Social Sim today closes the race round to build an Animal Crossing-like game with AI NPCs

Today, a Web3 company that created gaming experience “Today,” raised $5 million in seed funding to build a massive Animal Crossing-like “social sim” featuring digital assets and non-player characters (NPCs) powered by generative artificial intelligence. AI).

Today's basic premise revolves around SIM digital real estate. Players use different rare “seeds” to create their own island environment to explore. Depending on the rarity of the race, the island will have different features, characters, and things to explore.

The game is slated to launch in early 2025, but in-progress videos show an ongoing gaming world in the so-called “adventure games” genre. This includes titles such as Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, and Sun Haven, which are popular for offering immersive social experiences.

This is often done by using non-mandatory characters – in-game agents to advance the story and challenge the player, or by assisting characters controlled by human users – using scripted dialogue trees that can simulate dialogue.

Today, the company announced that it plans to enhance its non-player characters with generative AI technology.

Generative AI includes popular tools such as OpenAI's ChatGPT and Anthropic's Claude models. These systems are capable of generating compelling speech on many topics. In fact, you can encourage NPCs who can have endless conversations. However, it's worth noting that even the most powerful generative AI systems have a tendency to produce responses that contain false or nonsensical information.

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In an interview with GamesBeat, TODAY co-founder Michael O'Connor said the team's goal is to replicate real-life interactions in the game:

“Social simulation games lack deep and realistic NPC interactions that limit player immersion and reduce their interactions to superficial exchanges. We're changing expectations by replicating real-life dynamics by using advanced AI for our NPCs with unparalleled depth and responsiveness.

Done well, this can provide players with a happy medium between the banalities of NPCs who complete scripted dialogue and the often-cacophonous experience of multiplayer games with other players.