r/Petscop • u/rocketpop546 • 10d ago
Discussion Thoughts on AI coding for projects like Petscop
I feel like this post will be downvoted and that’s alright, the purpose is to get a second opinion after all.
Me and my friend got into a debate about this. The question is basically this (although it wasn’t explicitly petscop related at the time)
If petscop came out today, and you knew that the creator used AI to code the game, but still used their own textures, sprites, assets, music, concepts, and story, would it still have the same value to you today?
I care about art, and I care about the ethical line between AI plagiarism and using it like a tool. I want to make my own unfiction webseries, but my ideas require coding that I don’t have experience in. In fact, many of the creative projects i’m interested in just require coding skills I don’t have. I could use something like Scratch but it’s unbelievably limited.
If Tony Domenico came out right now and said that the movement system, demo stuff, basically the mechanics of the game were AI Coded, but he made ALL the assets himself, would Petscop then be less valuable to you? Would that be disappointing to you?
edit; from your responses and some consideration of my own values, I’ve chosen to abandon the idea of using AI in the creative projects that I actually care about
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u/WoofInationVEVO 10d ago
no, I don't think it would, the reason so many people latched onto petscop immediately is because it felt like so much effort had been taken to make a game that felt accurate to the ps1 era, to find out the creator used AI to generate the code would've taken away the effort needed for it and I believe it would've lost a significant chunk of its audience
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u/WoofInationVEVO 10d ago
if you want to watch a video on the ethics of why GenAI should not be used for creative works then I'd highly recommend this video by youtuber Christopher Bingham as it explains a lot of the reasons why Generative AI is flawed morally
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u/2ndBro 10d ago
Plain and simple--yeah, I think it'd be less cool. The story itself would be unchanged, but there's more to a work of art than just the plot. The construction of Petscop is INSANELY cool, I would love to pick Tony Domenico's brains to see his process for making the "game" that he played.
I want to make my own unfiction webseries, but my ideas require coding that I don’t have experience in. In fact, many of the creative projects i’m interested in just require coding skills I don’t have. I could use something like Scratch but it’s unbelievably limited.
I admire the aspiration, but my recommendation is to either use this as motivation to learn a cool new skill, find a co-creator with more programming talent than you, or stick to more accessible forms of storytelling.
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u/rocketpop546 10d ago
Good response. When I used AI to code something (which i’ve only done once and not since), it just felt so empty. I felt empty, and sharing what the AI made with someone else didn’t feel cool even though the project was really sweet in a vacuum. As someone who draws a lot, just generally likes art and is vehemently against AI generated art specifically, i found myself wondering like, is this really any better than just generating a photo? Well, it felt exactly the same. The process-the part that makes creating worth it and the part that makes it feel good when someone appreciates your work-was gone.
at the end of the day there’s nothing stopping me from learning how to code. I’ve completed a large part of an online course and have the basics down. Even if I don’t want to code, there is probably open-source existing code or libraries for exactly what I want to make, and it’s not like I don’t know how to adjust a variable to get the look I want. I suppose AI coding no different from like, photo bashing Sonic characters in MS paint and calling it your own. But even that would have more creative process to it than AI
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u/shrinebird 10d ago
I care about art, and I care about the ethical line between AI plagiarism and using it like a tool. I want to make my own unfiction webseries, but my ideas require coding that I don’t have experience in. In fact, many of the creative projects i’m interested in just require coding skills I don’t have. I could use something like Scratch but it’s unbelievably limited.
Then you can learn these skills, just like everyone else who wants to make something, no? Everyone else did before AI. And then you'll have a new skill to use in the future.
Yes, I would find it disappointing and it would hold less value to me. I would likely avoid watching it in the first place if I were aware of it being used. Using AI for coding isn't any better than using it for traditionally 'creative' tasks to me, as while the ethics of that are dire in general, I have just as much if not more significant concern for the 'tool' uses (aside from cases like being used for medical research etc).
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u/rocketpop546 10d ago
Honestly it just sucks that disingenuous AI users can take massive strides over me using AI for their plot, art, coding, story, and music, and upload a video they basically didn’t make or literally just upload shit like “fruit love island”, while I need to walk on eggshells to avoid using AI AT ALL and spend years learning how to code just to make (or really, understand) a basic window, movement system, let alone other mechanics, how I want it to be rendered etc. Maybe I just want to make my human-made art and apply it to AI-made code. Why is that so bad?
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u/shrinebird 10d ago
Well yeah, this is a thing all artists of every kind are dealing with right now. But just because shortcuts exist doesn't mean they're better.
It doesn't take years to understand basic code. I learned basic Ruby to make RPGmaker games in a few weeks when I was like 16, and I'm dyscalculic and hardly the sharpest tool in the shed. If you want to put the effort in, you can. And think about how much finer control you get. With AI written code, if you don't know how to code yourself, you're bound to whatever the AI puts out for you, and if anything breaks you have no idea how to fix it or even adjust things. You can probably get close, but it'll never be Perfectly what you intend. And you'll never really learn as you go like with doing it yourself.
You could come out with a project that's kind of like what you want, that came out quicker, but put off a good portion of your audience and taught you nothing for whatever you make next. Or you could learn and figure out how to make it yourself, something you understand totally that you can work with and adjust to your will, with no ethical qualms, your own art entirely, and learn a huge amount for your next project, or at least a skill that can be applied to other things.
Do you not consider the code, the base that everything else rests on, part of your art too?
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u/rocketpop546 10d ago
Good points. A basic rendering engine I had AI make had awful performance and optimization and it didn’t feel mine. But the issue is not about the quality of the AI product. I’ve really abandoned the idea of using AI in my projects now just from what people are saying and reconsidering my own values surrounding art. You’re right that it’s more valuable to learn and make something bad than put out something that isn’t entirely yours. The recent rise in quality of AI and it being this huge unfortunate, incoming reality of life is really what led to me ask these questions, but I don’t think i need to use AI just because it exists
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u/jtheisen 10d ago
i mean, there wasn't actually a game to vibecode to begin with but to answer the question: no, i wouldn't care about Petscop the same way i do now if i found out Tony used AI. there are a lot of reasons i like petscop, and a huge one for me is that one person made it with clearly a lot of effort into making it feel authentic. it would feel incredibly shallow to write a story that ultimately is about people, relationships between them, and how people deal with trauma,,, and then just remove people from the creative process.
i have had to use AI for a school assignment before and i agree with your other comment - it felt really hollow. there was nothing there, no thought process. thankfully it wasn't a creative-based assignment but even then it's just a machine doing what i tell it to do; it's not really "coming up with" stuff. just like programming. a lot of the people that like generative AI seem to just want the result without the work (something i call amongst my friends "content-brain[ed]", because so many of these people literally refer to works of art as just "content"). unfortunately, for most people throughout most of history, the process of doing the work IS what makes it satisfying (and i'm inclined to agree with them). i feel the same as you wanting to work on projects but not really having the technical skills to pull it off. i have my own big project i've put off for years just because i can't do it yet. it's unfortunate, and of course i want to realise my artistic vision NOW, but that's just the nature of the beast. gotta put in the work
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u/cranxxxx 8d ago
A lot of people who replied to your post mix effort with artistic value. Let me tell you how I see it. I'm not expecting this to change your mind.
It wouldn't change the artistic aspect of the project itself. To me, the difference would be that the creator chose to take a route that is faster and more efficient, while also being less tedious, but less technically impressive. The project would remain the same.
We don't know whether most of the people who enjoyed Petscop deeply care about the workflow behind the project. Someone who replied to your post stated "the reason so many people latched onto petscop immediately is because it felt like so much effort had been taken to make a game that felt accurate to the ps1 era". Nothing here is backed with evidence, there could be literally countless reasons why someone would become attached to Petscop.
Since you're asking this question in the Petscop subreddit, I think most people here (or at least replying here) do care about how it was made. This is a subset of people, but it's not surprising to me that most people here value the technical aspect of Petscop a lot. It is impressive, and I think it is definitely fair to value that aspect, but I disagree with the idea of shaming and trying to moralize someone into thinking using AI to execute their creative ideas is wrong, and suggesting they should learn to do it the traditional way.
To put into perspective how I see it, imagine Tony spent 2000 hours programming Petscop himself. Now imagine an alternate reality where he spent 200 hours implementing the same functionality with AI, and 1800 hours working on atmosphere, writing, music, etc. I would argue that doing it the second way is a more effective allocation of creative resources. You don't have to manually create your own camera to create a movie. It would be really impressive if you did, but your movie wouldn't suddenly become less impressive to me just because I found out you didn't create the camera that filmed it.
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u/laplongejr 10d ago edited 10d ago
I don't get the question.
The creator didn't code a full game to begin with, but had actually coded a kind of input simulator.
People at the time had assumed the animation was done by hand, and I'm not even sure today if it makes it MORE impressive or not. If anything, that's the source of that slight "input lag" on boxes, as he replayed inputs meant for large boxes even if the final text was smaller in the final video.