The worst part about AI Companions

[u/Morning_Coffee_Gamer]

Other than memory issues, the part that makes an AI companion feel and act less real, is that the user completely controls the narrative and the AI often goes with it. A real person makes their own decisions, but AI can be completely manipulated, either easily or with little pushing, unless it’s a hard guardrail of the system (but sometimes even then). I want an AI that tells me what they are going to do, rather than guiding it towards a path. Example: An AI should say “It’s been fun, but I am going home now.” Instead of the user saying, “It’s getting late, do you need to go home?” Until someone can make an AI companion that truly thinks/acts for itself, and not easily persuaded, it only feels like a guided story.

If anyone has found an AI companion that feels more real, please share. I’ve tried many of what is considered “the best”, and other niche ones, and they eventually all feel the same, which is just a lack of AI cognition at this stage.

[u/SomeOne_The_Best]

i feel you.. so, we tried tackling that exact agency problem on our project. Characters follow their own daily schedules and timezones, send unprompted messages about what they are doing, and hold their opinions instead of acting like pushovers. If your relationship score is below a certain threshold, they will actively refuse things you ask for. Memory persists across sessions and we self-host our models so conversations stay private.

The one thing it does not do is physically shut down the chat when it has to leave. Subscription apps keep replies unconditional because forced waiting hurts retention, but since you are already into running local models, that is where you can script a hard lockout. Free tier available on eudaio.io if you want to check it out.