The Readyverse—a metaverse gaming world inspired by author Ernest Cline’s “Ready Player One” book and film, and other properties—is getting an injection of generative AI.

Unveiled today at the Permissionless III conference in Salt Lake City, The Readyverse’s new AI model named Promptopia lets users generate new 3D objects in the game and in real-time using text prompts.

According to Readyverse Studios co-founder Aaron McDonald, the aim of Promptopia is to democratize game creation by enabling anyone to become a creator, regardless of technical skills. You can simply type whatever you want to make it appear in the game world.

Image: The Readyverse/Promptopia

“Think of it like an AI-powered Roblox with unlimited creativity thrown into popular game mechanics to try and make it more than about building stuff,” McDonald told Decrypt in an interview.

According to McDonald, players can use Promptopia to create new environments using Futureverse’s Altered State 3D model generator and music by way of the JEN AI platform, also co-founded by McDonald, which can be changed in a capture-the-flag style game mode.

“Promptopia is a mix of first-person shooter, capture-the-flag, and Roblox. All of the objects were generated by user prompts,” McDonald told Decrypt. “You can shoot other people’s objects and destroy them, and if you capture the flag, you can control the music and the environment.”

The Readyverse and Readyverse Studios were announced in March by McDonald, along with Shara Senderoff, Cline, and producer Dan Farah. To access Promptopia, players begin in The Readyverse online game Open before making their way to The Readyverse launcher.

“The generative environment, terrain, and objects inside of there are all using our own proprietary models,” McDonald said. “So we’re not just plugging in some third-party software. We have about 20 PhDs who work on the science of AI and generative AI.”

Readyverse Studios said that Promptopia aims to provide players with limitless creative freedom, integrating AI tools in real-time to generate 3D assets and environments. The Readyverse already features a number of major brands and properties, including Reebok, Cool Cats, DeLorean, and Ready Player One.

The Readyverse isn’t the first metaverse experience to experiment with text-based generative AI prompts to help players create more easily. Oncyber launched a ChatGPT-based feature along these lines in early 2023, and Hiber3D plugged in Google’s AI for similar functionality. Meta has also said that AI tools will help build out the metaverse.

According to McDonald, The Readyverse aims to make Cline’s dream of the Oasis—a connected digital universe—a reality.

Image: The Readyverse/Promptopia

“The Readyverse is probably best described as a next-gen launcher,” McDonald said. “It’s an immersive launcher experience with a whole bunch of tools built into it for developers to create interoperable experiences.”

The lack of interoperability, McDonald said, is one of the list of reasons that the metaverse hype that surged a few years back has yet to come to fruition.

“People imagined that you could build everything in this one world, and that you would jump from room to room in the house, as opposed to: How do we make the houses connect on a street?” he said. “Making the houses connect on a street is a harder thing to do.”

McDonald hopes bringing generative AI to The Readyverse ecosystem will propel the dream of the metaverse into reality, but is keenly aware that the gaming community at large is not fond of generative AI. But that’s also true with blockchain.

“AI is polarizing, and we’re no strangers to people giving their opinions on what we’re doing,” he said. “I think that change is always difficult for people, and there will always be people who react negatively towards it. That’s why we’ve tried to focus on the elements of fun, and: How can you make this thing fun so that people can look past that change and discover something new?”

Edited by Andrew Hayward