A substitute for real human companionship? Tencent is conducting a secret internal beta test for its AI gaming buddy "Goose Dimension".

Exclusive from Dujia: Tencent is currently conducting a confidential internal test of an AI gaming companion product named "Goosyverse", which features AI digital companions and provides a full suite of capabilities including voice dialogue, real-time image recognition, and in-game accompaniment. The product has multiple virtual female and male characters with distinct preset personalities built in. After players select a character, they can start casual chatting and interaction, or activate the dedicated gaming companion mode that adapts to a number of mainstream online games. It is worth noting that all functions are available for free for a limited time, and the interface has revealed a payment framework of star coins redeeming for energy, indicating the future commercialization direction of the product.

First-hand hands-on experience with "Goosyverse"

After entering "Goosyverse", the AI character selection interface will first come into view. You can freely switch between male and female character categories at the top of the page. The female character column is currently displayed, with three characters named Guyu, Shen Lubai and Xiaxia available for selection. Click the select button on the card to confirm your AI companion.

Here we select the character "Xiaxia" and then enter the main interaction interface of Goosyverse. The digital human image of Xiaxia is in the center of the screen, and the bubble box on the right shows her self-introduction of the character setting: talkative and approachable, claiming to be a top bronze-ranked player.

Three function entrances are arranged on the left side of the interface: Moments, Desktop Pet, and Skills. Moments is mainly used to capture the current image of the AI character, which can be set as the desktop wallpaper; Desktop Pet places the AI character on the desktop in the form of dynamic cartoon or static comic image.

At the bottom of the page is the dialogue input box, where you can manually enter text to share interesting stories. The orange phone icon in the middle initiates a voice call, and the microphone button on the right supports voice input. You can also see the values of two prop resources at the top, and the HOME button in the upper left corner can return to the character selection page at any time. The logic of the whole interface is very clear: you can not only have ordinary casual conversations, but also activate the exclusive AI gaming companion function to let Xiaxia become your online gaming buddy.

At the bottom left is the gaming companion module, click to activate the gaming companion mode. You can talk to it in real time during the game, and "Xiaxia" will automatically reply with voice.

Open the energy redemption pop-up window of Goosyverse, and you can see the embryonic form of the future commercialization of this product. It should be noted that during the internal test, no energy is consumed for all function experiences for the time being, and users can fully experience all capabilities for free. The pop-up lists the energy consumption rules of the official version: subsequent text dialogue, gaming accompaniment, voice call, and image generation will consume corresponding energy points for each round, per minute, or per image respectively. Energy is redeemed with star coins, and the interface prompts that a single redemption consumes at least 10 star coins, with several sets of gear options for quick selection.

At present, it is only in the confidential internal test stage, and the star coin balance and energy values have no actual function for the time being. This star coin to energy redemption system is most likely to be the payment mode after the official launch of Goosyverse.

New Experiment in Gaming Socialization: Why Tencent Bets on AI Digital Companionship

Gaming socialization has always been Tencent's core business, but the traditional gaming companion industry itself has exposed many practical problems. Third-party platforms on the market are mixed with good and bad, with high labor cost for real people, great difficulty in personnel management, and frequent problems such as out-of-control speech scripts and price chaos. For Tencent, AI virtual companion is to some extent an alternative attempt to the traditional real-person companion track, using AI to meet the companionship needs of players.

From the perspective of product scenarios, many players do not necessarily pursue high-level technical carry when playing games, but more need a chat partner that they can talk to at any time. The fragmented demand for emotional companionship has long existed when playing solo ranking matches or staying up late to start a game without friends to team up with. The positioning of Goosyverse is not to create a gaming master. You can see from the character settings that many AI characters mock their own average skill level, and the core demand is to "accompany" rather than "carry", which captures the emotional social gap of players during the game.

In terms of commercialization, the framework of star coins redeeming for energy has been built in advance. It is still in the free internal test stage at this stage, but the billing mode by rounds and duration has been planned. Different from one-time membership, the pay-per-use mode is more adapted to gaming scenarios: users consume resources according to how long they play, exploring a new value-added payment path.

It should also be noted that it is still in the confidential internal test at present, and the product still has uncertainties. AI companionship still faces practical difficulties: problems such as the stability of image recognition, the fun of dialogue, and the homogeneity of speech scripts after long-time interaction, all of which will determine whether this product can be officially launched to the public. Tencent's layout of Goosyverse is essentially an AI landing experiment of socialization + gaming. It first captures the segmented scenario of companionship, and then explores the possibility of subsequent commercialization. #Tencent #TencentInternalTestsGoosyverse #TencentConfidentiallyTestsAIgamingBuddyGoosyverse #Dujia