You can now talk to the Stone Age in an AI-driven Neolithic archaeology game

Generative AI is already reshaping writing, art, and film. Now, archaeologists are using it to let players talk to the past.

In a new project, researchers have built an interactive Neolithic game where AI-driven characters explain ancient life dynamically, without fixed scripts or costly production pipelines.

Using Unreal Engine, AI-driven characters, and online tutorials, the team built an educational 3D game about the Neolithic period in Northern Europe, quickly and at minimal cost.

“Free tools that are now available to everyone have the potential to revolutionize digital cultural heritage communication,” said Mikkel Nørtoft, an archaeologist at the University of Copenhagen and lead author of the study.

“With our research article, we give other professionals a clear recipe for getting started with digital storytelling without spending huge resources.”

Talking with a Stone Age woman

The game was developed as part of the ‘Deep Histories of Migration’ research project and is set in the Neolithic landscape of northern Europe.

 It is based on detailed video recordings of two well-preserved long dolmens at Lindeskov Hestehave on the Danish island of Funen.

Players explore the reconstructed site and interact with two AI-driven characters: a modern archaeologist and a Stone Age woman.

Rather than following a fixed script, the characters generate dialogue dynamically using generative AI, guided by prompts and archaeological knowledge compiled by the researchers.

“We haven’t had to write detailed manuscripts,” Nørtoft explained.

“The characters speak using generative AI and can express themselves—optionally in several languages—based on our prompts and our archaeological knowledge banks.”

This approach allows researchers to update the characters’ background stories as new findings emerge, ensuring that the content remains scientifically accurate while still feeling natural and responsive to players.

Built with free and accessible tools

To create the game, the researchers relied largely on freely available software. Unreal Engine served as the game-development platform, while MetaHuman Creator was used to design the two human characters.

AI-driven dialogue is handled through Convai, a cloud-based service that offers a free trial option. The only hardware requirement is a standard gaming GPU capable of rendering 3D graphics.

The full game project has been made openly available and can be downloaded and explored through the Unreal Engine Editor.

Taking control of the past

The researchers emphasize that the game is intended as a proof of concept rather than a finished museum product.

Their goal is to show that archaeologists, historians, and museum professionals no longer need to rely on expensive commercial developers to communicate their research.

“With a little help, most people can learn to build a simple scenario with characters in a few days,” Nørtoft said.

“Then they can start experimenting with this kind of dissemination using their own expert knowledge.”

The project signals a shift in how digital heritage experiences may be created in the future, placing historians and archaeologists directly in control of how the past is reconstructed, interpreted, and shared.

A demonstration of the game is available on YouTube, offering a glimpse of how AI-driven storytelling could reshape the way we explore prehistory.