From AI Generated Clip To Actual PC Game
Shores of Vaelithar started life as something a lot of PC gamers scroll past every day. It was a five second AI generated video clip made in Midjourney and posted on social media. It showed a moody first person view of a fantasy world with rolling green fields and a looming castle in the distance. It looked like one of those fake AI game demos that will never exist as a real playable title.
But this one is actually being turned into a real game for PC. The developer, a small studio called Desimulate, has now launched an official Steam page for Shores of Vaelithar. That already sets it apart from the usual AI generated hype clips that float around X and TikTok with no code behind them at all.
The twist is that even though the original viral clip was made with AI, the studio now says the actual game is not using AI generated assets. The Steam page does not carry an AI content disclaimer and the devs are very clear about what is and is not made by AI.
How The Devs Say They Use AI Now
Desimulate explains that every asset shown in the current game footage is made in engine and free of AI generated content. That means the environments, textures, props and other visuals you see in the latest clips are built the traditional way by humans using standard game development tools.
However, the team does still use AI as part of its early art pipeline. The creator openly states that the original game concept is based on the style of the viral Midjourney image. They have not completely walked away from AI. Instead they have moved it to what they call the pre concept stage.
Here is how they describe the process.
- They generate images in Midjourney to explore the overall vibe and style of the world.
- These AI images are used as rough mood boards and visual references.
- The human artists on the team then interpret those references and build actual game ready assets.
- No AI generated images are dropped directly into the engine as final textures or models.
The developer calls these images pre concept concept art. In their view, the AI is just a fast sketch tool to communicate ideas to the rest of the team. The real work of modeling, texturing and lighting is still done by artists in traditional tools.
For people who are skeptical of AI in games, this will still feel like a grey area. Critics will argue that you could simply hand your written prompts to a human concept artist instead of sending them to Midjourney. That would avoid the ethical and legal questions around scraping other artists work to train AI models. But compared to projects that flood their games with AI generated textures and character art, Shores of Vaelithar is trying to draw a line at using AI only for very early idea exploration.
Where Shores Of Vaelithar Goes Next
Right now Shores of Vaelithar is still in an early stage. The devs say they are focused on building a solid vertical slice. That means they want a short but polished chunk of gameplay that shows off the core mechanics, the look of the world and the overall feel of the experience.
Once they have that slice in a good state, they plan to look for funding so they can work on the game full time. That is a common path for small indie studios. A strong vertical slice can attract publishers, investors or crowdfunding backers who want to see something more concrete than a mood trailer.
Desimulate also admits that their current AI assisted concept approach is probably temporary. They say that as the project grows they expect to outgrow Midjourney for concept work and bring in a dedicated concept artist. In other words, they see AI as a stopgap tool for a tiny team, not as a long term replacement for human talent.
For PC gamers, Shores of Vaelithar is an interesting example of how messy the line between AI hype and real development has become. On one side you have a wave of AI generated fake game clips that will never produce a playable build. On the other side you have teams like this one that started with an AI created image but are now building a real game with a more traditional pipeline.
As more studios experiment with AI tools, expect more projects that sit somewhere in the middle. The key questions for players will be simple. Does it actually run as a game on PC, and are the final assets made by humans or scraped together by a model? Shores of Vaelithar is trying to answer that by keeping AI away from the final in game content while still admitting its role in the original spark of the idea.
Original article and image: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/the-fantasy-rpg-that-started-as-a-viral-ai-made-video-is-free-of-ai-generated-content-pledges-its-maker/
