"Yes. I mean, I think there are two processes. I think the power and money corrupted him in the end as well, but I also think that there’s something fundamentally anti-human about people who want to build utopias or paradises or heavens, because what they’re saying is, “I like humans apart from the bad bits.” And I mean, I’m trying to be a pluralist who likes all kinds of people. And I think there’s a side where people are just hideous perfectionists, want to get rid of the rough and the nasty and the ugly and the dirty. And that’s a huge side of us. So I worry about those people. I find them, you know, it’s a different kind of sociopathic behavior."

"I think story’s very important and very powerful, and when you combine the two successfully, you get the best of both worlds. But there is a tension always there. I think in a game like GTA IV, which I worked on and loved and I thought the story was great, but we got criticized because people felt there was almost too much story, and that meant you cared too much about Nico, and he wasn’t as effective an avatar in the open world. I think we probably got closest to reconciling them as perfectly as they can be done in Red Dead II, or when playing as Trevor in GTA V if you wanted to be crazy. I think those were when it really worked, the character, absolute freedom, because also you didn’t want… In any game, you don’t really want to compel the player."

"How are they not like me? You know? And then slowly, what is it like to feel like a human being, you know? And then in most of these games, how much of a psychopath are they? How much of a sociopath are they? And what are their good qualities? What is going to give them humanity alongside that? What are they, what for them, apart from money, is worth dying for? And then you start to build it out from these kind of fundamental sides. And suddenly you go, “Okay, actually, I can start to feel…” And then how do they speak? You know, because fundamentally, it doesn’t really matter what’s going on in their head; they haven’t actually got one, but what they say is what’s going to make you realize who they are. Superintelligent AI in A Better Paradise"