Sony Could Soon Automatically Play Portions Of Games For You

Sony often introduces convenient gameplay features into its games. While many of them tend to be quite innovative, a patent published by the company now wants to add an option already utilized in many titles. The publisher wants to secure an auto-play feature to play portions of gameplay in your place. It can auto-play grindy game sequences until you take back control.

The patent dubbed “METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR AUTO-PLAYING PORTIONS OF A VIDEO GAME” wants to add an option to handle the “anticipated grinding content (AGC).” Sony mentions that it would simulate the gameplay style of users to grind through tedious portions of a game. This is already used in many MMORPG mobile and PC titles, where you can leave it up to the game to do the combat and walking to quests part for you.

The auto-play mode uses data from the user play model to automatically play the AGC for the user using a gameplay style that simulates a gameplay style of the user. […] When gameplay of the AGC in auto-play mode is complete, a resume notification is presented to the display screen of the user device used by the user during the gameplay,” reads the patent.

Sony clarifies that the auto-play feature would use AI and trained models to decide what to do in place of users. When the game is done grinding for players, they can continue auto-playing or take control at any point. The patent argues that gamers may find some portions of the game quite repetitive, which can kill interest. By using the discussed option, players could easily skip to the fun parts of gameplay and save time for more activities.

By using auto-play mode, users can avoid the need to play parts of a game that they do not like playing and reduce the amount of time it takes to complete the game because the AI player can play the grinding portions of the game at a faster speed.”

I reckon Sony will use this system in multiplayer games. The patent mentions how other players will not be disappointed when one member has to go AFK since the auto-play feature would play for them until they return.

While an auto-play feature sounds fun, Sony has also been experimenting with many other unique ideas. The publisher previously patented a massive co-op game that supports hundreds of players in a theater. The studio also secured a legal doc to let you decide how much NPCs talk in the game.