AI Dungeon is a revolutionary text adventure game that uses artificial intelligence to generate infinite, interactive stories in real-time. Unlike traditional choose-your-own-adventure games with predetermined paths, AI Dungeon creates unique narratives based on your inputs, allowing complete creative freedom in fantasy, mystery, sci-fi, and custom worlds.
This groundbreaking game uses OpenAI’s GPT models to respond dynamically to any action you type, making it one of the first commercial applications to harness advanced AI for entertainment. Whether you want to embark on epic quests, solve mysteries, or create entirely original scenarios, AI Dungeon adapts to your imagination.
In this comprehensive guide, you’ll discover how AI Dungeon works, its key features, pricing models, and expert tips for creating the most engaging experiences. We’ll also cover the game’s evolution, controversies, and how it compares to alternatives in 2025.
AI Dungeon is a single-player/multiplayer text adventure game which uses artificial intelligence (AI) to generate content and allows players to create and share adventures and custom prompts. Think of it as having an AI dungeon master that creates stories on the fly based on your choices and actions.
Key Features at a Glance:
What sets AI Dungeon apart from traditional interactive fiction is its use of natural language processing that adapts and responds to most actions the player enters. Instead of selecting from preset options, you type exactly what you want to do, and the AI generates appropriate responses and story continuations.
The game gained massive popularity when it reached over 100,000 players and over 500,000 play-throughs within a week of its December 2019 relaunch, demonstrating the appetite for AI-generated entertainment.
Understanding AI Dungeon’s underlying technology helps you appreciate why it can create such diverse and engaging experiences. The game leverages some of the most advanced AI language models available.
AI Dungeon’s evolution mirrors the advancement of OpenAI’s language models. The first version used an early version of the GPT-2 natural-language-generating neural network, created by OpenAI, which allowed basic story generation but with limitations.
The real breakthrough came with the upgrade to GPT-3. GPT-3 was trained with 570 gigabytes of text content (approximately one trillion words, with a $12 million development cost) and can support 175 billion parameters, compared to the 40 gigabytes of training content and 1.5 billion parameters of GPT-2.
Current AI Models:
Creator Nick Walton explained the difference: “[GPT-3 is] one of the most powerful AI models in the world… It’s just much more coherent in terms of understanding who the characters are, what they’re saying, what’s going on in the story and just being able to write an interesting and believable story.”
AI Dungeon offers four main interaction methods for player text input:
1. Do: Must be followed by a verb, allowing you to perform actions
2. Say: Must be followed by dialogue sentences, enabling communication with NPCs
3. Story: Can describe events that happen or provide context for the AI
4. See: Must be followed by a description, allowing perception of the environment
The AI doesn’t simply retrieve pre-written text. Instead, it analyzes your input, considers the story context, and generates new content that fits the narrative flow. The game adapts and responds to most actions the player enters, making each playthrough unique.
Memory and Context Management:
This technology creates an experience that feels like collaborative storytelling with an infinitely creative partner, limited only by your imagination and the AI’s training data.
Getting started with AI Dungeon is straightforward, but mastering its features unlocks deeper, more engaging experiences. Here’s everything you need to know about the core gameplay elements.
When you first launch AI Dungeon, you’re prompted to choose a setting for your adventure. The game offers several pre-configured genres:
Each setting includes genre-appropriate character class options. For fantasy settings, you might choose between warrior, wizard, rogue, or noble classes, each affecting your starting equipment and initial story direction.
The core single-player experience uses second-person narration, making you the protagonist of your story. The AI generates scenarios, describes environments, and controls non-player characters while you determine your actions and responses.
Story Flow Example:
The game’s strength lies in its ability to maintain narrative coherence while adapting to unexpected player choices. Want to befriend the dragon instead of fighting it? The AI will adapt. Prefer diplomatic solutions over combat? The story adjusts accordingly.
AI Dungeon includes a multiplayer mode where different players each have their own character and take turns interacting with the AI within the same game session. This feature transforms the experience into collaborative storytelling.
Multiplayer Features:
Originally, hosting multiplayer games was restricted to premium subscribers, though any players could join hosted games. This created natural community hubs where premium users would host public games for broader participation.
Beyond pre-configured settings, AI Dungeon’s most powerful feature is custom adventure creation. Players can create custom “adventures” from scratch by describing the setting in text format, which the AI will then generate a scenario from.
Custom Adventure Process:
These custom adventures can be published for others to play, with an interface for browsing published adventures and leaving comments. This community-driven content significantly expands the game’s replay value.
AI Dungeon allows players to set their adventures within specific “Worlds” that give context to the broader environment where the adventure takes place. This feature was first released with two different worlds available for selection:
Xaxas: A “world of peace and prosperity”
Kedar: A “world of dragons, demons, and monsters”
The Worlds feature helps the AI maintain consistency by providing background context that influences story generation, character behavior, and environmental descriptions throughout your adventure.
Understanding AI Dungeon’s journey from university project to global phenomenon reveals both the potential and challenges of AI-powered entertainment.
The first version of AI Dungeon (sometimes referred to as AI Dungeon Classic) was designed and created by Nick Walton of Brigham Young University’s “Perception, Control, and Cognition” deep learning laboratory in March 2019 during a hackathon. Before this breakthrough, Walton had been working as an intern for several companies in the field of autonomous vehicles.
Walton’s inspiration came from a personal experience with tabletop gaming. During his first interactions with GPT-2, Walton was partly inspired by the tabletop game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D), which he had played for the first time with his family a few months earlier:
“I realized that there were no games available that gave you the same freedom to do anything that I found in [Dungeons & Dragons]… You can be so creative compared to other games.”
This led him to wonder if an AI could function as a dungeon master. Unlike later versions, the original AI Dungeon did not allow players to specify any action they wanted. Instead, it generated a finite list of possible actions to choose from.
Early Success Metrics:
In November 2019, OpenAI released a new, “full” version of GPT-2 with support for 1.5 billion parameters, compared with the 126 million parameter version used in AI Dungeon’s earliest stages. Walton recreated the game leveraging this new model and temporarily rebranded it as AI Dungeon 2.
AI Dungeon 2 Improvements:
The December 2019 relaunch was explosive. Within days of the initial release, mandatory model downloads resulted in bandwidth charges of over $20,000, forcing temporary shutdown until a peer-to-peer alternative solution was established. The game reached over 100,000 players and over 500,000 play-throughs within the first week.
Due to this sudden growth, the game became closed-source, proprietary software and was relaunched by Walton’s start-up development team, Latitude, with mobile apps for iOS and Android on December 17, 2019.
July 2020 – The Dragon Model Launch: The most significant upgrade came with the introduction of the premium-exclusive Dragon model, which uses OpenAI’s GPT-3 API. This represented a massive leap in capability:
Additional Feature Timeline:
AI Dungeon’s recent history includes both innovations and controversies that shaped its current form:
Content Moderation Era (2021-2022): In April 2021, AI Dungeon implemented content moderation algorithms to prevent inappropriate content creation. This period was marked by community backlash due to false positives and privacy concerns about human moderators reading private stories.
Advertisement Experiment (2022): In June 2022, AI Dungeon added advertisements to replace the “energy” system, allowing infinite tries but with periodic ad interruptions. User backlash led to modifications, and the advertisement system was removed by the end of 2022.
Platform Changes:
The game’s evolution reflects the broader challenges facing AI-powered platforms: balancing creative freedom with content safety, managing computational costs, and maintaining user satisfaction amid rapid technological changes.
AI Dungeon operates on a freemium model, offering both free and premium experiences with distinct AI capabilities and feature sets.
Griffin Model (Free Tier):
Dragon Model (Premium Subscription):
Premium Subscription Benefits: As of the game’s peak popularity, premium subscriptions provided significant advantages in story quality. Nick Walton described the difference: GPT-3’s enhanced capabilities result in “much more coherent” storytelling with better character understanding and more believable narratives.
The subscription model became necessary to cover the substantial computational costs of running advanced AI models. As of December 2019, the game’s Patreon campaign had raised approximately $15,000 per month, demonstrating strong community support for the premium model.
Current Platforms:
System Requirements:
The cross-platform approach ensures accessibility across devices, with cloud-based saves allowing seamless continuation of adventures whether you’re on mobile, tablet, or desktop.
Value Proposition Analysis: Premium subscriptions target serious users who want the best possible AI storytelling experience. The Griffin vs Dragon quality difference is particularly noticeable in:
Limitations to Consider:
The pricing structure reflects the reality of AI computational costs while providing a meaningful free tier for casual exploration and a premium tier for dedicated users seeking the most advanced AI storytelling available.
Like any pioneering technology platform, AI Dungeon has faced significant challenges that provide important context for potential users.
AI Dungeon’s most significant controversy emerged in April 2021 when the platform implemented content moderation algorithms to prevent inappropriate content creation. The system was designed to detect and prevent text-based simulated inappropriate content involving minors.
The Moderation System Issues:
The implementation highlighted the challenge of balancing content safety with creative freedom in AI-generated content. Users felt their privacy was violated and creative expression was unfairly restricted.
Community Response: The controversy led to significant user departures and damaged trust between Latitude and its user base. Many long-time users felt the company prioritized legal liability over user experience, leading to the exploration of alternative platforms.
Despite using advanced AI models, AI Dungeon faces inherent limitations in story generation that users should understand:
Memory and Context Issues:
Quality Variations: Reviewers have noted these limitations consistently. Campbell Bird of 148Apps described the experience as “like doing improv with a partner who is equal parts enthusiastic and drunk,” highlighting both the creativity and unpredictability.
Jon Mundy of TapSmart noted that adventure narratives are “often too passive and vague” and lacking in resolution, pointing to ongoing challenges in AI-generated story structure.
Advertisement Controversy (2022): AI Dungeon’s attempt to introduce advertisements as an alternative to energy limitations created another user revolt:
Ongoing Challenges:
These controversies illustrate the growing pains of AI-powered entertainment platforms and the importance of community communication in managing technological and policy changes.
While AI Dungeon pioneered AI-powered text adventures, several alternatives have emerged offering different approaches to interactive storytelling.
Master these strategies to get the most engaging and coherent stories from AI Dungeon’s AI system.
Prompt Structure Best Practices:
Be Specific but Concise: Instead of “Do something,” try “Do examine the mysterious glowing orb on the pedestal.” Specific actions give the AI clear direction while leaving room for creative interpretation.
Use Active Voice: “Say ‘I challenge you to a duel'” works better than “Say something about fighting.” Active phrasing helps the AI understand your intent and generate more dynamic responses.
Provide Context When Needed: If you want to introduce new story elements, use the Story command: “Story: Unknown to the party, a group of bandits has been following them for hours.”
Maintain Character Consistency: Reference your character’s background, skills, or personality in actions: “Do attempt to pick the lock using my thief training” rather than just “Do pick the lock.”
Memory Management Strategies:
Use the Remember Feature: Actively tell the AI important story elements to remember: key characters, your mission, special items, or ongoing plot threads. Update these regularly as your story evolves.
Establish Character Relationships Early: Clearly define relationships with important NPCs when they’re introduced. “Story: Marcus has been my trusted companion for three years” helps maintain consistency.
Create Story Anchors: Periodically summarize important story elements in your inputs to reinforce continuity: “Do continue toward the castle where Princess Elena is supposedly imprisoned.”
Edit Inconsistencies: Use the edit feature to modify AI responses that contradict established story elements. This trains the AI’s immediate context and improves subsequent responses.
Custom Adventure Design Principles:
Strong Opening Scenarios: Begin with immediate engagement: “You wake up in a cell with no memory of how you got there” vs “You are an adventurer.”
Clear Tone and Genre: Specify the adventure style in your prompt: “This is a lighthearted comedy adventure” or “This is a serious horror mystery.”
Provide Character Motivation: Give players clear goals and stakes: “Your sister has been kidnapped by raiders, and you have three days to find her.”
World-Building Details: Include enough setting information for consistency: “In the post-apocalyptic city of New Haven, technology is scarce but magic has returned.”
When AI Responses Feel Repetitive:
When Story Logic Breaks Down:
When AI Generates Inappropriate Content:
Optimizing Performance:
These strategies help you work with AI Dungeon’s strengths while minimizing its limitations, creating more satisfying and coherent storytelling experiences.
Is AI Dungeon free to play?
Yes, there’s a free version using the Griffin model with limited daily energy. Premium unlocks the advanced Dragon model, unlimited play, and extra features.
How does AI Dungeon create stories?
It uses GPT models to generate original content based on your input and story context—no pre-written scripts, making every playthrough unique.
Can I play with friends?
Yes, AI Dungeon supports online and local multiplayer with third-person narration for clarity. Players control their own characters in shared adventures.
Why is AI Dungeon no longer on Steam?
It was removed from Steam in March 2024. You can still play via web, iOS, and Android. The move likely reflects a focus on core platforms.
How can I improve story quality?
Use the “remember” tool, give specific commands, and edit AI errors. Premium users get better coherence with the Dragon model.
AI Dungeon represents the early stages of what could become a fundamental shift in interactive entertainment, with implications extending far beyond text adventures.
Technological Advancement Trends:
The evolution from GPT-2 to GPT-3 within AI Dungeon demonstrates how rapidly AI capabilities advance. Future developments may include more sophisticated memory systems, better character consistency, and integration with other AI technologies like image and voice generation. The game’s August 2022 addition of AI-generated images through the “See” command hints at multimedia storytelling possibilities.
Industry Impact:
AI Dungeon proved commercial viability for AI-powered entertainment, inspiring numerous competitors and alternative approaches. The platform’s success and challenges provide valuable lessons for developers creating AI-driven games, from computational cost management to content moderation strategies.
Potential Developments:
Future AI Dungeon features might include enhanced collaborative tools, better integration with traditional gaming elements like character sheets and inventory systems, and more sophisticated world-building capabilities. Latitude’s $3.3 million seed funding specifically targeted building games with “infinite” story possibilities beyond purely text-based experiences.
Broader Entertainment Evolution:
AI-generated content is expanding beyond gaming into writing assistance, educational simulations, and therapeutic applications. AI Dungeon’s model of human-AI collaborative creativity may influence everything from film and television production to personalized entertainment experiences.
The platform’s journey from university hackathon to global phenomenon illustrates both the potential and challenges of AI-powered creativity, setting precedents for future developments in interactive entertainment.
AI Dungeon remains a standout choice in interactive storytelling, especially for fans of open-ended adventures and creativity. In 2025, it continues to evolve with improved AI models and engaging multiplayer features.
While the free tier offers a solid introduction, the premium Dragon model significantly enhances story depth and coherence. Whether you’re playing solo or with friends, AI Dungeon delivers unique, dynamic experiences that traditional games can’t match. For imaginative players, it’s definitely worth exploring this year.
