The Intersection of VR and AI: Transforming Digital Experiences
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VR and AI, different as they may seem, can work together to build even more immersive environments. Let’s take non-playable characters (NPCs), for example—these, most often found in gaming, can be powered by generative AI to behave proactively in a much more complex way than with regular scripts. This isn’t important just in gaming but also in other industries like training, enabling businesses to craft much more compelling, less predictable scenarios. Here, we shall explore this topic further—we invite you to read this article.
The Synergy between AI and VR
Virtual reality is all about immersion, compelling worlds that resemble real-life environments and situations. Yet, so far, there was one thing that they could not imitate: human interactions. Artificial intelligence is here to change that.
When we discussed how AI will change the Metaverse, we already mentioned that the content will be impacted the most. With artificial intelligence, companies will finally be able to recreate the true real-life experience, including (but not only) human interactions. AI will modify the scenarios, impact the behavior of NPCs, and even enhance the graphics, taking immersion to another level. But this is not the only thing that will get an upgrade—so will the quality of the tasks and functions of such worlds for people.
VR and AI: Practical Applications
How can VR and AI work together? What will they change, and how? Let’s delve into this a bit more deeply and present several examples of this pair in practice.
Fire Safety Training
We may already observe VR fire safety training programs, but they still do not unlock their full potential. Currently, they can be utilized to:
- simulate the real-life environment and practice safety training in a given location,
- train creative thinking in pre-programmed situations,
- foster exchanging experiences.
With AI, this can be taken to a completely new level, enabling you to:
- create unpredictable fire training scenarios designed by AI,
- practice out-of-the-box solutions in unpredictable situations,
- evaluate the effects of the training by measuring various, often unstructured data about the trainees’ performance.
Data Analytics and Visualization in Finance
When it comes to VR data visualization in finance, AI may be utilized to both analyze the information presented and adapt the visualization to the preferences of those involved. It helps businesses extract insights from it much more quickly through smart, 3D data manipulation and reduces the volume of information displayed to only the most crucial points.
Each person interested will see the data displayed differently, based on what they opted for in the past. As a result, every user can extract information from the visualized graphs much more easily and quickly, avoiding potential errors.
Immersion in Gaming
Finally, VR and AI are the perfect pair to make the gaming experience more immersive. More intelligent, less predictable NPCs, better graphics, or even a dynamically changing environment that does not need to be programmed to be affected by the players’ actions—all of this is possible with these two technologies. Combining them together will create a new era of gaming, one that lets the players truly live in the story they are presented with and embrace the world they explore.
Conclusions
AI and VR are a pair designed for greater things. They will enhance the experience of those using virtual reality significantly while improving all the existing VR systems. As such, we must accept artificial intelligence and expect it to be a component of more and more VR platforms. After all, everybody will want to reap the harvest and benefit from unleashing the potential of this pair.
You may also read: Will The Metaverse Ever Feel Real? (Part 1)
Author: Rafał Siejca
Rafal has over twenty years of corporate experience, including roles at Millennium Bank, Comarch, and leading software teams at PZU, one of Europe’s largest insurance companies. As one of Poland’s few true VR experts with a decade of experience, he ensures timely, high-quality project delivery as CEO and CTO.