It used to be that when you were on the same level in a game, you could hand your controller over to a friend, sibling, or parent to help you out. Now that we've left the nest and don't have friends with endless amounts of free time to come over and play games, we're much more limited in what we can do when we hit a roadblock.
Well, not anymore. Microsoft is looking for a way to seamlessly hand off controls to someone else while we're playing a game and let them jump in before handing it back to us. And if you don't have friends willing to help you, then of course Microsoft does also it works to make artificial intelligence jump in and play for you. Just like the current style.
Both Xbox and PlayStation are looking for ways to let AI play games for us
As noted by Tech4Gamers, Microsoft recently published a patent for this technology that it previously applied for in August 2024.
Now, the patent largely focuses on how “help sessions” would work. Basically, the player would receive a pop-up telling them that a helper is available to jump in and take control of their game.
There's a lot of technical language being used here, but from what we can decipher it sounds like there's an element of “machine learning”, meaning the potential for an AI to take over the controls instead of a human player. It's also not entirely clear whether we'll hand the virtual controller to a person we know or someone approved by Xbox. Either way, it sounds like the hint is meant to be short-term, so we can't just sit back and let someone do all work for us.
Interestingly, PlayStation was involved in similar technology. It was for a “ghost player” AI that could help us when we got stuck, so that's basically what Microsoft is all about, albeit without human choice. It also seems to allow for more long-term AI play, with the option to have an entire section or level completed for you, as opposed to just guiding. Who wants to play games?
Jokes aside, there is potential for this to be a great accessibility tool. Some inputs may be impossible for some players due to disabilities, and this would at least ensure they can get through the section they are having trouble with if other accessibility options don't work. With that being said, it sounds like it will mostly be aimed at those who find a section of the game too difficult.
- Date of establishment
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April 4, 1975
- CEO
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Satya Nadella
- Headquarters
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Redmond, Washington, United States
