Neuro-sama and Vedal: Changing the Landscape of Livestreaming

Neuro-sama, an AI vtuber

        In 2019, a programmer known on the internet mononymously as Vedal trained a neural network on the rhythm game osu! and deployed it under the moniker Neuro-sama. This AI became skilled enough at the game that it was able to beat several profession players. This drew the attention of osu! fans and many others toward Neuro-sama and her creator. 

        Three years after this acclaim, Vedal reintroduced Neuro-sama as a chatbot vtuber. Now, she hosts live streams on Twitch, where fans tune in to watch her play video games and banter with them live. This iteration, for which she is most well known, can be described as a bunch of AI in a trench coat. Vedal developed a large language model (a la ChatGPT) that reads messages from viewers and incorporates a text-to-speech algorithm that allows her to speak the responses she generates. Another AI operates a Live2D model--and anime-esque avatar that moves and emotes in concert with her speech. On top of all this, Vedal repurposed the AI that he trained on osu! and re-trained it on a several other popular games, e.g., Minecraft.

        All of this gives the impression of a real person playing games and interacting with viewers in the same way any other Twitch channel might. However, this is only an impression. One of the biggest draws of Neruo-sama is that she is not a real person. This leads her to say things that a real person would not, often to great comedic effect. 

Neuro-sama with her creator, Vedal, who often appears with a turtle avatar

        We talked in class on Wednesday about artificial creativity. I agree with the general concensus that AI in its current iteration lacks the capacity for creativity. I would not venture to suggest that Neuro-sama herself is engaged in the creative process, but Vedal certainly is. It takes an immense amount of creativity to be able to construct all of the moving parts that comprise Neuro-sama and combine them to essentially create an living character. Vedal often joins the live stream to discuss updates on Neuro-sama and demo new features. These moments demonstrate the complexity of the neural networks and the code that maintains them, which is nothing short of stupefying. These demo streams also show that Vedal has a deep knowledge of how to interact with the Neuro-sama large language model, and their banter borders on slapstick.

        With every Neuro-sama iteration, Vedal shows his ability to marry the decidedly disconnected realms of artificial intelligence and entertainment in highly innovative ways. While Neuro-sama may not be creative herself, her existence is emblematic of human creativity.