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Remember that "Where's the Shovelware?"¹ post? ¹ https://mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the-shovelware-why-ai-coding https://mikelovesrobots.substack.co

Remember that "Where's the Shovelware?"¹ post? ¹ https://mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the-shovelware-why-ai-coding https://mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the-shovelware...

0dayz 20d ago
Oh yes, first thing that sprung to mind when I started to see games being made with Ai on itch and then steam and of course the posts showing up daily on certain subreddits.
CM30 20d ago
I think one look at the flood of vibe-coded projects (like decomps, mods, etc) hitting the retrogaming scene now proves this article wrong already. You literally see a major project blow up in one day, then immediately get 'busted' for AI. And it's almost certainly hitting other fields too. Games on Steam, mobile apps, websites and web apps, etc.
- api 20d ago
  Busted? I’d think that AI would be a godsend for retro computing, a field always starved for programmer support especially in emulating obscure stuff.
  - CM30 20d ago
    There's a lot of hatred for AI in these communities, to the point half of Twitter/Bluesky/Reddit goes ballistic when they learn the developer used Claude or Codex at some point. Media outlets and influencers are doing the same thing too.
    - api 20d ago
      Yes I’ve seen this. The hatred is easily as unhinged as some of the stuff from the “AI will soon learn to fold space and access infinite energy from the zero point after it recursively becomes god” delusional AI utopia crowd, or the “nuke data centers” crowd. AI seems to break a lot of peoples’ brains. It’s like it totally bypasses nuanced thinking and understanding and normal curiosity and goes straight to some kind of overflow state.
      - piperswe 20d ago
        The hatred stems from retrocomputing enthusiasts wanting an escape from modern computing. When someone's having fun with their retrocomputing hobby, they don't want what they see as the worst part of modern computing playing any role in that hobby. They're trying to get away from the hype, but it's inescapable.
  - purpleflashing 20d ago
    People do it for the pleasure of figuring out obscure stuff. The point is dealing with that old unsupported tech as much as the games themselves.
    - plastic-enjoyer 20d ago
      Yeah, people on HN don't do anything for the pleasure of anything but to be productive and provide value to whoever. So, don't bet on people here understanding this mindset.
      - opan 19d ago
        The business/money and startup culture is only a part of HN. I'm here because computers are cool and news hits here fast (also the comments can be interesting). I don't care about IPOs, unicorns, celebrities, AI, etc. I like to see the new Asahi Linux updates, Dolphin progress reports, new OpenBSD releases, discussions about vim and emacs or other unix tools, stories of repairing old arcade hardware, that kinda stuff. Some guys on IRC used to post HN links all the time and at some point I became one of them. Perhaps I'm a minority, but I doubt I'm the only one who feels this way.
  - mitxela 20d ago
    It's possible to use AI to help create non-slop. However, almost nobody does.
    - kcoul 19d ago
      Exactly! AI is just mirroring the slow death of creativity over the last couple of decades. If you have the willpower to live a more analog life free of creativity-killing digital wasteland-type deathtraps, the creative spark that hits in moments of quiet contemplation can be funneled through the accelerator of AI-assisted coding to create incredible things. Why does no one seem to realize this?
moralestapia 20d ago
A lot of friends who were not computer illiterate but also definitely not coders are now publishing websites regularly with whatever comes to their mind at the time. Quality could be questionable but quantity-wise I can definitely see the start of the exponential growth.
- fluoridation 20d ago
  Yeah, I think the ideal AI user for coding is the one who is not so ignorant that they can't even explain what they want done, but not so knowledgeable that they could simply do it themselves. It's like a crutch: if you don't have legs it's completely useless, but it can let you hobble around if yours don't work perfectly, and if they do work then it's also pretty much useless.
  - qarl 20d ago
    My wife plays the web games from the New York Times. There was one she liked but she wanted to change the rules. Of course it took Claude Code about 10 minutes to do it, and she was delighted.
- jjgreen 20d ago
  I can definitely see the start of the exponential growth No you can't
- mitxela 20d ago
  For websites, isn't that just Wix? Or Microsoft Frontpage?

Remember that "Where's the Shovelware?"¹ post? ¹ https://mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the-shovelware-why-ai-coding https://mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the-shovelware...

0dayz 20d ago

Oh yes, first thing that sprung to mind when I started to see games being made with Ai on itch and then steam and of course the posts showing up daily on certain subreddits.

CM30 20d ago

I think one look at the flood of vibe-coded projects (like decomps, mods, etc) hitting the retrogaming scene now proves this article wrong already. You literally see a major project blow up in one day, then immediately get 'busted' for AI. And it's almost certainly hitting other fields too. Games on Steam, mobile apps, websites and web apps, etc.

api 20d ago
Busted? I’d think that AI would be a godsend for retro computing, a field always starved for programmer support especially in emulating obscure stuff.
- CM30 20d ago
  There's a lot of hatred for AI in these communities, to the point half of Twitter/Bluesky/Reddit goes ballistic when they learn the developer used Claude or Codex at some point. Media outlets and influencers are doing the same thing too.
  - api 20d ago
    Yes I’ve seen this. The hatred is easily as unhinged as some of the stuff from the “AI will soon learn to fold space and access infinite energy from the zero point after it recursively becomes god” delusional AI utopia crowd, or the “nuke data centers” crowd. AI seems to break a lot of peoples’ brains. It’s like it totally bypasses nuanced thinking and understanding and normal curiosity and goes straight to some kind of overflow state.
    - piperswe 20d ago
      The hatred stems from retrocomputing enthusiasts wanting an escape from modern computing. When someone's having fun with their retrocomputing hobby, they don't want what they see as the worst part of modern computing playing any role in that hobby. They're trying to get away from the hype, but it's inescapable.
- purpleflashing 20d ago
  People do it for the pleasure of figuring out obscure stuff. The point is dealing with that old unsupported tech as much as the games themselves.
  - plastic-enjoyer 20d ago
    Yeah, people on HN don't do anything for the pleasure of anything but to be productive and provide value to whoever. So, don't bet on people here understanding this mindset.
    - opan 19d ago
      The business/money and startup culture is only a part of HN. I'm here because computers are cool and news hits here fast (also the comments can be interesting). I don't care about IPOs, unicorns, celebrities, AI, etc. I like to see the new Asahi Linux updates, Dolphin progress reports, new OpenBSD releases, discussions about vim and emacs or other unix tools, stories of repairing old arcade hardware, that kinda stuff. Some guys on IRC used to post HN links all the time and at some point I became one of them. Perhaps I'm a minority, but I doubt I'm the only one who feels this way.
- mitxela 20d ago
  It's possible to use AI to help create non-slop. However, almost nobody does.
  - kcoul 19d ago
    Exactly! AI is just mirroring the slow death of creativity over the last couple of decades. If you have the willpower to live a more analog life free of creativity-killing digital wasteland-type deathtraps, the creative spark that hits in moments of quiet contemplation can be funneled through the accelerator of AI-assisted coding to create incredible things. Why does no one seem to realize this?

moralestapia 20d ago

A lot of friends who were not computer illiterate but also definitely not coders are now publishing websites regularly with whatever comes to their mind at the time. Quality could be questionable but quantity-wise I can definitely see the start of the exponential growth.

fluoridation 20d ago
Yeah, I think the ideal AI user for coding is the one who is not so ignorant that they can't even explain what they want done, but not so knowledgeable that they could simply do it themselves. It's like a crutch: if you don't have legs it's completely useless, but it can let you hobble around if yours don't work perfectly, and if they do work then it's also pretty much useless.
- qarl 20d ago
  My wife plays the web games from the New York Times. There was one she liked but she wanted to change the rules. Of course it took Claude Code about 10 minutes to do it, and she was delighted.
jjgreen 20d ago
I can definitely see the start of the exponential growth No you can't
mitxela 20d ago
For websites, isn't that just Wix? Or Microsoft Frontpage?