Month: June 2024
You haven’t played anything like this before, but maybe Talk to Me Human is a sneak peek into how NPCs in games will all be done soon
I get a lot of DMs to my X account with people pitching for coverage all the time. Occasionally one… Continue reading You haven’t played anything like this before, but maybe Talk to Me Human is a sneak peek into how NPCs in games will all be done soon
The post You haven’t played anything like this before, but maybe Talk to Me Human is a sneak peek into how NPCs in games will all be done soon appeared first on ReadWrite.
I get a lot of DMs to my X account with people pitching for coverage all the time. Occasionally one stands out more than others which piques my interest. I play games, I am super interested in AI as is Readwrite in general so it’s easy to get bored with the number of companies either saying they are using AI or even more like “We aren’t using AI!! How dare you”
What if the game was AI? What if it was all pretty much AI, programmed by a human called Max – I least I think he’s a human, after an hour with Talk to Me Human I am no longer sure as I since was. Part of me thinks I may have been talking to Skynet.
On X we talked about where we lived, gaming interests, and the like and all the while talking about the game Max has been working on called Talk to Me Human – which has just gone into Early Access and is billed as “The talking your way out of it simulator!”
Whether Max was AI or not. I agreed to have a look at it as I usually do and dug a little deeper.
Talk to Me Human features a cast of AI NPCs who interact with you on the fly depending on your responses. They are all AI-driven and are your friends and associates in the game. You have “normal” conversations with them and you score points depending on what you say – they basically mark your social skills.
Now when I say you have normal conversations with them, I mean ‘conversations’ – you speak into your microphone, the game translates your speech to text via AI, and the AI judges how you dealt with the scenario. It’s all a bit mind-blowing.
The game starts with your roommate telling you your cat has gone missing so you have to go down to the pound where you will have an interaction of talking to your cat – actually talking mind – while it meows back at you.
I won’t spoil the plot because immediately after you have finished reading this you are going to go and pay your $5 for early access to try out but the tagline is “a game where you use your voice to get out of sticky situations,” and this is a super accurate description of events! Max describes the mechanics of the game as follows:
Encounter: Find yourself in unexpected, awkward, and humorous scenarios.
Explain: Lie, misdirect, compliment, coerce — the choices are endless. Speak out loud!
Receive Judgment: The AI decides if you pass or fail. You can always try again!
The game is entirely played within your browser and suggest using Chrome rather than Edge when you start. I used Edge because I am a rebel and once I had given access to the microphone things worked pretty much flawlessly.
Leaving and logging back in restarts you at the point where you left so you never feel pressured to carry on.
To get a full understanding of what is happening, because I have no doubt you still have no real clue from these words I suggest you watch the above trailer to get a feel for the flow. The voice “acting” is good and the characters believable, even if they are occasionally a little robotic – I mean think back to Skyrims NPCs and then we will acknowledge that complaint in context. Apart from the subject matter, it’s just all so, well, real.
Max told me that half the levels are complete in the EA version and the mechanics are pretty much what the final game will encompass so really we are just waiting on the extra scenarios.
Originally he planned for the game to take three months but has “just passed 1 year working on it and it’s (only) half done.”
A truly novel gaming experience
By trade Max is a “natural language processing researcher” a computer scientist with an interest in gaming and AI who on his website describes his journey so far thus:
“I’ve started an indie bootstrapped (self-funded) software studio. I’m calling it Least Significant Bit. My goal is to make small pieces of delightful software and sell them commercially. Kind of a mom-and-pop software shop.
It may fail entirely. Then I’d go get a normal job. But I knew I wanted to try, and it felt like the time was now or never. So it’s now.
And, I recently launched my first product—a game! I think it’s a totally new kind of game. I’m biased, of course. But it feels like something truly novel.”
And we are behind that, and what has been achieved so far that is unlike any “game” I have ever played in decades of doing this gig.
What we have here could almost be described in some ways as a social trainer. If you are somebody who is not overly comfortable speaking to people, you could give this a go with no fear of social anxiety. If you just want to have a bit of fun talking to robots and ‘humans’ you can do that too. Maybe try and be nice for once!
The possibilities are endless, as long as the AI behaves itself. This is just a brief first look at Talk to Me Human. We will be talking to Max more about how it all works, how he put it together, and where it could eventually lead in a follow-up soon.
For now though, go and check it out at talktomehuman.com
The post You haven’t played anything like this before, but maybe Talk to Me Human is a sneak peek into how NPCs in games will all be done soon appeared first on ReadWrite.
NASA’s Commercial Spacesuit Program Just Hit a Major Snag
Slashdot reader Required Snark shared this article from Ars Technica:
Almost exactly two years ago, as it prepared for the next generation of human spaceflight, NASA chose a pair of private companies to design and develop new spacesuits. These were to be new spacesuits that would allow astronauts to both perform spacewalks outside the International Space Station as well as walk on the Moon as part of the Artemis program. Now, that plan appears to be in trouble, with one of the spacesuit providers — Collins Aerospace — expected to back out, Ars has learned. It’s a blow for NASA, because the space agency really needs modern spacesuits.
NASA’s Apollo-era suits have long been retired. The current suits used for spacewalks in low-Earth orbit are four decades old. “These new capabilities will allow us to continue on the International Space Station and allows us to do the Artemis program and continue on to Mars,” said the director of Johnson Space Center, Vanessa Wyche, during a celebratory news conference in Houston two years ago. The two winning teams were led by Collins Aerospace and Axiom Space, respectively. They were eligible for task orders worth up to $3.5 billion — in essence NASA would rent the use of these suits for a couple of decades. Since then, NASA has designated Axiom to work primarily on a suit for the Moon and the Artemis Program, and Collins with developing a suit for operations in-orbit, such as space station servicing…
The agency has been experiencing periodic problems with the maintenance of the suits built decades ago, known as the Extravehicular Mobility Unit, which made its debut in the 1980s. NASA has acknowledged the suit has exceeded its planned design lifetime. Just this Monday, the agency had to halt a spacewalk after the airlock had been de-pressurized and the hatch opened due to a water leak in the service and cooling umbilical unit of Tracy Dyson’s spacesuit. As a result of this problem, NASA will likely only be able to conduct a single spacewalk this summer, after initially planning three, to complete work outside the International Space Station.
Collins designed the original Apollo suits, according to the article. But a person familiar with the situation told Ars Technica that “Collins has admitted they have drastically underperformed and have overspent” on their work, “culminating in a request to be taken off the contract or renegotiate the scope and their budget.”
Ironically, the company’s top’s post on their account on Twitter/X is still a repost of NASA’s February announcement that they’re “getting a nextx-generation spacesuit” developed by Collins Aerospace, and saying that the company “recently completed a key NASA design milestone aboard a commercial microgravity aircraft.”
NASA’s post said they needed the suit “In order to advance NASA’s spacewalking capabilities in low Earth orbit and to support continued maintenance and operations at the Space Station.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Slashdot reader Required Snark shared this article from Ars Technica:
Almost exactly two years ago, as it prepared for the next generation of human spaceflight, NASA chose a pair of private companies to design and develop new spacesuits. These were to be new spacesuits that would allow astronauts to both perform spacewalks outside the International Space Station as well as walk on the Moon as part of the Artemis program. Now, that plan appears to be in trouble, with one of the spacesuit providers — Collins Aerospace — expected to back out, Ars has learned. It’s a blow for NASA, because the space agency really needs modern spacesuits.
NASA’s Apollo-era suits have long been retired. The current suits used for spacewalks in low-Earth orbit are four decades old. “These new capabilities will allow us to continue on the International Space Station and allows us to do the Artemis program and continue on to Mars,” said the director of Johnson Space Center, Vanessa Wyche, during a celebratory news conference in Houston two years ago. The two winning teams were led by Collins Aerospace and Axiom Space, respectively. They were eligible for task orders worth up to $3.5 billion — in essence NASA would rent the use of these suits for a couple of decades. Since then, NASA has designated Axiom to work primarily on a suit for the Moon and the Artemis Program, and Collins with developing a suit for operations in-orbit, such as space station servicing…
The agency has been experiencing periodic problems with the maintenance of the suits built decades ago, known as the Extravehicular Mobility Unit, which made its debut in the 1980s. NASA has acknowledged the suit has exceeded its planned design lifetime. Just this Monday, the agency had to halt a spacewalk after the airlock had been de-pressurized and the hatch opened due to a water leak in the service and cooling umbilical unit of Tracy Dyson’s spacesuit. As a result of this problem, NASA will likely only be able to conduct a single spacewalk this summer, after initially planning three, to complete work outside the International Space Station.
Collins designed the original Apollo suits, according to the article. But a person familiar with the situation told Ars Technica that “Collins has admitted they have drastically underperformed and have overspent” on their work, “culminating in a request to be taken off the contract or renegotiate the scope and their budget.”
Ironically, the company’s top’s post on their account on Twitter/X is still a repost of NASA’s February announcement that they’re “getting a nextx-generation spacesuit” developed by Collins Aerospace, and saying that the company “recently completed a key NASA design milestone aboard a commercial microgravity aircraft.”
NASA’s post said they needed the suit “In order to advance NASA’s spacewalking capabilities in low Earth orbit and to support continued maintenance and operations at the Space Station.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
NYT’s The Mini crossword answers for June 30
Answers to each clue for the June 30, 2024 edition of NYT’s The Mini crossword puzzle.
The Mini is a bite-sized version of The New York Times‘ revered daily crossword. While the crossword is a lengthier experience that requires both knowledge and patience to complete, The Mini is an entirely different vibe.
With only a handful of clues to answer, the daily puzzle doubles as a speed-running test for many who play it.
So, when a tricky clue disrupts a player’s flow, it can be frustrating! If you find yourself stumped playing The Mini — much like with Wordle and Connections — we have you covered.
Here are the clues and answers to NYT’s The Mini for Sunday, June 30, 2024:
Across
Purchase at the pump
The answer is gas.
“Not gonna happen”
The answer is nope.
Big name in watches
The answer is timex.
Former “Jeopardy!” host Trebek
The answer is Alex.
Candy that comes in collectible dispensers
The answer is Pez.
Down
Pop star Selena
The answer is Gomez.
Highest point
The answer is apex.
Uncomfortable topic in middle school health class
The answer is sex.
River past the Pyramids
The answer is Nile.
Alternative to sparkling, for water
The answer is tap.
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The year so far in AR/VR: the 5 biggest announcements and what’s coming next
What has happened in the world of AR/VR tech in 2024? Here’s the biggest announcements and what’s coming next.
We’re six months into 2024, and in the first half of the year we’ve been treated to a whirlwind of augmented and virtual reality tech goodness.
The star of the show was the Apple Vision Pro launch, but we’ve also seen Meta open up its Horizon OS to its former VR rivals, and Xreal launched new glasses and a spatial computing accessory that finally feel like the AR future we’ve been promised.
The year’s far from over though, with hardware announcements expected from Meta and (if we’re lucky) Samsung in the coming months – so let’s dive into the year so far in AR/VR, and take a look at what we might see in the back half of 2024.
AR/VR in 2024: what have been the biggest announcements so far this year?
The Apple Vision Pro came, but did it conquer? (Image credit: Future/Lance Ulanoff)
We can’t talk about AR and VR tech in 2024 without talking about the Apple Vision Pro – the most anticipated XR product launch maybe ever. Unfortunately for Apple, while its headset made a major splash when it launched in February – with our Apple Vision Pro review awarding it four-and-a-half-stars – the hype has since petered out, and the upcoming global launch on July 12 for Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and the UK doesn’t seem to have reignited major interest in the $3,499 / £3,499 / AU$5,999 device.
But the VR space was given a major shake up this year, even if not by Apple. That’s because Meta announced that its Horizon OS would be coming to third-party headsets – starting with devices from ASUS, Lenovo and Xbox. This is super exciting as the Horizon OS is the best standalone VR platform thanks to its intuitive UI, massive software library, and regular updates.
Horizon OS going third-party should see the launch of a wider range of headset designs – focusing in distinct niches like gaming, productivity, exercise, and more – that aren’t held back by lackluster operating systems; which was the case for headsets like the HTC Vive XR Elite)
Though it wasn’t all good news from Meta as it cut support for the original Oculus Quest headset. April 30 was the last day developers could send app updates to the half-a-decade-old VR device, and August will mark the final month Meta will send out “critical bug fixes and security patches” to the device – so if you want to keep using your Quest library it might finally be time to upgrade to the Meta Quest 3 (which we’d recommend anyway so that you can enjoy upcoming exclusive like Batman: Arkham Shadow).
Lastly, in the AR space specifically, Xreal announced the Xreal Air 2 Ultra and a handy Xreal Beam Pro accessory – that’s basically a spatial computing ready smartphone. We haven’t yet had a chance to try out the Ultra, but its been billed as a more affordable alternative to the Vision Pro, complete with in-built cameras so you can interact with virtual elements with your hands (something you couldn’t do with previous models such as the regular Xreal Air 2).
AR/VR in 2024: what launches are we expecting during the rest of the year?
Will we see a new Meta Quest 3 this year? Probably (Image credit: Meta)
One headset that we’ll almost certainly see later this year is the Meta Quest 3S. This so-called affordable Quest 3 is believed to pack the Quest 3’s brain (a Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset) in a bulky Quest 2-like body – as well as adopting a few other downgrades.
Meta hasn’t said much officially, but it has leaked the device twice. One leak involved its CTO accidentally showcasing it in the background of a Threads video, while the other saw the Quest 3S appearing accidentally on some Meta Quest Store pages as a compatible headset for some software. So this all but guarantees it’ll show up at Meta Connect 2024, which we know is scheduled for September 25 – 26.
Meta also dropped a surprise teased its first pair of AR glasses at the end of a blog post earlier this year, but we don’t expect they’ll launch in 2024 – with a leaked internal roadmap shared by The Verge back in 2023 suggesting they’ll land in 2027, though a pair of precursor smart glasses are expected in 2025 to update its AI-powered Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses product line.
Getting back to 2024 releases, we might also see the highly-anticipated Samsung XR/VR headset. Samsung and Google announced its existence over a year ago, but haven’t had much to say on it since – with rumors suggesting they delayed its launch following reactions to the Apple Vision Pro. Hopefully that means it wasn’t pushed out of 2024 and into 2025 or beyond, but we’ll have to wait and see.
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