A $2.3 Billion Bet: Can Fortnite and Other Video Games Train AI Robots for Our World?
Imagine walking into a tech office and seeing someone intensely playing Fortnite for hours on end. Now imagine that "someone" is actually an advanced artificial intelligence. That is exactly what visitors experienced at General Intuition, a startup that just secured a massive $320 million investment, boosting its valuation to $2.3 billion. The real surprise is what happens next. The same AI brain powering the virtual Fortnite player is also driving a large, four-legged robot roaming the office. This robot, relying only on a single camera for sight, explores its surroundings much like a curious toddler, occasionally bumping into chairs or trash cans as it learns its physical space. This quick adaptation is remarkable, especially since the AI model only needed eight minutes of outdoor real-world data to fine-tune its navigation skills for indoor spaces. General Intuition’s core idea is that AI can learn how to move and interact with the world by studying human game...