Video game companies across Asia are embracing artificial intelligence (AI) to bring their characters to life in new and exciting ways. You’re now seeing games that feel more immersive, with characters who respond naturally and environments that adapt in real time — all thanks to recent AI advances.
Asian video game developers are racing to apply AI technologies to their characters: South Korea’s Krafton is working with U.S. giants such as OpenAI, while Chinese players like Novaserene are powered by DeepSeek.https://t.co/s1Cb5XUo1j
— Nikkei Asia (@NikkeiAsia) July 5, 2025
From South Korea to China, developers are working with major AI firms to reshape how you interact with games. Their goal? To make virtual worlds feel more alive than ever before.
Krafton leads South Korea’s AI game revolution
South Korea’s largest game maker, Krafton, is advancing its AI-powered gaming initiatives through partnerships with U.S. tech giants, including Nvidia and OpenAI. The company’s newest simulation game, inZOI, utilizes a small language model (SLM) to enable characters to think, react, and behave in ways that mimic real-life scenarios.
“We made such a game for the first time in the world,” said Lee Kang-wook, who heads Krafton’s deep learning division. According to Lee, characters in inZOI don’t just follow scripts — they respond to players and their environment based on distinct personalities.
Released in March, inZOI sold over 1 million copies in its first week. Players have been drawn to its dynamic storytelling, where no two playthroughs are the same. Krafton’s decision to run the AI on users’ computers rather than the cloud has helped reduce both cost and energy use. This approach required clever data compression, with technical support from Nvidia.
“So, we are very proud of this,” Lee said. “Nvidia is also pleased with the project. I always tell the team we are writing the history of video games.”
Despite the success, Lee says Krafton is not getting too comfortable. “There are many Chinese companies that are doing very well. We’re always on our toes.”
Chinese studios join the AI race
China’s game developers are also quickly jumping on the AI bandwagon. Among the rising stars is Novaserene Entertainment, founded in 2023 by veteran producer Zhao Tongtong, who was inspired by the launch of ChatGPT to explore AI’s possibilities in gaming.
Backed by Ant Group, Novaserene is building games where AI plays a central role. In its titles, even the non-player characters (NPCs) now move and talk in ways shaped by the virtual world around them, not just pre-programmed lines.
Zhao explains that such realism was hard to achieve with traditional logic-based programming. But AI is changing that. “We hope to create a 3D game world where, powered by AI, your virtual characters can behave just like real people,” he said. “And beyond just the characters, we want the entire environment to respond dynamically.”
Other major Chinese developers, such as NetEase, are also stepping up their efforts. NetEase’s Sword of Justice includes NPCs powered by DeepSeek, a Chinese language model known for its surprising accuracy and low cost. An international version of the game is already in the works.
DeepSeek has helped boost confidence among Chinese companies looking to develop games using local AI technologies, thereby reducing their reliance on U.S.-based models.
Looking beyond gaming: Robots next?
Still, not everyone believes AI will give developers a long-term advantage. Charlie Chai, an analyst with 86Research, warns that AI features could soon become standard across most games. “That edge may disappear,” he said, adding that most game development tasks still can’t be done by AI alone.
At Krafton, however, the team is already thinking about what’s next. Lee, who also teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says the same AI brains used in games could one day power physical robots.
“If we replace the virtual bodies of characters in games [with physical forms], it’s the same as robots,” he explained. “I’d like to take this well-working brain [out of game characters] and put it in a different body. Imagine what other synergies there might be.”
Whether it’s gaming, robotics, or beyond, AI is opening doors for developers — and for you as a player — that were unimaginable just a few years ago.
