At CES 2025, NVIDIA revealed its latest advancements in generative AI for gaming with its Avatar Cloud Engine (ACE). This cutting-edge platform enables game developers to create autonomous characters that interact with players, adapt to changing scenarios, and provide a new level of immersion.
By integrating ACE, games such as PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS and MIR5 are introducing AI companions and enemies capable of behaviors previously seen only in human players. NVIDIA’s partnerships with major developers like Krafton, Wemade Next, and NetEase aim to redefine how gamers experience virtual worlds.
PUBG: The Rise of AI Teammates
One of the most prominent applications of NVIDIA ACE is in Krafton’s globally popular PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS, where players will soon encounter PUBG Ally, the first “Co-Playable Character” (CPC).
Unlike traditional non-playable characters (NPCs), PUBG Ally functions as an AI-driven teammate that communicates in game-specific terminology, provides tactical recommendations, and supports players by performing complex tasks such as sharing loot, driving vehicles, and flanking enemies.
Demonstrations of the technology at CES showcased the Ally’s ability to process real-time game events, anticipate player needs, and coordinate strategies dynamically.
Krafton CEO CH Kim highlighted the significance of this innovation during the CES keynote. “CES 2025 marks a significant milestone for Krafton as we work to unveil AI technology that will revolutionize the gaming industry,” Kim stated. He said that Krafton intends to work closely with NVIDIA to enhance user experiences through AI-powered innovations like CPC, which they believe will redefine gaming.
The PUBG Ally is powered by NVIDIA’s Mistral-Nemo-Minitron-8B small language model (SLM), which allows it to make decisions and respond in real-time while operating directly on players’ gaming devices. This local computation avoids the latency challenges of cloud-based AI, ensuring smoother gameplay.
Adaptive Boss Battles in MIR5
In contrast to PUBG’s emphasis on cooperative AI, Wemade Next’s MMORPG MIR5 introduces NVIDIA ACE-powered AI bosses designed to challenge players in ways that go beyond traditional scripted encounters.
These dynamic bosses, such as Asterion, can analyze player behaviors, team compositions, and tactics to adapt their strategies in real-time. Asterion remembers prior encounters and adjusts its approach to ensure no two battles are the same.
Wemade Next CEO Jung Soo Park shared his perspective on this innovation, emphasizing its transformative potential. “Together with NVIDIA, we have begun a new era of gaming with NVIDIA ACE autonomous game characters,” Park said. “MIR5’s AI bosses are a milestone moment in gaming, enabling unique boss encounters with every play session. We’re excited to see how this technology transforms games.”
These adaptive mechanics aim to deepen player engagement by requiring new strategies and dynamic thinking, marking a significant step forward in MMO game design.
Expanding AI in Gaming
Beyond PUBG and MIR5, NVIDIA ACE is being implemented across a range of gaming genres to enhance NPC interactivity and player immersion. In Naraka: Bladepoint, developed by NetEase, AI teammates will soon offer players gear recommendations, swap equipment, and provide tactical guidance based on individual playstyles. Scheduled for release in March 2025, this feature will first launch on the mobile PC version of the game.
Meanwhile, Krafton’s life simulation game InZoi uses NVIDIA ACE to power so called Smart Zoi characters. These autonomous NPCs interact dynamically with players and their environment, reflecting unique personalities and decision-making abilities.
For example, a Smart Zoi might offer directions to a lost NPC or choose to help another character in need, depending on its personality traits.
The Technology Behind NVIDIA ACE
NVIDIA ACE relies on advanced technologies to deliver lifelike, autonomous game characters. Small Language Models (SLMs), such as Mistral-Nemo-Minitron-8B, are compact neural networks optimized for real-time decision-making, allowing characters to interpret their environment and act without relying on cloud-based computation.
NVIDIA describes how this works in a related blog post:
“In order for our SLMs to make good decisions, there must be a high frequency stream of perception data provided to the autonomous game character.
Several models and techniques are used to capture this sensory data: One of the best sources of information in the game world is the game itself.
Game state can be transcribed into text so that a SLM can reason about the game world
Audio: NemoAudio-4B-Instruct – A new Audio+Text in and Text out SLM that is capable of describing a soundscape in a gaming environment; Parakeet-CTC-XXL-1.1B-Multilingual – Transcribes multilingual audio to text.
Vision: NemoVision-4B-128k-Instruct – A new Audio+Image in and Text out SLM capable of simple spatial understanding.
Game State: One of the best sources of information in the game world is the game itself. Game state can be transcribed into text so that a SLM can reason about the game world.”
Audio2Face, another integral component, automates facial animation by syncing characters’ lip movements and expressions with audio inputs, saving developers significant time and resources. NVIDIA has also incorporated Stable Diffusion, a generative image model, into ACE to enable real-time customization of in-game assets, such as player-designed textures and artwork.
Implications for the Gaming Industry
NVIDIA ACE’s ability to simulate human-like behaviors in NPCs has far-reaching implications for game development. By reducing the reliance on scripted interactions, it frees developers to focus on creating more dynamic and adaptive gameplay experiences.
For instance, in the upcoming murder mystery game Dead Meat, ACE powers unscripted interrogations, allowing players to ask NPCs open-ended questions and receive contextually relevant responses. Similarly, in the sandbox title AI People, ACE drives NPCs that autonomously interact with their surroundings, creating evolving narratives based on player actions.
As NVIDIA ACE continues to integrate into more titles, it sets the stage for a future where AI-driven companions, adversaries, and narratives are the norm in gaming. By combining technical sophistication with practical applications, NVIDIA is reshaping what is possible in the gaming industry, ensuring players experience richer and more immersive worlds.
