Vapor World: Over The Mind Cutscene
Image: ALIVE Inc.

I admit that I'd been looking forward to Vapor World: Over The Mind this week, but hadn't been paying that much attention to it. A promising 2D souls-like that looks more than a little bit like a side-scrolling version of Lies Of P, give or take a bit more dreamy steampunk inspiration. Unfortunately, its early access debut today was tripped up by Korean developers ALIVE Inc. deciding to AI-generate the game's cutscenes, voicework, and more. A decision immediately voted on by the public, with the game sitting at a mere 19% positive user reviews, many criticizing the cutscenes specifically for not even being able to consistently carry a main character's appearance from one shot to the next. Oof.

The good news is that shortly after this catastrophic first showing, studio head Young Kim published an apologetic statement promising that the AI cutscenes will be removed soon, with further details to be released over the weekend. It's not the best apology, with the developer lamenting their inability to deliver the game's story without AI assistance, and seemingly hopeful that AI will eventually be able to replace human art seamlessly, but it's a tentative first step. At least there's an admission that AI is just not fit for use and the generated pseudo-art will be replaced with their "own original content".

One small blessing, as mentioned in the developer's statement, is that removing the cutscenes should be a quick and easy process, as first they were animated in-game with the original assets, and only replaced later in production with the more cinematic machine-generated versions. There's no word on whether they'll be removing or replacing the AI voicework - a point that I hope their next statement will address too, but it's a step in the right direction.

That said, this is not the sort of showing any game wants to make on launch day, and will almost certainly eat into sales, kneecapping its progress through that delicate early access development phase. While I'm hoping that ALIVE can excise all the AI and get this ship turned around, I'd be lying if I expected the process to be smooth and easy. That said, it's also good to see more developers denouncing AI usage (even if it is under public pressure), and I wish them all the luck getting this fixed.

Vapor World is out now in early access for £12.79/$15, with a 10% launch discount, but you might want to wait a few weeks to see how the AI removal process pans out first. We'll be circling back on this one once the dust has settled and the steam has cleared, and see just how far things have improved.