Justin Carter, Contributing EditorNovember 20, 20243 Min ReadImage via Niantic.At a GlanceThe AR dev has spent half a decade using its games and positioning tech to build a 'detailed understanding' of the planet.Niantic recently announced a Large Geospatial Model (LGM), which uses machine learning to "understand a scene and connect it to millions of other scenes globally." But according to 404 Media, the LGM was possibly made by conscripting unaware players into doing the studio's work for years through games like Pokmon Go.In its blog, Niantic expressed hope the LGM would "implement a shared understanding of geographic locations, and comprehending places yet to be fully scanned." It's built on the studio's Visual Positioning System (VPS), which lets players "position themselves in the world with centimeter-level accuracy" and see or place digital content in their exact location, even after they've left.Both Pokmon Go and Ingress are augmented reality (AR) titles, and collect geolocated images as players explore locations to find Pokmon or player-made art. By Niantic's admission, its VPS has over 10 million locations scanned globally from the past five years, and "receive[s] about 1 million fresh scans each week," which are collected from its gamesone of which has been quite popular for nearly a decade, meaning players may have unknowingly participated in helping build its LGM.Similar to a Large Language Model (LLM), Niantic's model scrapes data from real-world locations, and it hopes to use the technology to "enable computers not only to perceive and understand physical spaces, but also to interact with them in new ways." And what makes its data more substantial than something like Google Maps or Street is the point of view: as Niantic notes, the data is "taken from a pedestrian perspective and includes places inaccessible to cars."As of July 15, 2024, Niantic's privacy policy confirms it uses geospatial technology and player recordings to "build a 3D understanding of real-world places, with the goal of offering new types of AR experiences to our users." The feature is opt-in and can be disabled by players at any time, but appears to be a "critical component" of Niantic's goals for AR and its model."The path from LLMs to LGMs is another step in AIs evolution," its blog concluded. "The worlds future operating system will depend on the blending of physical and digital realities to create a system for spatial computing that will put people at the center."The games industry wants to go in on genAI, for better or worseCompanies like NVIDIA and OpenAI have previously come under criticism for using what or whoever they could to build their AI technology. In August, 404 published a report claiming NVIDIA did extensive scraping of copywritten material across YouTube for its AI tools, and would reportedly dismiss concerns about the practice or say it was "in full compliance with the letter and spirit of copyright law."Breaching consent has been a major point of criticism regarding generative AI and similar technology for some time: voice actors have talked about how their voices have been used by modders making content for popular games, and expressed similar worry that audio companies are forcing them into letting their performances be used to train AI models.Some developers have used genAI tech in non-voice acting ways as a means of lightening the development load and finding new fixes to old problems. But top-level executives think the technology can also be put toward concepting new game ideas or other creative means.Game Developer has reached to Niantic for clarification on how its geospacial data was obtained, and the transparency of that data's use. We will update when a response is given.Read more about:Generative AIAbout the AuthorJustin CarterContributing Editor, GameDeveloper.comA Kansas City, MO native, Justin Carter has written for numerous sites including IGN, Polygon, and SyFy Wire. In addition to Game Developer, his writing can be found at io9 over on Gizmodo. Don't ask him about how much gum he's had, because the answer will be more than he's willing to admit.See more from Justin CarterDaily news, dev blogs, and stories from Game Developer straight to your inboxStay UpdatedYou May Also Like