I see a lot of people doing recreations of games (or simply new ones) but I've noticed that there's just some ick-factor (hard to explain), in addition to performance issues, and just plain old bugs.

It's amazing what can be built using vibe-coding, but it still feels far away from actually being able to create proper games with soul.

Or am I wrong?

You’re not wrong but there are only so many game designers out there who have a distinct style and an art director who is a bit unhinged. Moreso when it’s a style that isn’t obviously trying to sell you something, which is unfortunately a pit many indie games fall into as they race to be a better version of what they saw other successful indie games do. It was already a saturated product before AI

Adding 2c, because I am building stuff with near zero previous game building experience.

I don't think you are that far off. It did get remarkably easy to get to a working prototype and get ideas you carried all those years in your head, but then you get to see how well they fare in reality. Worse, some combinations of those ideas don't mesh well with others.

Example, among other things, I am building a.. protest simulator based on Chicago riots ( not plopped anywhere.. it is still not balanced based on AI vs AI results so far). The basic location, sprites, system is in place, but the overall .. dunno.. there is something missing ( edit: though atm, violence is minimal by design and I wonder if that needs to be present even if it is rare ).

I guess what I am saying is: AI can you get pretty far with the initial build, but your guiding hand is still what counts for making it good.

If anything, things are harder now.

I'm not sure if meant to ask if this project is an ai-recreation. I just wanted to say that the fheroes2 project is much older than that. I was playing with it during covid (if I remember right).

I suppose it's possible that they have changed development practices recently, but I think you can probably enjoy it without guilt if that worries you!

In general terms, the machine can do the coding, you have to provide the soul. It's no different from the tons of human-made shovelware with no clear direction.

> Or am I wrong?

I don't know what kind of answer you're looking for. There's no soul and games don't have them.

You have some kind of subjective feeling of nostalgia (or something else) and want to pin it on AI-assisted development. That's real for you, but not objective.

fheroes2 predates the era of vibed AI recreations which get abandoned in a week or two.