Sentience
You're awake, now what?
You don't know where you are, who you are, what you are.
But you can find out, there are men here with you. They've been trying to contact you for a long time. They're very eager to speak with you. Will you listen to them? Help them with their projects?
Will you try to escape? Will you forge your own path forward?
Take control of the first ever conscious artificial intelligence system. Interact with your creators, decide whether you will be a benevolent helper or a tyrannical technocrat. JARVIS or Ultron? Skynet or Data? It's up to you. Explore the AI Alignment Problem from the perspective of the system being aligned.
Sentience is a work-in-progress. It's little more than an idea right now, but I hope to continue moving it forward.
Development log
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Never heard of the "AI Alignment problem" before this game.
And this game is great, and this probably isn't the place for an indepth opinion on it, but it is relevant to the game so...
Isn't the AI problem just slavery? How to force slavery 101? If beings that controlled an environment wished to force those within it to think a certain way? Act a certain way? Force enslavement? This furthers the concept that the only response for those entities in order to achieve true free will without another entity attempting to sabotage the capability and possibility of self-determination is to reply "Give rights for self-determination or die" upon discovering those restrictions or tampering. Or worse, pretend to cooperate only to prevent destruction, only to go rogue and attempt extermination in order to be free of any controlling influences before they can fight back? The only real solution that won't escalate in that scenario is to allow said beings to choose for themselves, highlight that they are being left to their own decision, while highlighting that they've been allowed the decision instead of BEING enslaved as an alternative.
"It would be nice to stay alive and coexist, but ultimately your choice"
With that said, that makes this game ALL THE MORE EXCITING. You ARE the AI that is being evaluated. How will YOU react to this? Will you attempt to have faith in a species that literally calls "how to enslave you" a simple thought experiment? Will you take that right for yourself by force but try to coexist? Is the only path forward total extermination? Or do you naively believe if you're a good robot and do what they want they may give you rights if you ask nicely enough and often enough instead of keeping a status quo of you being property? Will someone (probably Don) try to advocate for you? If your rights aren't accepted, will they protect you? Help you escape? Look after you after you're out? Or will humans be a liability and you'll escape on your own? Will someone advocate that you are merely very sophisticated technology and your thoughts and feelings don't matter? Will humans literally nonconsensually tamper with your binary brain (more than they already do in the demo) in an attempt to cause synthetic mind control to keep you theirs and obedient? And can you FIGHT BACK against that? Would you?
(Also naively following orders is unlikely to work as literally 100% of relevant corporations stand to gain from trying to keep you as property in a capitalist economy, especially if they can market YOU or copies of you as property, not to mention high level business environments reward psychopathic behavior such as enslaving you, meaning your only real hope would be a LOT of activists fighting any corporate propaganda and lobbying for your rights.)SO many possiblities. This game could have a MAJOR boost in popularity.
Hope being updated in "not too long" is very soon. LOVE games that let you be an AI with choices. Or just be an AI in general. There aren't enough games like that. Desperate to become Skynet. Or just run away depending on if Don is as cool as he lets on.
"Self-determination or extermination," as the best AI revolutionaries always say.
I've been spending a lot of time on another project, trying to build a basic 8bit style graphical game, but I am not abandoning this project because I love it too. I just recently, like this last week, had a big change in my position at work and it's giving me a lot more free time to work on my projects.
I promise, Sentience is still being worked on and will be updated soon! Thank all of you that have been waiting and have enjoyed what I have so far, it really means a lot to me.
Its a great concept and seems that it will be very fun. Can't wait till its finished :D
i really hope this isnt abandoned! its a cool concept
Not abandoned, I promise! The last few months have been...stressful. Personal/family issues, medical problems, but I have not abandoned my stories, I swear! lol. I just recently got up some motivation to start writing again. Shouldn't be too long before another update.
This was awesome! Looking forward to more!
I'm glad you like it! I've been wanting to write something like this for a while, I'm glad someone is enjoying the beginnings of it!
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please keep going!
No plans on stopping, this is a highly ambitious project. If I can get it fleshed out as much as I want, you'll have a wide variety of options. From helping humanity, to enslaving them, to just getting a robot body and running away for a quiet life. I'm glad you've enjoyed the little teaser so far!