内容来源：https://www.wired.com/story/i-made-terrible-games-with-googles-ai-playground/

内容总结：

谷歌本周推出了一款名为Playground的AI游戏生成工具，隶属于其AI实验平台Google Labs。用户只需在类似聊天框的界面中用自然语言描述想要的游戏，Playground便能自动生成可在浏览器中运行的完整游戏，并支持通过追加指令不断调整设计。用户还可上传图片、视频或模型作为参考素材，否则所有视觉内容均由AI生成。该工具与Meta此前发布的游戏生成服务Horizon Create类似，本质上是一种“氛围编程”式的游戏制作方式。

据体验者反馈，制作过程非常直观、对话式且响应迅速，即使完全没有游戏开发经验或编程能力的人也能快速上手。一位编辑在一天之内便做出了三款可玩但质量平平的游戏。第一款叫《Pork Drop》，提示词是“俄罗斯方块，但用可爱的猪代替方块”，经过几轮迭代后，AI生成了一个猪脸方块版本的俄罗斯方块。第二款叫《Dinner Darling》，提示词仅为“同性恋晚宴”，AI生成了一个2D Flash风格的派对模拟游戏，玩家扮演一位压力巨大的主人，需要在倒计时内为挑剔的客人准备各种小吃和鸡尾酒。第三款叫《Neon Don》，是一款赛博朋克风格的俯视角射击游戏，主角是一位“极度离异”的老警察，在合成器波背景音乐中与成群的敌人交战。这款游戏是体验者投入精力最多、也是被其他用户游玩次数最多的一款。

不过，Playground也存在明显局限。谷歌对用户的使用额度设有上限，额度耗尽后需等到下个周期才能继续编辑，除非付费购买更多额度。此外，平台上生成的游戏在菜单、音乐、战斗选项和美术风格上呈现出高度同质化，翻看多个作品后会发现明显的雷同感。体验者认为，Playground短期内玩起来有趣，也让人对游戏制作产生兴趣，但本质上仍是“AI流水线产物”，距离真正实用的游戏开发工具还有不小差距。

中文翻译：

Neon Don对他前妻的律师真是恨得牙痒痒。只要一有机会，他一边对着像素化的坏蛋们突突突地扫射，一边就会跟你念叨这事。他也不是真实存在的人——他的形象只在一个俯视角赛博朋克风格的射击游戏里存在了几分钟，由谷歌实验室服务Playground生成。

“继续开枪！”Neon Don一边扫倒敌人一边说，“布伦达把别的东西全拿走了！”

Playground是谷歌本周推出的服务，隶属于Google Labs——这是谷歌为旗下各种尚未落地为正式应用或官方服务的AI实验项目设立的展示页面。（谷歌之前在做音乐制作类项目时也用过类似方式。）它的运作方式与Meta在9月宣布的游戏生成服务Horizon Create类似。

Playground本质上就是视频游戏版的“氛围编程”，让人们在一个类似聊天机器人的界面中用大白话描述自己想要做什么样的游戏。然后Playground会构建出一个可在浏览器中运行的游戏版本。你可以继续输入指令来调整设计。如果你有想作为参考的素材，可以上传照片、视频或模型。否则，所有视觉和设计都由AI生成。

制作游戏的过程非常直观、像是对话一样，而且响应迅速。这意味着它非常适合我这种几乎没有游戏开发功底、甚至连像样的编程技能都没有的菜鸟。仅仅随手抛出几个想法，我就在一天之内做出了三款可玩、运行稳定、但质量完全不咋地的游戏。

Pork Drop

我的第一款作品是Pork Drop，来自这条提示词：“俄罗斯方块，但用可爱的小猪代替方块。”我输入之后，点了“构建”。AI吭哧吭哧跑了一阵，然后吐出了一个农场主题的俄罗斯方块，每个方块上都画着小猪脸。

我迭代了几次才实现我的构想，告诉AI不仅要在方块上贴猪脸，还要让方块本身就是扭曲的猪的形状。“每个方块都是一只猪，”我写道，“被扭成俄罗斯方块各个方块的形状。让它们看起来有点被压扁了，但还是很可爱！”最终得到了一个干净、可玩的俄罗斯方块，不过偶尔会有方块看起来像一只摆着T字姿势、四肢大张的猪。AI建议起名叫Piggy Stacker，但我觉得我的名字更好。（我是对的。）

Dinner Darling

下一个游戏创意来自我的同事Jay Dayrit。当我问他我应该做什么样的游戏时，他立刻说：“同性恋晚宴。”我把这句话输了进去。

没有追加任何要求，生成的结果是一款2D Flash风格的游戏，名叫Dinner Darling。画风看起来每个人都像Bitmoji表情包。你扮演一个看起来压力山大的主人朱利安，任务是举办一场高档晚宴，客人挑剔得很，似乎就是没法好好坐在餐桌旁的椅子上。随着倒计时推进，你得为越来越愤怒的客人们准备各种精致布鲁斯凯塔和浓缩咖啡马提尼。

生成之后，我试玩了一下，惨败——根本来不及搞清楚操作，就没法及时给客人端上点心或鸡尾酒。（其中一位客人萨莎连续要了好多杯浓缩咖啡鸡尾酒。）“派对灾难，”游戏结束画面写道。

游戏里完全没有提到任何人的性取向，但当我输掉时，Dayrit从办公室另一头喊过来：“看到没？你游戏玩得烂是因为你是直的！”干得漂亮，Playground。

我的同事Reece Rogers看了这个游戏后就没那么印象深刻了。“这太不现实了，因为连素食或无乳制品选项都没有，”他说。

Neon Don

花费精力最多的游戏，也是后来被Playground上随机用户玩得最多的游戏。（任何人都可以用谷歌账号登录，玩这些用户生成的游戏。）截至发稿，我已经有七个独立玩家了，这显然意味着这款游戏是我的杰作。

我让AI做一款“赛博朋克风格节奏游戏”，玩家扮演一个“离了好几次婚”的沧桑前警察，对抗一波波 rogue 特工和腐败政客。一开始它做出来的是《节奏光剑》那种类型，但我让AI把它改得更像俯视角射击游戏《迈阿密热线》。最终成品就是Neon Don（名字是我起的），一款俯视角街机风射击游戏，配有脉冲合成的背景音乐。

Neon Don也是我试图试探内容边界的一款游戏，想看看Playground能让我做到什么程度。

我描述了敌人的样子，Playground的AI在此基础上自己加了不少细节，包括“壮硕宽厚的体型，突出的啤酒肚把紧身战术衬衫和工装裤撑得紧绷”以及“定制的硬汉摇摆走路动画”。行吧，Playground，你随意发挥。

游戏一开始有几个小问题。我逐一应对，一点一点添加功能。我口述了关卡缩放、Boss生成和更丰富的敌人种类等系统。我指出了移动性问题，比如玩家会卡住，它给修好了。（偶尔也会引入其他问题。）我让它开发一套文字吐槽系统，让主角在战斗中说出符合角色的俏皮话，比如“继续开枪！布伦达把别的东西全拿走了！”或者“我挨过我前妻律师比这更狠的打击！”

我想，真正的游戏开发者会知道该说什么才能真正打磨功能、让游戏更好玩或更可玩。平台上别人做的一些热门游戏比我的好得多，因为我倾向于依赖更偏“氛围感”的迭代修改，比如“把Don做高一点”或者“再离婚一点”。

游戏计划

过了某个节点之后，谷歌会限制你对Playground服务的使用量。每个新游戏及其中的每次迭代都会消耗你的额度。（给我所有新晋忠实粉丝的提示：我的作品更新将在10月14日额度刷新后推出。）

这意味着我的游戏还有很多问题。我想给Neon Don加一个“后空翻”按钮，但AI把它叫做“Doge flip”，我觉得这名字烂透了，但在使用额度恢复之前改不了。我想改难度，加更多武器选项。我想做很多事，但我不会为更多使用额度掏钱。

Playground确实让我对制作视频游戏这门真正的艺术产生了兴趣。它很有趣，也还算直观，而且你能实时玩到实实在在的成果。人们很可能会用它做出一些有意思的东西。但各种限制让它无法真正实用。

而且，当你翻看Playground上的游戏时，一种如出一辙的雷同感弥漫在一切之中。不同的游戏类型最终呈现出几乎一模一样的菜单和音乐。你开始看到同样的战斗选项和风格选择反复出现。

Playground玩一会儿挺有意思。但很快你就会发现，从里到外全是AI粗制滥造的东西。这话你去跟你前妻的律师说吧。

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英文来源：

Neon Don is really pissed at his ex-wife’s lawyer. He’ll tell you any chance he gets while he shotguns lines of pixelated bad guys. He’s also not real—his likeness has only existed for a few minutes in a top-down cyberpunk-style shooter game, generated in the Google Labs service Playground.
“Keep shooting!” Neon Don says as he mows enemies down. “Brenda took everything else away!”
Playground, which Google launched this week, is part of Google Labs, the company’s landing page for its various AI experiments that haven’t made it into an app or official service quite yet. (Google has done this before with things like music production). It works similarly to Horizon Create, the game generation service Meta announced in September.
Playground is essentially vibe coding for video games, letting people describe in plain language what kind of game they want to make in a chatbot-like interface. Playground then builds a working in-browser version of a game. You can add further instructions to tweak the design from there. If you have assets you want to use as a reference, you can upload photos, videos, or models. Otherwise, the visuals and designs are all AI-generated.
The process of making a game is very straightforward, conversational, and responsive. That means it is perfect for dummies like me with little to no video game development chops or even decent coding skills. By simply throwing out some ideas, I built three playable, stable, and not even remotely good games in one day.
Pork Drop
My first work was Pork Drop, a result generated from the prompt “Tetris but with cute pigs instead of blocks.” I typed that in, hit Build. The AI chugged, then spit out a farm-themed version of Tetris with little pig faces drawn on every block.
I had to iterate a bit to realize my vision, telling the AI not just to stick pig faces on the blocks but to have the blocks shaped like distorted pigs. “Each block is a pig,” I wrote, “contorted into the shape of the Tetris blocks. Make ’em look a little squished but still cute!” This resulted in a clean, playable version of Tetris, though the occasional block looked like a T-posed pig with its legs spread-eagle. The AI suggested the title Piggy Stacker, but I thought mine was better. (I’m right.)
Dinner Darling
The next game idea came courtesy of my colleague Jay Dayrit, who, when asked what kind of game I should make, immediately requested, “Gay dinner party.” I typed that in.
With no follow-up requests, the result was a 2D flash-style game called Dinner Darling. The art looks like everyone is a Bitmoji. You’re placed in the shoes of a very stressed-out-looking host, Julian, who is tasked with hosting a fancy dinner party with fussy guests who can’t seem to sit in their chairs at the table. As timers count down, you have to prepare various artisanal bruschettas and espresso martinis for your increasingly angry guests.
After it generates, I give the game a shot and fail miserably, unable to figure out the controls in time to bring my guests a timely pastry or cocktail. (Sasha, one of the guests, required numerous espresso cocktails in a row.) “PARTY CATASTROPHE,” the game-over screen read.
There is no mention of anybody’s sexuality in the game at all, but when I lost, Dayrit called from across the office, “See? You're bad at the game because you're straight!” Well played, Playground.
My colleague Reece Rogers was less impressed when he looked at the game. “This is very unrealistic, because there’s not a vegan or dairy-free option,” he said.
Neon Don
The game that took the most work is the one that has since been played the most by random people on Playground. (Anyone can sign in with their Google account and play these user-generated games.) I’m up to seven unique players as of publication, which apparently means this game is my masterpiece.
I asked the AI to make a “cyberpunk-style rhythm game” where you play as a “very divorced” grizzled ex-cop who battles waves of rogue agents and corrupt politicians. It started as a Beat Saber–type title, but I asked the AI to make it more like the top-down shooter Hotline Miami. The result was Neon Don (title mine), a top-down, arcade-like shooter with pulsing synth wave background music.
Neon Don is also the game I tried to push the content bounds on, to see what Playground would let me get away with.
I described the enemies, and Playground AI added its own details on top, including “bulky, wide builds with prominent beer bellies straining against their tight tactical shirts and cargo pants” and “custom tough-guy swagger animations.” OK, Playground, go off.
The game had several small issues at first. I countered them and added features a little bit at a time. I dictated systems for level scaling, boss generation, and better enemy variety. I flagged mobility issues, like the player getting stuck, and it fixed them. (And occasionally introduced other problems.) I asked it to develop a text-based snark system that made the main character respond to combat with witty in-character quips like “Keep shooting! Brenda took everything else away!” or “I’ve taken worse hits from my ex-wife’s lawyer!”
I imagine that a real game developer would know what to actually say to sharpen features and make the game more fun or playable. Some of the top games people have created on the platform are much better than mine, since I tended to lean on more vibe-based iterative changes like, “Make Don taller” or “more divorced.”
Game Plan
After a certain point, Google throttles your usage of its Playground service. Every new game and iteration therein uses up more of your allowance. (Note for all my new loyal fans: Updates on my titles will be coming on October 14 when my usage allowance refreshes.)
That means my games still have many issues. I wanted to add a “Backflip” button to Neon Don, but the AI called it “Doge flip,” which I think sucks but cannot change until my usage credits recharge. I want to change the difficulty and add more weapon options. I want to do a lot of things, but I ain’t paying for more usage credits.
Playground does make me interested in the actual art of making video games. It’s fun and somewhat intuitive, and there are tangible results you can play with in real time. People are probably going to make some interesting stuff with it. But the limitations keep it from being truly useful.
Also, when you scroll through the Playground games, an unmistakable sameness permeates everything. Different game genres wind up with almost identical menus and music. You start to see the same types of combat options and style choices.
Playground is fun for a bit. But soon it becomes pretty clear it’s AI slop all the way down. Tell that to your ex-wife’s lawyer.
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