Alisa Chumachenko CEO of GOSU.AI – Interview Series

Alisa Chumachenko is the CEO of GOSU.AI, an AI assistant that helps gamers to become better players. GOSU.AI improve your skills through the detailed analysis of matches.

When did you initially fall in love with gaming?

I think it all started when I was 5 years old and was still living in the USA. My mom got me a Nintendo and since then gaming has been a big part of my life. I used to spend a lot of time playing MMO games like World of Warcraft or Lineage 2, loads of mobile games and now I am testing various games for kids since I have a little daughter myself.

You have quite the entrepreneurial streak having founded Game Insight, a leading innovator of mobile and social games in 2009. What inspired you to launch your own gaming studio?

Originally, I have studied to be a theatre director and worked as an ice artist in a circus for around 10 years. At some point while playing an online game I met a popular russian singer Sergey Zhukov. At that time Sergey has also been a shareholder in the company “Territory” where I have been offered a job.

A bit later the company was renamed into ASTRUM Online Entertainment and in 2009 was merged with Mail.ru forming a holding company Mail.ru Group.

The merger was conflicting and difficult, hence, I decided to quit. Immediately after quitting I have received a lot of offers from multiple developers which lead me to an idea of making a game incubator. That is how Game Insight has started.

We were the pioneers of the social and mobile market. It turned out that our experience in game development, marketing and free-to-play model was very relevant in the new industry. Game Insight has been in the top 20 mobile game developers worldwide and was the first company in the world to launch a microtransaction on Google prior to Google Play being a thing. We were also first to introduce a city-building idea with the launch of a game called Paradise Island. It is amazing to innovate a new emerging industry. It inspired us a lot.

What were some of the games that were launched on Game Insight and what did you learn from the experience?

In total we have launched over 45 games with over 200 releases on different platforms like Facebook, VKontakte, iOS, Android or Windows. Most notable games were Paradise Island, Airport-City and Dragon Eternity.

It would be hard to emphasize one or a few specific experiences while being with Game Insight. It was a very fast paced environment that demanded us to be agile, versatile and creative.

In 2017, you went on to launch GOSU.AI. What was the inspiration behind this startup?

I personally am a big fan of real-time in-game AI personalization. I believe that it is the future that is being built right now. AI can help to understand user habits and preferences and even do some little adjustments that would lead to a much better user experience.

Here in GOSU Data Lab we are dealing with AI in different games. What technology can already do fits the definition of fiction, hence, technology is the new magic.

What are some of the games that are currently offered on the platform, and are there plans on adding additional games to the network?

Currently our tool is compatible with both leading MOBA franchises in the world – Dota 2 and League of Legends. In the long run we are definitely looking to expand the list of games that we support, however, that might take some time since we are a start-up company and our team is considerably small for a very fast expansion.

GOSU.AI enables players to play smarter and improve their skills through the detailed analysis of matches and to get personal recommendations. Could you describe some of the artificial intelligence technologies that are used to help gamers improve their gameplay?

Using classical ML algorithms such as Random Forest or Gradient Boosting, and Rule-Based models, GOSU Data Platform fire triggers like “User starts fighting”, “User has learned ability Q”, etc. As a result, the user gets predefined messages like “Use Q and W before the ultimate, to boost your damage”, “When Ahri uses Q it sends out and pulls back her orb …”, etc

What type of recommendations should players expect?

Our experience shows that usually users are most interested in in-game items and skill builds, laning advice or some technical questions that are related to the game. E.g. “What items to buy?”, “What should I do in my lane”, “What is the cooldown of Pudge’s Meat Hook skill”?, etc. With this information we have built a tool that is predicting most of the questions players can have and we are proactively giving advice based on real time in-game situations. GOSU.AI is a second screen gaming buddy that contains everything that a player might need.

How will AI aid the development of a user’s skill set in the future?

Currently our assistant is pretty simple. It provides tips and voice guides for 2 specific games. In the near future future GOSU Voice Assistant will have more functionality:

• In-game tutorial: a basic introduction to the game for beginners.
• Wiki knowledge base: AI will be able to provide detailed information about game related questions.
• Team Play: a feature allowing users to share GOSU Assistant to their friends that are not using our service.
• Data based information: personal statistics, infographics, etc.

This is just a part of ideas that we have for our tool development. There is plenty more that we are testing or gathering more information about. Some ideas are fairly crazy – what if AI would offer you to get or even order some food for you? Or suggest to take a quick stretch after a lengthy gaming session? We are a company that is making a tool for gamers that is made by gamers, thus, you can definitely expect some interesting functionality in the future.

What is the GOSU Club and what benefits will players receive?

GOSU Club is our opportunity to say thank you to our loyal users. First of all, of course, absence of advertisements while using the application. Secondly, it’s an opportunity to participate in product development. GOSU Club members have access to a private discord channel where they can chat with developers and high skill and rank players. Club members can directly ask for advice or even request a demo review and be given personalized advice. We are very grateful to all GOSU Club members, because we feel their support and they motivate us to make a really high-quality product.

Is there anything else that you would like to share about GOSU.AI?

AI and deep learning help our assistant to turn the gaming experience to the angle that the players like the best. And do it in real-time. Real-time AI personalization is the future of the games and this is the magic that our assistant can do now and will do much better in the future. There is a lot of talk about AI right now – we are doing a very simple thing – we are not developing a super-magical AI that is talked about breathlessly at business conferences. We do applied things – we do real things. We adapt existing technologies to a specific product, to a specific game, so to speak. If you dig deep into it, there is no actual magic inside. It is our job to take the technology that is available and adapt it to the application tasks. However, if you look at it with the user's eye, it's magic in action. This is the future that is already here.

Thank you for the great interview, I really enjoyed learning more about GOSU.ai.