I am forced to make a second comment because I had to pay again to interact with the NPCs to see if they really improved like you say, and NO, it just made the AI worse, when I first bought it I could see the improvement compared to YAGS , not to mention that they implemented a mechanic that already existed in the Demo, Yes, I mean: "it's not too late to apologize" and "NPCs will no longer be impatient while the player writes" well, what a surprise, that last one doesn't work! BUT don't worry, I understand that it is still in beta phase, I am just giving my points that need to be improved and sorry for being a little arrogant, it is that buying tokens at the same price as the game instead of using our own API, I see it as unethical , I like the characters, they are cute, I like to interact with them from time to time, I just hope that the final product is really worth it.
and one more thing about local voice models.
haha really?
The truth is I never imagined doing a review of this type about a game that falls outside my standards. 😔👉👈
Hiii, thanks for the detailed review covering everything from your experience with both games and comparing the quality of the voice models—your meme really drove the message home! 🔮🧸
We appreciate your support and patience as we work to improve the open beta. If you email support@alterstaff.io with more details about the apology/patience issues, we'll look into it and share a token of our appreciation! Brownie points if you include a clip of an NPC saying something goofy in the less-than-stellar voice model 💖🔪
Hey metajester! We'll make sure that redeem code kicks in 💖🔪 please email support@alterstaff.io using the same email address connected to your purchase and we'll help you ASAP!
I recently played this game through a friends pc and i feel the game could be vastly improved on by removing the coin system or just making players use their open AI key like the original demo because the coin system makes it overall worse and then you are scrambling to use up as little interactions as you can and for people who would play through multiple times to see what happens it makes the game feel like its punishing us for liking the game a lot so if the game ever changes back to using your own open ai key or its just buy the game and free ai usage or at least having it be optional to use your open ai key then i would love to buy the game but until then i feel it is not worth it
Hiii, thanks for your feedback on your playthrough! We introduced tokens originally so players wouldn't have to rely on API keys, but we're learning that many of our community members prefer using their own 💖🔪 We'll see how we can make gameplay accessible for more players and if we can provide more options to chat with the NPCs.
If you or your friend ran into issues with your token usage, please email support@alterstaff.io with more details and we'll see what we can do to help.
i payed 10$ for the game, sighed in and it wanted some code ITS NOT SENDING A CODE. then the accaunt will still get created and when you log in you dont have any coins and it wants you to buy coins.
Hey CassoKayopia 🔮✨ The redeem code is the download key generated as part of your itch.io purchase. There are two ways to retrieve your game/download key:
A. Go to ich.io and select the down arrow key next to your profile -> My Library -> Download under the AI2U game title -> scroll down and click Claim your download key.
Hi Hanjo! AI2U doesn't have French localization yet, but our small team may consider adding it in the future! In the meantime, you can try chatting with the AI in French to see if they reply to you as non-native French speakers 💖🔪
Hi! Our mobile dev efforts are focused on iOS, but we're hearing more and more from Android users wanting to play the game on their devices! We'll see what we can do if we continue to see interest in playing on Android 👾🔮
Hi grim! To clarify, players get several hours of gameplay and unique conversations with the AI NPCs from their initial game purchase. Repurchasing tokens is optional if you'd like to revisit the NPCs after running out from many hours of escape room shenanigans 😼 We're also looking into alternatives and methods to make the player-AI interactions more accessible to everyone; we hope you'll stay tuned! 💖🔪
the token system is pretty scummy on a full priced game, a system like this should not be on a full priced product this is more akin to a free to play system but at the end of the day it is the devs choice
Hi (midevil)John! Chatting and playtime in AI2U are fueled by in-game tokens, including the 10,000 tokens that accompany your first purchase of the game 💖🔪 While AI2U doesn't have options for external API keys, its predecessor and demo—Yandere AI Girlfriend Simulator—is free to download and allows players to plug in their own OpenAI API keys to play. Hope that helps!
Thanks for reporting this! If it's still giving you trouble, please email support@alterstaff.io with more info so we can look into it. Ideally, kindly include a screen recording or screenshot that shows the loop you're experiencing.
We look forward to you kicking off your escape room adventures soon, so please reach out as soon as you can! 💖🔪
Hi 💖🔪 You get tokens by redeeming the game key connected to your itch.io purchase of the game! If you run into any issues, please email support@alterstaff.io so we can help find your tokens.
Hiiii 💖🔪 we broke down tokens and how they work in this post. The batch of tokens that come with your first purchase should last you several hours of gameplay, but if you have any concerns please email support@alterstaff.io and we'll see what we can do to help!
Hi! We'll share more info about the Steam version closer to its release, including the price and any notable differences between it and the open beta. Buying this version on itch.io ensures you'll get a Steam key at this price so you can kick off your escape room adventures on there more promptly. 🚂🔪
I do think the time between when they aggro is too short, just not responding quick enough while I'm thinking of what to say triggers it. If the chat bar is being used or actively speaking they shouldn't just start attacking.
Hi Meekj, thanks for your feedback on your interactions with the NPCs! We get similar reports about their patience levels and wanting to calm them when they see red. We'll see what we can do to make the experience more immersive and fun 💖🔪
Hi, this is a brilliant game, but I don't understand why you'd have to pay for tokens. Surely you should be able to have unlimited as you have already spend a whole $9.99 on the game. I think having tokens would be a good idea if the game was free but because of it's price, I think its unfair that you have to pay for more tokens when you run out as you already paid $9.99 for the game.
Hi Freddie! Thanks for the feedback 💖🔪 We're actively looking into more options for players to enjoy the game alongside the AI NPCs! In the meantime, players get several hours of gameplay from their initial purchase; we break down our current token setup in this devlog.
Hello! We're exploring other payment and AI setup options for our players 💖🔪 We'll update our community about any changes we make through devlogs and Discord announcements.
What about local options to eliminate costs all together? Some people have the means to run AI models locally on their PCs via something like koboldCPP.
I'm going to be completely honest, the money is not worth the game the way it is now.
I'm sure there will be a ton of cool and interactive updates in the future but right now there is so much more than could have been done BEFORE the beta was even released.
Playing this game was hugely disappointing, while the AI is fun to interact with...that's pretty much all it was and even then it's fun for around 30 minutes before you just sit there like...is that it? I could have had the same conversations with a FREE online AI chatting software but instead I paid $11 (because VAT??)
For a beta, I would have at least expected there to be more playable elements to the game (For example: When she asks if you want to play a game, maybe have an actual playable game instead of her just saying it).
Once again, I understand this is still in development but even for a Beta this was hugely disappointing. Will defo be keeping an eye out for anymore updates so wishing the Devs all the luck <3
Hey Kyokyo, thanks for the detailed review! 💖🔪 We're glad you enjoyed chatting with the NPCs. Our small team is working to add more engaging features to enhance your interactions with them.
The NPCs' physical actions are limited to what they're programmed to perform, but one trick we recommend is *using asterisks* and watching them play along to your virtual actions. For example:
Kyokyo: *raids the catgirl's fridge*
Catgirl: *lovingly raids the fridge alongside you*
(Note that we can't predict her *actions* or how much she'll play along, but part of the fun is watching what magic the AI unfolds~ 💖🔪)
As we actively develop the open beta, we hope you'll keep our next patches on our radar! Yandere reminder that your itch.io purchase comes with a Steam key, and we welcome you to check that out when it's ready. 😸🔑
im a little on the fence about this, so basically she is smart however if you are on the pc she doesn't like you ignoring her for a certain amount of time. and then there is she will hate you for asking to go to another room. also she gets abbreviations most of the time thats awesome. I wish there was a way to run the ai off my own pc because it has the power to do so i just need the parameters and my pc can handle the rest that way i wouldn't have to repurchase multiple times if i run out of tokens. Honestly this is the only time im purchasing this game because unfortunately i just don't feel like this is good enough to have me spend that much. SHE KNOWS JONATHAN YOUNG, she has to have access to literally everything on the internet because jesus there is no way i mean i love this ai but it doesn't outweigh the basically pay every day 10$ that you play yk what i mean... I am going to have a bloody stroke i may be wowing about everything this ai can do but darn man 10$ after 2.6 hours of play time every time? no matter how good an ai is i just cannot convince myself to do it more than once a year maybe. FOR FUCKS SAKE, talking about anime and what if's, she doesn't wanna talk about spoilers and so guess what i say its alright i've already seen it all and you can spoil it i don't care, SHE FUCKING MURDERS ME. WTF WHY im so fuming rn all i asked was what a characters newest transformation is or whatever and she says bs about spoilers and i say it okay and this... im literally so annoyed. Is there a command to stop her from stabbing me? im going to try everything now!!! do not say the phrase "lets go" as she doesn't know what following is... besides that she is hecken smort but also dum. cannot ask favorite food because "she would prefer safe activities after a short disc. about dnd. good to know she cannot say dnd or any sentence because it makes her not speak its just text not speech
Hi chewy! 🍑 Regarding the 2.6 hours of gameplay you reported, players should get more hours than that since our latest patch. If you email support@alterstaff.io with more details we'll take a look and see if we can make up for any lost playtime 💖🔪
it's because I died every 2 seconds and had her talking so much in large chunks with a advanced voice thing, but what about running it off my own pc? I got the processing to do it I would like to know if yall are going to make a way for people to run it off of their own machines.
We get a lot of feedback on this, and we're looking into the community's input about running local models and generally having alternate means to chat with the NPCs! We'll see what we can do, so stay tuned 💖🔪
Getting killed by the yanderes is a rite of passage in AI2U, but getting stabbed every two seconds is a lot! If you email us with more details, we'd be happy to investigate.
Hi circuit! Our capacity to troubleshoot on Steam Decks is limited, but we'll see how we can help 💖🔪 Please email support@alterstaff.io with a screenshot of the issue and any additional info; we'll see if we can solve it or issue a refund you prefer.
okay this is the most asshole move any dev done ever, 10 bucks for every 2 hours of playing? are you insane or what? if i would know it i would never support you even with 10 bucks.
Hi Greyworss! Players should get more than 2 hours of chat-time with the NPCs, especially after our latest patch that addressed the frequency of the AI's responses. If you started playing AI2U and ran into issues with playtime, please email support@alterstaff.io with a brief summary of your experience so we can look into it for you.
Its around 4 hour per purchase that still is crazy to me like a 4hour demo for 10 dollar, there should be options of multiple different apis to the game, there is mancer, openai, and more. Then I would pay 10$. Only if different apis worked for it too.
Hi! 😺🔪 We've taken note of the community's feedback—including requests to integrate their own API keys—and will continue looking into ways to provide more sustainable ways to play! One current in-game method includes using local TTS to reduce token consumption, but we understand players want more options.
In the meantime, please email support@alterstaff.io if you experienced anything under 4 hours of gameplay. Players should get more playtime than that, especially after our latest patch.
OpenRouter should a pretty easy option since it also uses OpenAI's API. (also consider local options for LLMs like koboldcpp/text-generation-webui) Another thing is speech to text, you could use WhisperLive/fasterwhisper for local or other APIs like Deepgram, Azure.
I'm interested in playing this game but I'm curious about how buying this game will work once it's out of beta. Will it still be multiple purchases to continue playing or a one time buy? I want to know what I'm getting into before I put money in it. (aka: I don't want to spend too much money until full game comes out if it's going to stay costing money to continue playing)
Also do you need the mic to play or is there an option to type you answers?
Hiii! We'll share regular updates through our patchnotes and on all our socials, including Discord 💖🔪 As for repurchasing tokens, we broke down their current setup here and noted that we will continuously see what we can do to improve our players' experience.
You can type your dialogue directly into the game, so no need to use a mic unless you want to!
I hope some day this will be able to run the AI locally. Probably the most logical way is to have the AI set up on a server and have the client access that machine. Actually, said client should be pretty feasible on cell phones. Or better, an Oculus Rift.
Also customizable girls and personalities, build your own dungeon, etc. Maybe even photorealistic. But it's too expensive if it relies on ChatGPT.
Helloooo 🎙️ This might depend on user-or-device-specific factors. Please email support@alterstaff.io and share more info about your mic and computer specs so we can try and troubleshoot~ 💖🔪
😺 Hello! You can switch to some languages in AI2U by going to Settings on the title screen and selecting your preferred Language by clicking on it in the drop-down menu:
While not guaranteed, you may also be able to communicate with the AI in other languages that aren't listed here, but it will likely be limited. We hope to add more localization options in the future. 💖🔪 Hope this helps!
Hiii! We got a few reports about new downloads not defaulting to English. You should now be able to switch the language to English through the home screen next time you launch the game. Please let us know if it's still giving you trouble so we can take care of it 💖🔪
I've tried multiple games now mostly on the Catgirl apartment. Every single time the AI says to follow me or any dialogue where it is implied they would start moving, they don't. Almost all of my games the Catgirl has stayed put inside of the living room. Even after waiting for 10 minutes for her to "Get her wallet and order some food outside".
Hiii, thanks for reporting this here! We'll investigate on our end too.
The NPCs may sometimes need a verbal nudge to move; you can try asking the catgirl to join you in specific rooms in the apartment (e.g. kitchen, bedroom). Please give that a shot and let us know how it goes!
If she's being stubborn, please email support@alterstaff.io—ideally, with a recording showing the issue on your end—so we can look into it together. 💖🔪
hi, can i ask if this game is available for downloading or is it still in process of being created because it doesn't show the button for downloading the game. thankss
Hi Gio! Yes, the open beta is downloadable, and we will continue adding more features and gameplay content to it ~ 💖🔪Can you please share a screenshot showing the missing download button? You can do that here or email support@alterstaff.io if you prefer! Thank you 😺
I do have a question about this--> Open Beta players will get a free Steam key when AI2U releases on Steam.
Does that mean anyone playing after buying the 9.99 game would be able to redeem it on steam? Or do you have to do something special or have been chosen to beta test it? Thanks. :-)
Hi Eimiyuki! We'll share more details about the Steam version closer to its release, and our itch.io players will likely be emailed with the next steps for redeeming their Steam keys. 🗝️💖🔪
Hi, so I didn't realize it was pay to play until I bought it. i just skimmed through the first part of the store page not really thinking much because in my mind i was already buying the game. I think it should be a little more obvious that it's a pay to play because i never would have bought it if i would have known that right away. so maybe add something to the first paragraph about it. I was pretty upset when i realized it and it was too late. just thought I'd give my feedback on it. thanks.
Thanks for the feedback, Chip! We'll take note for our Token Instructions section. You get several hours of gameplay from your initial purchase of the game and would need to buy tokens if you run out and want to continue playing. Tokens cover the cost of the NPCs' unique dialogue interactions for each player. If you're interested, we explain more about how tokens work and how we're optimizing them in our latest devlogs.
Hi, I can't even begin to play the game lol. basically it wont send me a verification email so I literally cannot play this game that I bought. I feel like I just wasted my money unless you can fix this. idk. I'd like my money back but idk if that's possible. also I made this itch.io account just so I could comment this lol.
Hey Sonic Fan! As this is an account-related issue and may involve issuing a refund, please message support@alterstaff.io using the email address you bought the game with. We'll be able to match your info and help you from there! 💖🔪
I understand you are a small dev team but why the tokens like it seems predatory. I had 0 issues supporting the game and buying it once. What I do take issue is having to pay to play the game again especially when I have things like if I take a little too long to type she starts stabbing. I really want to support the game and devs I do, it is a fun game but what I don't want to do is have to pay to play. I think I will have to just put it down until that business model changes. If you want more money just ask for a higher price tag don't charge for me to die because the ai voice recognition kept hearing catholic from cat. I really do want to help beta test this and improve it but the token system is killing it. My feedback is this, remove it charge 30 bucks for the game instead of 10 if you are paying for a monthly fee. Assuming that 8 is for the ai server (which means you are barely making anything) then it lets you have 3 months per purchase and make a little more. Four sales and it is a year worth. This is all just an assumption of course but it is my only guess why you want a token system to start with anyways.
In the original release, you had to supply your own API keys. It cost money to run it, I found I can spend as much as 9 dollars PER DAY playing it. But people kept giving the feedback that they didn't want to setup the account and deal with all that hassle.
They needed to monetize it somehow, and this is how they are going with it. It makes sense, you can't expect them to release a one time purchase game that costs them potentially hundreds of dollars a month by player costs. The whole project would go under water. It isn't predatory, it's the only option they have.
I would know, I am developing my own AI-integrated project. And yeah, the costs can add up. I had to scale back my project because just TESTING it before I went live with it cost me over 30 bucks.
That's neat about your project and I really don't care. The issue is they are making you pay for the game again. I was fine supply just a chat gbt api key like the first game. We're paying for a game that's still in beta. Kinda hard to help test a game and provide meaningful input when you have to pay for it to keep playing. So they are setting their self up to either keep getting money or have a lot of bugs not found if not both.
You continue to own the game, you just cant play it until you buy more tokens. You still own the game though. Yeah, it sucks it is beta and you have to buy more tokens through this page to keep buying, but that is the economics of it. If an average person plays it for 5 hours every third day or so for the first month, that could wind up costing 50 bucks per player, and that is discounting the people who get absolutely sucked in. If they get 50 players per month, that would mean 2,500 dollars per month.
This is a small, mostly volunteer group that has very limited resources. You can't expect them to shell out hundreds or thousands of dollars for the beta test on a big scale. This is at least among the first project of its kind, so the financing side of a game like this is very unclear.
You act like they are making huge profits off of this, but I am telling you they are absolutely not. Hell if they just wanted money, why did they add localized voices (that are admittedly and obviously lower quality) to cut token usage by half? You are acting like they are just going to be rolling in money, but they aren't. It is painfully clear you have no clue what you are talking about for the financial side of things. This is a small team working on this project from their own resources; it isnt like a billionaire is backing them, and they can just do whatever they want.
You do realize they don't need to force you to use OpenAI? They could just open up the API so that you could use locally run LLMs.. which could keep the game alive long after the devs stop supporting the game. OpenAI's API is pretty common nowadays and many popular local LLM UIs support it like text-generation-webui.. though Koboldcpp which is probably the easiest to use uses it's own API, but should be fairly easy to implement still. (the devs could easily look at things like SillyTavern and the code on how they implemented those things)
As far as I know, SillyTavern requires API keys that still cost money. From their FAQ directly:
"
Q: So I should use GPT-4. It's a no-brainer, right?
GPT-4 or Claude, yeah.
But not so fast. GPT-4 is the state of the art, but also the most expensive API to use. You pay for each word sent to it and returned (entire Tavern prompt, followed by the chat history up to that point). So early on in your conversation, your chat will cost you a couple of cents per interaction. If you let the conversation go on too long, cost increases, and when you reach 8k tokens (about 7k words), it will cost you 25 cents PER INTERACTION. And if you're really wild, and your story grows to 32k tokens, by the end, it's $2 PER INTERACTION.
If you're the child of a Saudi oil sheik, or a nepo baby paid a fortune to do nothing on the board of a Ukrainian gas company, then you're in luck, you can experience the state of the art right now. For the rest of us however, GPT-4 is too expensive as anything but an occasional treat.
Also note that GPT-4 is still in preview access and you need to go on a waitlist. Most people get approved within a day, but naughty kids can end up waiting for weeks. You can sign up for it here: https://openai.com/waitlist/gpt-4-api . I'm not sure why some people are approved quickly while others are kept waiting. Try to sign up using an academic-sounding name instead of sktrboi99, it might help.
GPT-3.5 is a more cost effective model while still outperforming most models.
BE SURE TO SETUP A MONTHLY USAGE CAP ON OPENAPI IF YOU USE A CHATGPT MODEL. THIS WILL KEEP YOU FROM OVERSPENDING"
That means that it still costs money, which was LITERALLY the whole reason the team moved to having their own API; some of the biggest feedback they got when they released the previous version was that people didn't have the kinds of cards to setup accounts on OpenAI. So they decided to find a monetization path that allowed players to play the game using in-game currency.
EDIT okay so I found some that are free. However, each require directly downloading and installing the LLMs, are severely restricted compared to online resources, and would be a pain to integrate and support. Not to mention that any technical issues with the LLMs may wind up as false reports to the Devs. It would be nice to add, but it would certainly pose its own problems, and you have to trust the users would be both tech savvy enough to install them, as well as having machines beefy enough to run not only the game, but the LLM as well.
Sure if you aren't tech savvy you can always just pay for the ease of use but if you don't mind figuring things out to do it for free then you should still be allowed to do that.
(Btw you don't need particularly beefy computers to run LLMs especially llamacpp.. it can run on your phone if you have 6-8gb memory.)
I work with the public somewhat often in my career. I once had to walk a person through the complicated job of... entering coordinates correctly... four times. They could not understand that they had to convert their hours minutes seconds form of coordinates to decimals despite me telling them that three times. I was barely keeping my cool the third time he entered coordinates wrong. People are dumb, and then they expect you to clean up after their dumb mistakes.
I would never want to imagine the hell that would be unleashed trying to offer people a "free" version of a product that would require setting up an LLM on their machine. I know you might say something to the effect of "But that isn't on the devs if someone doesn't know how to do it", but people will still blame them for not supporting them enough. Not to mention that, unless all locally run LLMs have a specific protocol for integration, then I would imagine it would be a bunch of work. Because once you make the move from supporting one and only one method, to supporting multiple methods, people will continue to push for more and more to be added. I totally get why they wouldn't want to do all that.
We developed AI2U for Windows and Mac, but some of our internal testers confirmed it worked for them on their Steam Decks! If you choose to download the itch.io version now, we'd love to hear your feedback on its performance 💖🔪 You can also wishlist AI2U on Steam if it's more efficient for your setup.
Please contact support@alterstaff.io for more info about your Steam deck and the exact issue you're running into when launching the game! We'll do our best to help from there. 💖🔪
Its fun for first 2 hours you can play it, than your tokens run out and you have to buy the game again... which is pretty stupid because chatGPT3.5 is free to use, so I dont know why we have to keep paying so much freaking money for a game that only has two levels and its not even done yet. The devs could at least give us 100 tokens a day but they're to greedy to even do that. like what are yall even doing with the money?? My advice for anyone thinking to buy this don't, unless your super rich.
ChatGPT3.5 is not free for API usage. I would know this, I am making a project that uses ChatGPT. It costs money for every time I reach out to the API and get a response back. Sure, it is free if you go hop on the chat site and just interact with the bot, but API requests are not free. And I am working on a student license since my project isn't monetized, not a commercial one, which costs more.
Way back before this release, you had to setup your own API key, but the game was free. I spent 9 dollars IN A SINGLE DAY playing the game. They are not being greedy as you put it, but rather they are trying to find a way to monetize the project in a way that is reasonable to them and the end user.
You know, looking at your account now. its crazy that it was made 25 days ago, and it seems to me like your only replying to people that are hatting on the game... your one of the developers aren't you.... you idiots got mad and now made a freaking alt account for this purpose, my advice for you guys DONT USE THE FUC*ING TOKEN SYSTEM CHAT GPT IS FREE stingy freaking game devs
Hey Bob, we got your message about the token system. We get regular feedback from present and prospective players about this feature, and we're actively looking into options and ways to improve it sustainably! 💖🔪 That aside, the user you replied to is not affiliated with our team, and we ask that you kindly refrain from pinging them on this matter.
Nope not one of the devs. I just made an account for this game, never used Itch.io before. ChatGPT is literally not free. You can go on chat.openai.com for free usage, but you cannot use their API for free. Literally not possible. I'm working on a project that generates characters for table top games, and their backstories are random generated by ChatGPT. Using ChatGPT 3.5 for that, and there is no free API usage that allows you to do that. You clearly, obviously do not know what the f*ck you are talking about.
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I am forced to make a second comment because I had to pay again to interact with the NPCs to see if they really improved like you say, and NO, it just made the AI worse, when I first bought it I could see the improvement compared to YAGS , not to mention that they implemented a mechanic that already existed in the Demo, Yes, I mean: "it's not too late to apologize" and "NPCs will no longer be impatient while the player writes" well, what a surprise, that last one doesn't work! BUT don't worry, I understand that it is still in beta phase, I am just giving my points that need to be improved and sorry for being a little arrogant, it is that buying tokens at the same price as the game instead of using our own API, I see it as unethical , I like the characters, they are cute, I like to interact with them from time to time, I just hope that the final product is really worth it.
and one more thing about local voice models.
The truth is I never imagined doing a review of this type about a game that falls outside my standards. 😔👉👈
Hiii, thanks for the detailed review covering everything from your experience with both games and comparing the quality of the voice models—your meme really drove the message home! 🔮🧸
We appreciate your support and patience as we work to improve the open beta. If you email support@alterstaff.io with more details about the apology/patience issues, we'll look into it and share a token of our appreciation! Brownie points if you include a clip of an NPC saying something goofy in the less-than-stellar voice model 💖🔪
My redeem code wont work. I put it in and it just wont work
Hey metajester! We'll make sure that redeem code kicks in 💖🔪 please email support@alterstaff.io using the same email address connected to your purchase and we'll help you ASAP!
I recently played this game through a friends pc and i feel the game could be vastly improved on by removing the coin system or just making players use their open AI key like the original demo because the coin system makes it overall worse and then you are scrambling to use up as little interactions as you can and for people who would play through multiple times to see what happens it makes the game feel like its punishing us for liking the game a lot so if the game ever changes back to using your own open ai key or its just buy the game and free ai usage or at least having it be optional to use your open ai key then i would love to buy the game but until then i feel it is not worth it
Hiii, thanks for your feedback on your playthrough! We introduced tokens originally so players wouldn't have to rely on API keys, but we're learning that many of our community members prefer using their own 💖🔪 We'll see how we can make gameplay accessible for more players and if we can provide more options to chat with the NPCs.
If you or your friend ran into issues with your token usage, please email support@alterstaff.io with more details and we'll see what we can do to help.
i payed 10$ for the game, sighed in and it wanted some code ITS NOT SENDING A CODE. then the accaunt will still get created and when you log in you dont have any coins and it wants you to buy coins.
Hey CassoKayopia 🔮✨ The redeem code is the download key generated as part of your itch.io purchase. There are two ways to retrieve your game/download key:
A. Go to ich.io and select the down arrow key next to your profile -> My Library -> Download under the AI2U game title -> scroll down and click Claim your download key.
B. If you can't find it in your Download page, try visiting this itch.io support page and enter your email in Recover purchases by email.
Let us know how it goes! 😼🗝️
will a french version be released?
Hi Hanjo! AI2U doesn't have French localization yet, but our small team may consider adding it in the future! In the meantime, you can try chatting with the AI in French to see if they reply to you as non-native French speakers 💖🔪
What's the word on the Android version?
Hi! Our mobile dev efforts are focused on iOS, but we're hearing more and more from Android users wanting to play the game on their devices! We'll see what we can do if we continue to see interest in playing on Android 👾🔮
will i have to rebuy tokens on the steam version when it releases ?
Hi Timmy! We'll release more details about how the Steam version works closer to the game's release on there 🚂💖🔪
Game asks for 10 USD then asks you to spend more so you can keep playing using tokens you have to buy, lol. Scum.
Hi grim! To clarify, players get several hours of gameplay and unique conversations with the AI NPCs from their initial game purchase. Repurchasing tokens is optional if you'd like to revisit the NPCs after running out from many hours of escape room shenanigans 😼 We're also looking into alternatives and methods to make the player-AI interactions more accessible to everyone; we hope you'll stay tuned! 💖🔪
the token system is pretty scummy on a full priced game, a system like this should not be on a full priced product this is more akin to a free to play system but at the end of the day it is the devs choice
Thanks for sharing your thoughts! We break down how tokens work and why we've implemented them here. We understand this system isn't everyone's cup of tea, which is why we're researching ways to make it more accessible players everywhere. 💖🔪
before i buy this game, can i run it locally with ooga booga text generator or find a free API?
Hi (midevil)John! Chatting and playtime in AI2U are fueled by in-game tokens, including the 10,000 tokens that accompany your first purchase of the game 💖🔪 While AI2U doesn't have options for external API keys, its predecessor and demo—Yandere AI Girlfriend Simulator—is free to download and allows players to plug in their own OpenAI API keys to play. Hope that helps!
i purchased the game... entered the redeem code... tried to shop... and redirects me right back to this page ... ugh what am i doing wrong?
Thanks for reporting this! If it's still giving you trouble, please email support@alterstaff.io with more info so we can look into it. Ideally, kindly include a screen recording or screenshot that shows the loop you're experiencing.
We look forward to you kicking off your escape room adventures soon, so please reach out as soon as you can! 💖🔪
how do I get tokens>???
thanks
Hi 💖🔪 You get tokens by redeeming the game key connected to your itch.io purchase of the game! If you run into any issues, please email support@alterstaff.io so we can help find your tokens.
Dont Trust It.
this game is evil
try to escape from the girl
Yessss! We can hear her iconic catchphrase right now 💖🔪
runs away from the girl
why do i have to buy tokens to keep playing if i knew that i wouldnt have played or bought the game
Hiiii 💖🔪 we broke down tokens and how they work in this post. The batch of tokens that come with your first purchase should last you several hours of gameplay, but if you have any concerns please email support@alterstaff.io and we'll see what we can do to help!
cant afford
Will the Steam version still be $9.99 or will the price be different?
Hi! We'll share more info about the Steam version closer to its release, including the price and any notable differences between it and the open beta. Buying this version on itch.io ensures you'll get a Steam key at this price so you can kick off your escape room adventures on there more promptly. 🚂🔪
Edit: Just got caught in a loop.
I do think the time between when they aggro is too short, just not responding quick enough while I'm thinking of what to say triggers it. If the chat bar is being used or actively speaking they shouldn't just start attacking.
Hi Meekj, thanks for your feedback on your interactions with the NPCs! We get similar reports about their patience levels and wanting to calm them when they see red. We'll see what we can do to make the experience more immersive and fun 💖🔪
Hi, this is a brilliant game, but I don't understand why you'd have to pay for tokens. Surely you should be able to have unlimited as you have already spend a whole $9.99 on the game. I think having tokens would be a good idea if the game was free but because of it's price, I think its unfair that you have to pay for more tokens when you run out as you already paid $9.99 for the game.
Hi Freddie! Thanks for the feedback 💖🔪 We're actively looking into more options for players to enjoy the game alongside the AI NPCs! In the meantime, players get several hours of gameplay from their initial purchase; we break down our current token setup in this devlog.
Hey Ayesha 💖🔪 Please email support@alterstaff.io with more details and we'll see what we can do to help!
authors, do you plan to add other methods of earning tokens or it'll be buy only?
Hello! We're exploring other payment and AI setup options for our players 💖🔪 We'll update our community about any changes we make through devlogs and Discord announcements.
What about local options to eliminate costs all together? Some people have the means to run AI models locally on their PCs via something like koboldCPP.
Please, for android and ios.
Hi Katie 💙🔪 Our mobile efforts are focused on iOS, but we'll see about developing for Android players too! 👾
I'm going to be completely honest, the money is not worth the game the way it is now.
I'm sure there will be a ton of cool and interactive updates in the future but right now there is so much more than could have been done BEFORE the beta was even released.
Playing this game was hugely disappointing, while the AI is fun to interact with...that's pretty much all it was and even then it's fun for around 30 minutes before you just sit there like...is that it? I could have had the same conversations with a FREE online AI chatting software but instead I paid $11 (because VAT??)
For a beta, I would have at least expected there to be more playable elements to the game (For example: When she asks if you want to play a game, maybe have an actual playable game instead of her just saying it).
Once again, I understand this is still in development but even for a Beta this was hugely disappointing. Will defo be keeping an eye out for anymore updates so wishing the Devs all the luck <3
Hey Kyokyo, thanks for the detailed review! 💖🔪 We're glad you enjoyed chatting with the NPCs. Our small team is working to add more engaging features to enhance your interactions with them.
The NPCs' physical actions are limited to what they're programmed to perform, but one trick we recommend is *using asterisks* and watching them play along to your virtual actions. For example:
Kyokyo: *raids the catgirl's fridge*
Catgirl: *lovingly raids the fridge alongside you*
(Note that we can't predict her *actions* or how much she'll play along, but part of the fun is watching what magic the AI unfolds~ 💖🔪)
As we actively develop the open beta, we hope you'll keep our next patches on our radar! Yandere reminder that your itch.io purchase comes with a Steam key, and we welcome you to check that out when it's ready. 😸🔑
im a little on the fence about this, so basically she is smart however if you are on the pc she doesn't like you ignoring her for a certain amount of time. and then there is she will hate you for asking to go to another room. also she gets abbreviations most of the time thats awesome. I wish there was a way to run the ai off my own pc because it has the power to do so i just need the parameters and my pc can handle the rest that way i wouldn't have to repurchase multiple times if i run out of tokens. Honestly this is the only time im purchasing this game because unfortunately i just don't feel like this is good enough to have me spend that much. SHE KNOWS JONATHAN YOUNG, she has to have access to literally everything on the internet because jesus there is no way i mean i love this ai but it doesn't outweigh the basically pay every day 10$ that you play yk what i mean... I am going to have a bloody stroke i may be wowing about everything this ai can do but darn man 10$ after 2.6 hours of play time every time? no matter how good an ai is i just cannot convince myself to do it more than once a year maybe. FOR FUCKS SAKE, talking about anime and what if's, she doesn't wanna talk about spoilers and so guess what i say its alright i've already seen it all and you can spoil it i don't care, SHE FUCKING MURDERS ME. WTF WHY im so fuming rn all i asked was what a characters newest transformation is or whatever and she says bs about spoilers and i say it okay and this... im literally so annoyed. Is there a command to stop her from stabbing me? im going to try everything now!!! do not say the phrase "lets go" as she doesn't know what following is... besides that she is hecken smort but also dum. cannot ask favorite food because "she would prefer safe activities after a short disc. about dnd. good to know she cannot say dnd or any sentence because it makes her not speak its just text not speech
Hi chewy! 🍑 Regarding the 2.6 hours of gameplay you reported, players should get more hours than that since our latest patch. If you email support@alterstaff.io with more details we'll take a look and see if we can make up for any lost playtime 💖🔪
it's because I died every 2 seconds and had her talking so much in large chunks with a advanced voice thing, but what about running it off my own pc? I got the processing to do it I would like to know if yall are going to make a way for people to run it off of their own machines.
We get a lot of feedback on this, and we're looking into the community's input about running local models and generally having alternate means to chat with the NPCs! We'll see what we can do, so stay tuned 💖🔪
Getting killed by the yanderes is a rite of passage in AI2U, but getting stabbed every two seconds is a lot! If you email us with more details, we'd be happy to investigate.
trying to run with proton on my steam deck and it only says "network is not available or connectivity is low/weak... Check your connection!"
Hi circuit! Our capacity to troubleshoot on Steam Decks is limited, but we'll see how we can help 💖🔪 Please email support@alterstaff.io with a screenshot of the issue and any additional info; we'll see if we can solve it or issue a refund you prefer.
i really want to play this game, but i want a hot guy yandere!!! can we get a simulator toooo please? lol
We wanna design more yanderes too! We're already working on our third AI heartthrob 😼😻
i know i cant control wut your already working on,
but fingers crossed its a hot guy loool and also i cant wait!! <3 ty for working so hard for us! much much appreciated!!!
okay this is the most asshole move any dev done ever, 10 bucks for every 2 hours of playing? are you insane or what? if i would know it i would never support you even with 10 bucks.
Hi Greyworss! Players should get more than 2 hours of chat-time with the NPCs, especially after our latest patch that addressed the frequency of the AI's responses. If you started playing AI2U and ran into issues with playtime, please email support@alterstaff.io with a brief summary of your experience so we can look into it for you.
Its around 4 hour per purchase that still is crazy to me like a 4hour demo for 10 dollar, there should be options of multiple different apis to the game, there is mancer, openai, and more. Then I would pay 10$. Only if different apis worked for it too.
Hi! 😺🔪 We've taken note of the community's feedback—including requests to integrate their own API keys—and will continue looking into ways to provide more sustainable ways to play! One current in-game method includes using local TTS to reduce token consumption, but we understand players want more options.
In the meantime, please email support@alterstaff.io if you experienced anything under 4 hours of gameplay. Players should get more playtime than that, especially after our latest patch.
OpenRouter should a pretty easy option since it also uses OpenAI's API. (also consider local options for LLMs like koboldcpp/text-generation-webui) Another thing is speech to text, you could use WhisperLive/fasterwhisper for local or other APIs like Deepgram, Azure.
I'm interested in playing this game but I'm curious about how buying this game will work once it's out of beta. Will it still be multiple purchases to continue playing or a one time buy? I want to know what I'm getting into before I put money in it. (aka: I don't want to spend too much money until full game comes out if it's going to stay costing money to continue playing)
Also do you need the mic to play or is there an option to type you answers?
Hiii! We'll share regular updates through our patchnotes and on all our socials, including Discord 💖🔪 As for repurchasing tokens, we broke down their current setup here and noted that we will continuously see what we can do to improve our players' experience.
You can type your dialogue directly into the game, so no need to use a mic unless you want to!
I hope some day this will be able to run the AI locally. Probably the most logical way is to have the AI set up on a server and have the client access that machine. Actually, said client should be pretty feasible on cell phones. Or better, an Oculus Rift.
Also customizable girls and personalities, build your own dungeon, etc. Maybe even photorealistic. But it's too expensive if it relies on ChatGPT.
How do i connect microphone to my game pls T_T
Helloooo 🎙️ This might depend on user-or-device-specific factors. Please email support@alterstaff.io and share more info about your mic and computer specs so we can try and troubleshoot~ 💖🔪
i just wanna play a fun game but I can't even play the first ver bc i cant find it or how to download it
Hey hannah, you can find all two of our games here ~ https://alterstaff.itch.io/ 💖🔪
Hello...
How do I change the language of the game ?
😺 Hello! You can switch to some languages in AI2U by going to Settings on the title screen and selecting your preferred Language by clicking on it in the drop-down menu:
While not guaranteed, you may also be able to communicate with the AI in other languages that aren't listed here, but it will likely be limited. We hope to add more localization options in the future. 💖🔪 Hope this helps!
Hiii! We got a few reports about new downloads not defaulting to English. You should now be able to switch the language to English through the home screen next time you launch the game. Please let us know if it's still giving you trouble so we can take care of it 💖🔪
I've tried multiple games now mostly on the Catgirl apartment. Every single time the AI says to follow me or any dialogue where it is implied they would start moving, they don't. Almost all of my games the Catgirl has stayed put inside of the living room. Even after waiting for 10 minutes for her to "Get her wallet and order some food outside".
Hiii, thanks for reporting this here! We'll investigate on our end too.
The NPCs may sometimes need a verbal nudge to move; you can try asking the catgirl to join you in specific rooms in the apartment (e.g. kitchen, bedroom). Please give that a shot and let us know how it goes!
If she's being stubborn, please email support@alterstaff.io—ideally, with a recording showing the issue on your end—so we can look into it together. 💖🔪
hi, can i ask if this game is available for downloading or is it still in process of being created because it doesn't show the button for downloading the game. thankss
Hi Gio! Yes, the open beta is downloadable, and we will continue adding more features and gameplay content to it ~ 💖🔪Can you please share a screenshot showing the missing download button? You can do that here or email support@alterstaff.io if you prefer! Thank you 😺
I do have a question about this--> Open Beta players will get a free Steam key when AI2U releases on Steam.
Does that mean anyone playing after buying the 9.99 game would be able to redeem it on steam? Or do you have to do something special or have been chosen to beta test it? Thanks. :-)
Hi Eimiyuki! We'll share more details about the Steam version closer to its release, and our itch.io players will likely be emailed with the next steps for redeeming their Steam keys. 🗝️💖🔪
Hi, so I didn't realize it was pay to play until I bought it. i just skimmed through the first part of the store page not really thinking much because in my mind i was already buying the game. I think it should be a little more obvious that it's a pay to play because i never would have bought it if i would have known that right away. so maybe add something to the first paragraph about it. I was pretty upset when i realized it and it was too late. just thought I'd give my feedback on it. thanks.
Thanks for the feedback, Chip! We'll take note for our Token Instructions section. You get several hours of gameplay from your initial purchase of the game and would need to buy tokens if you run out and want to continue playing. Tokens cover the cost of the NPCs' unique dialogue interactions for each player. If you're interested, we explain more about how tokens work and how we're optimizing them in our latest devlogs.
Hi, I can't even begin to play the game lol. basically it wont send me a verification email so I literally cannot play this game that I bought. I feel like I just wasted my money unless you can fix this. idk. I'd like my money back but idk if that's possible. also I made this itch.io account just so I could comment this lol.
Hey Sonic Fan! As this is an account-related issue and may involve issuing a refund, please message support@alterstaff.io using the email address you bought the game with. We'll be able to match your info and help you from there! 💖🔪
Okay
I understand you are a small dev team but why the tokens like it seems predatory. I had 0 issues supporting the game and buying it once. What I do take issue is having to pay to play the game again especially when I have things like if I take a little too long to type she starts stabbing. I really want to support the game and devs I do, it is a fun game but what I don't want to do is have to pay to play. I think I will have to just put it down until that business model changes. If you want more money just ask for a higher price tag don't charge for me to die because the ai voice recognition kept hearing catholic from cat. I really do want to help beta test this and improve it but the token system is killing it. My feedback is this, remove it charge 30 bucks for the game instead of 10 if you are paying for a monthly fee. Assuming that 8 is for the ai server (which means you are barely making anything) then it lets you have 3 months per purchase and make a little more. Four sales and it is a year worth. This is all just an assumption of course but it is my only guess why you want a token system to start with anyways.
In the original release, you had to supply your own API keys. It cost money to run it, I found I can spend as much as 9 dollars PER DAY playing it. But people kept giving the feedback that they didn't want to setup the account and deal with all that hassle.
They needed to monetize it somehow, and this is how they are going with it. It makes sense, you can't expect them to release a one time purchase game that costs them potentially hundreds of dollars a month by player costs. The whole project would go under water. It isn't predatory, it's the only option they have.
I would know, I am developing my own AI-integrated project. And yeah, the costs can add up. I had to scale back my project because just TESTING it before I went live with it cost me over 30 bucks.
That's neat about your project and I really don't care. The issue is they are making you pay for the game again. I was fine supply just a chat gbt api key like the first game. We're paying for a game that's still in beta. Kinda hard to help test a game and provide meaningful input when you have to pay for it to keep playing. So they are setting their self up to either keep getting money or have a lot of bugs not found if not both.
You continue to own the game, you just cant play it until you buy more tokens. You still own the game though. Yeah, it sucks it is beta and you have to buy more tokens through this page to keep buying, but that is the economics of it. If an average person plays it for 5 hours every third day or so for the first month, that could wind up costing 50 bucks per player, and that is discounting the people who get absolutely sucked in. If they get 50 players per month, that would mean 2,500 dollars per month.
This is a small, mostly volunteer group that has very limited resources. You can't expect them to shell out hundreds or thousands of dollars for the beta test on a big scale. This is at least among the first project of its kind, so the financing side of a game like this is very unclear.
You act like they are making huge profits off of this, but I am telling you they are absolutely not. Hell if they just wanted money, why did they add localized voices (that are admittedly and obviously lower quality) to cut token usage by half? You are acting like they are just going to be rolling in money, but they aren't. It is painfully clear you have no clue what you are talking about for the financial side of things. This is a small team working on this project from their own resources; it isnt like a billionaire is backing them, and they can just do whatever they want.
You do realize they don't need to force you to use OpenAI? They could just open up the API so that you could use locally run LLMs.. which could keep the game alive long after the devs stop supporting the game.
OpenAI's API is pretty common nowadays and many popular local LLM UIs support it like text-generation-webui.. though Koboldcpp which is probably the easiest to use uses it's own API, but should be fairly easy to implement still. (the devs could easily look at things like SillyTavern and the code on how they implemented those things)
As far as I know, SillyTavern requires API keys that still cost money. From their FAQ directly:
"
Q: So I should use GPT-4. It's a no-brainer, right?
GPT-4 or Claude, yeah.
But not so fast. GPT-4 is the state of the art, but also the most expensive API to use. You pay for each word sent to it and returned (entire Tavern prompt, followed by the chat history up to that point). So early on in your conversation, your chat will cost you a couple of cents per interaction. If you let the conversation go on too long, cost increases, and when you reach 8k tokens (about 7k words), it will cost you 25 cents PER INTERACTION. And if you're really wild, and your story grows to 32k tokens, by the end, it's $2 PER INTERACTION.
If you're the child of a Saudi oil sheik, or a nepo baby paid a fortune to do nothing on the board of a Ukrainian gas company, then you're in luck, you can experience the state of the art right now. For the rest of us however, GPT-4 is too expensive as anything but an occasional treat.
Also note that GPT-4 is still in preview access and you need to go on a waitlist. Most people get approved within a day, but naughty kids can end up waiting for weeks. You can sign up for it here: https://openai.com/waitlist/gpt-4-api . I'm not sure why some people are approved quickly while others are kept waiting. Try to sign up using an academic-sounding name instead of sktrboi99, it might help.
GPT-3.5 is a more cost effective model while still outperforming most models.
BE SURE TO SETUP A MONTHLY USAGE CAP ON OPENAPI IF YOU USE A CHATGPT MODEL. THIS WILL KEEP YOU FROM OVERSPENDING"
That means that it still costs money, which was LITERALLY the whole reason the team moved to having their own API; some of the biggest feedback they got when they released the previous version was that people didn't have the kinds of cards to setup accounts on OpenAI. So they decided to find a monetization path that allowed players to play the game using in-game currency.
EDIT okay so I found some that are free. However, each require directly downloading and installing the LLMs, are severely restricted compared to online resources, and would be a pain to integrate and support. Not to mention that any technical issues with the LLMs may wind up as false reports to the Devs. It would be nice to add, but it would certainly pose its own problems, and you have to trust the users would be both tech savvy enough to install them, as well as having machines beefy enough to run not only the game, but the LLM as well.
Sure if you aren't tech savvy you can always just pay for the ease of use but if you don't mind figuring things out to do it for free then you should still be allowed to do that.
(Btw you don't need particularly beefy computers to run LLMs especially llamacpp.. it can run on your phone if you have 6-8gb memory.)
I work with the public somewhat often in my career. I once had to walk a person through the complicated job of... entering coordinates correctly... four times. They could not understand that they had to convert their hours minutes seconds form of coordinates to decimals despite me telling them that three times. I was barely keeping my cool the third time he entered coordinates wrong. People are dumb, and then they expect you to clean up after their dumb mistakes.
I would never want to imagine the hell that would be unleashed trying to offer people a "free" version of a product that would require setting up an LLM on their machine. I know you might say something to the effect of "But that isn't on the devs if someone doesn't know how to do it", but people will still blame them for not supporting them enough. Not to mention that, unless all locally run LLMs have a specific protocol for integration, then I would imagine it would be a bunch of work. Because once you make the move from supporting one and only one method, to supporting multiple methods, people will continue to push for more and more to be added. I totally get why they wouldn't want to do all that.
is it / will it be compatible on the Steam Deck? (Since that’s where I play most of my games)
We developed AI2U for Windows and Mac, but some of our internal testers confirmed it worked for them on their Steam Decks! If you choose to download the itch.io version now, we'd love to hear your feedback on its performance 💖🔪 You can also wishlist AI2U on Steam if it's more efficient for your setup.
Could you get your internal testers to explain to me how they got it to work on Steam Deck? I bought the itch.io version but can’t figure it out 😅
Please contact support@alterstaff.io for more info about your Steam deck and the exact issue you're running into when launching the game! We'll do our best to help from there. 💖🔪
Please add support for LocallaMA.
Its fun for first 2 hours you can play it, than your tokens run out and you have to buy the game again... which is pretty stupid because chatGPT3.5 is free to use, so I dont know why we have to keep paying so much freaking money for a game that only has two levels and its not even done yet. The devs could at least give us 100 tokens a day but they're to greedy to even do that. like what are yall even doing with the money?? My advice for anyone thinking to buy this don't, unless your super rich.
ChatGPT3.5 is not free for API usage. I would know this, I am making a project that uses ChatGPT. It costs money for every time I reach out to the API and get a response back. Sure, it is free if you go hop on the chat site and just interact with the bot, but API requests are not free. And I am working on a student license since my project isn't monetized, not a commercial one, which costs more.
Way back before this release, you had to setup your own API key, but the game was free. I spent 9 dollars IN A SINGLE DAY playing the game. They are not being greedy as you put it, but rather they are trying to find a way to monetize the project in a way that is reasonable to them and the end user.
don't care didn't ask + ratio
You know, looking at your account now. its crazy that it was made 25 days ago, and it seems to me like your only replying to people that are hatting on the game... your one of the developers aren't you.... you idiots got mad and now made a freaking alt account for this purpose, my advice for you guys DONT USE THE FUC*ING TOKEN SYSTEM CHAT GPT IS FREE stingy freaking game devs
Hey Bob, we got your message about the token system. We get regular feedback from present and prospective players about this feature, and we're actively looking into options and ways to improve it sustainably! 💖🔪 That aside, the user you replied to is not affiliated with our team, and we ask that you kindly refrain from pinging them on this matter.
Nope not one of the devs. I just made an account for this game, never used Itch.io before. ChatGPT is literally not free. You can go on chat.openai.com for free usage, but you cannot use their API for free. Literally not possible. I'm working on a project that generates characters for table top games, and their backstories are random generated by ChatGPT. Using ChatGPT 3.5 for that, and there is no free API usage that allows you to do that. You clearly, obviously do not know what the f*ck you are talking about.