Position: Interactive Generative Video as Next-Generation Game Engine
Jiwen Yu, Yiran Qin, Haoxuan Che, Quande Liu, Xintao Wang, Pengfei Wan, Di Zhang, Xihui Liu
2025-03-25
Summary
This paper proposes using AI-generated videos as a new way to create video games, making them more creative and cheaper to develop.
What's the problem?
Making video games is hard and expensive because game developers have to create all the content themselves.
What's the solution?
The researchers suggest using AI to automatically generate video game content, like environments and characters, making the process faster and more creative.
Why it matters?
This work matters because it could revolutionize game development, making it easier for anyone to create unique and engaging games.
Abstract
Modern game development faces significant challenges in creativity and cost due to predetermined content in traditional game engines. Recent breakthroughs in video generation models, capable of synthesizing realistic and interactive virtual environments, present an opportunity to revolutionize game creation. In this position paper, we propose Interactive Generative Video (IGV) as the foundation for Generative Game Engines (GGE), enabling unlimited novel content generation in next-generation gaming. GGE leverages IGV's unique strengths in unlimited high-quality content synthesis, physics-aware world modeling, user-controlled interactivity, long-term memory capabilities, and causal reasoning. We present a comprehensive framework detailing GGE's core modules and a hierarchical maturity roadmap (L0-L4) to guide its evolution. Our work charts a new course for game development in the AI era, envisioning a future where AI-powered generative systems fundamentally reshape how games are created and experienced.