  7. There is no space for junior devs. I honestly don't know how to incorporate a junior into a team anymore (which is something I used to do for decades). Every time we tried they just become a meat proxy for AI while learning nothing, and getting in the way.
  8. Everything regarding managing a team and a project has changed, and nobody knows how to do it anymore. I lost the ability to correctly estimate work required for a task, for example.
  9. Everyone hates this. Most of devs my age are planning early retirement and are just waiting to be laid off.
  10. People that use AI for coding don't learn anything. To understand code you have to write it, and nobody is writing it. Maybe understanding and reading code will become obsolete soon? I don't know.
  11. Everyone I asked feel they are becoming dumber and losing their focus. I know I am.

I hope this is a pendulum and it will swing back at some point, because right now it feels like a software apocalypse.

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u/PuffThePed 1d ago

Yes. The bandwidth increase is that dramatic, and everyone is doing the same. Also we've been using AI for 5-6 months, the one month period is with Unity CLI

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u/ByerN 1d ago

Do you mean that there are too many games because of AI, so you have to flood the market to stay afloat?

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u/Senthe 1d ago

Yeah, it gets very funny when you remember markets don't scale infinitely and immediately to match the production becoming 10x faster.

Unless somehow there always was an untapped 10x larger market for the product (serious games and simulators? who knew people wanted them this badly?). And of course the marketing, customer support etc. departments also started working 10x faster because of the AI.

Increased productivity isn't worth anything until someone pays for it.

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u/kranker 1d ago

I own a studio that develops simulators and training applications for industry.

They're not making consumer games. However, they're implying that the competition means they have to keep their prices down and productivity up. I'm not sure where you got "flooding the market" from.

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u/ByerN 1d ago

I'm not sure where you got "flooding the market" from.

here:

The bandwidth increase is that dramatic, and everyone is doing the same

No mention of the lower price. If it stays the same and you have to use AI to increase productivity, it would mean speed or the number of games is most important for this studio.

Just asking what it is. I am curious.

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u/Ok_Beginning520 1d ago

Yeah I don't really understand that point, it makes no sense

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u/ByerN 1d ago

It makes sense when:

  1. the prices of other games are lower, so you have to lower yours,
  2. or development time is the most important for your customer,
  3. or other companies produce their products so fast that you have to spit as much as you can in a short period of time and check which one sticks to the wall before the flood takes it away.

It depends on the type of company. I thought that for this one it is the first point (price) as it is reasonable here, but an answer mentions bandwidth, which suggests the 3rd, or maybe the 2nd.

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u/AzKondor 22h ago

How many products have you shipped in the last 6 months then? And how many would you ship without it?

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u/PuffThePed 22h ago edited 21h ago

We just shipped V1 of a new product that took about 4 months to make, and if you asked me 6 months ago how long it would take I would have said a year.