Piero Molino

AI industry and gaming industry misalignmentOct 1, 2026

AI and gaming industries have limited interaction

Piero Molino observes that the AI and gaming industries rarely interact, despite gaming historically being an early adopter of new technologies like 3D physics and online networking — a pattern that has not held for AI.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

When I started this company, I brought together people from both the AI industry and the gaming industry, exactly because those two spaces don’t interact a lot.

Context

Piero Molino. That’s a great question.

AI misuse in game development

AI misuse in game developmentOct 1, 2026

AI asset generation can feel like cheapening the player experience

Piero Molino describes player pushback against AI used to generate game assets. He is sympathetic to the view that cheaper development can produce a worse experience when the art is less good.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

It seems like AI is basically a mechanism for cheapening the development cost and cheapening their experience. I’m sympathetic to that kind of argument because games are an incredible combination of tech and art. If you make it so the art is not as good as it used to be, but it’s cheaper, then it feels like the worst version.

AI-native game design

AI-native game designOct 1, 2026

The sweet spot: AI enables novel mechanics; classical design delivers mastery

Through prototyping, Piero Molino found that games with either minimal AI (a superficial addition) or maximal AI (fully AI-governed rules) underperform; the most engaging prototypes blended AI-driven novelty (e.g., real-time creature generation) with classical, learnable game mechanics (e.g., card-and-dice battles) that support player mastery and progression.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

In our experience, the prototypes that were more in between these two extremes were the most fun. You have some aspects of the game where AI is fundamental and the game would not have been possible before, but some other aspects where classical game mechanics and game design become the predominant part.

AI product design principle

AI product design principleOct 1, 2026

Best AI applications make AI invisible to users

Piero Molino argues that effective AI integration means users stop noticing the AI — they should not think about model choice, token consumption, or inference speed, as those details distract from flow in gameplay or knowledge work.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

I think you shouldn’t be thinking about which model you’re using, how many tokens per second, how many tokens you’re consuming, and all of these implementation details. They get you away from the game you’re playing or the task you’re performing as a knowledge worker.

Context

Piero Molino.

fine-tuning efficacy

fine-tuning efficacyOct 1, 2026

Task data and fine-tuning drove the performance gains

Piero Molino says the vast majority of value in his experiments came from data for the task and from fine-tuning after training. He describes the base model as more or less an independent variable.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

The vast majority of the value was coming from the data for the task. The base model was more or less an independent variable. The actual effect was coming from the fine-tuning and the increased performance that you get after post-training.

game revenue measurement

game revenue measurementOct 1, 2026

Revenue measures overall game value—not individual features

The value of individual game features (e.g., one more creature in Bobium Brawlers) is unknown because players don’t pay for them directly; only total game revenue provides a measurable indicator of the game’s overall value.

Supporting evidence

Piero Molino·Oct 1, 2026

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Original excerpt

We don’t know exactly how valuable one more creature in Bobium Brawlers will be, because people aren’t paying for the creatures. But we will know how valuable the whole game is because we will know the revenue for the game.