On Tuesday afternoon, Anthropic launched Claude Plays Pokémon on Twitch, a reside stream of Anthropic’s latest AI mannequin, Claude 3.7 Sonnet, taking part in a recreation of Pokémon Red. It’s change into an interesting experiment of types, showcasing the capabilities of at this time’s AI tech and other people’s reactions to them.
AI researchers have used all types of video video games, from Street Fighter to Pictionary, to check new fashions — usually extra for amusement than utility. But Anthropic stated that Pokémon proved to be a helpful benchmark for Claude 3.7 Sonnet, which may successfully “assume” by means of the kinds of puzzles the sport comprises.
Like OpenAI’s o3-mini and DeepSeek’s R1, Claude 3.7 Sonnet can “cause” its approach by means of powerful challenges, like taking part in a online game designed for kids. While the mannequin’s non-reasoning predecessor, Claude 3.5 Sonnet, failed the very starting of Pokémon Red — exiting the participant’s dwelling in Pallet Town — Claude 3.7 Sonnet managed to win three fitness center chief badges.
The latest Claude nonetheless runs into hassle, although. Hours into the Twitch stream, the mannequin was deterred by a rock wall, which it couldn’t stroll by means of irrespective of how laborious it tried.
One Twitch consumer summed up the scenario this fashion: “who would win, a pc AI with hundreds of hours put into programming it, or 1 rock wall?”
Eventually, Claude realized that it may navigate across the wall.
On the one hand, it’s irritating to observe Claude traverse Pokémon Red with the pace of a Slowpoke, reasoning by means of each step with excruciating contemplation. Yet it’s additionally oddly compelling. The left of the stream reveals Claude’s “thought course of,” whereas the fitting reveals real-time gameplay.
At one level, Claude tried to find Professor Oak inside his laboratory, however received confused, as a result of there have been different NPCs within the scene.
“I discover a brand new character has appeared beneath me — a personality with black hair and what seems to be a white coat at coordinates (2, 10),” Claude wrote. “This is likely to be Professor Oak! Let me go down and discuss to him.”
Claude then proceeded to mistakenly discuss to an NPC apart from the Processor — an NPC the mannequin had spoken with a number of instances earlier than. Some of the thousand-odd folks within the Twitch chat began to get antsy. Others, notably those that’d been watching the stream for various minutes, have been much less fearful.
“Guys chill,” one individual wrote within the chat. “Before we exited and entered Oak’s lab like 10 instances earlier than understanding the best way to transfer on.”
For longtime Twitch customers, the format of Anthropic’s stream would possibly really feel nostalgic. Over a decade in the past, tens of millions of individuals tried to play Pokémon Red directly in a first-of-its-kind on-line social experiment known as Twitch Plays Pokémon. Each consumer may management the participant character through Twitch chat, leading to predictably chaotic gameplay.
Some AI researchers have cited Twitch Plays Pokémon as an inspiration for his or her work. In October 2023, Seattle-based software program engineer Peter Whidden printed a YouTube video detailing how he educated a reinforcement studying algorithm to play Pokémon. His AI spent over 50,000 hours taking part in the sport earlier than it discovered to efficiently navigate it. One problem was that the AI most popular to admire the pixelated surroundings as a substitute of really taking part in the sport.
AI-powered “reenactments” of Twitch Plays Pokémon like Whidden’s and Anthropic’s are entertaining, however somewhat bittersweet on the similar time. The authentic stream was such a pivotal second in Twitch historical past as a result of it introduced folks collectively in an surprising approach. Everyone was on the identical staff, working towards the objective of getting the participant character to cease working in circles and really progress by means of the sport.
In 2025, it appears we’re now not teammates, however spectators, watching an AI mannequin attempt to play a recreation many people received the hold of once we have been 5 years previous. It’s an AI-motivated microcosm of a bigger development: our experiences on-line are shifting from shared, communal actions to extra solitary ones.
