What are AI-generated turn images? (beta)

What are AI-generated turn images?

Beta. This feature is experimental. The AI's choices about when to illustrate a turn, and the images themselves, will get better as we tune the prompts and model. Feedback is welcome.

Some worlds opt in to turn images: an illustration generated alongside a turn when the AI thinks that turn has a strong visual beat worth picturing, such as a first meeting with a character, a dramatic reveal, or a transition to a new location.

Turn images are off by default for every world. They only run when three conditions are all met:

  1. The world's author has opted the world in.
  2. Your account setting allows images.
  3. You haven't disabled images for this specific journey.

How much do they cost?

Each generated image costs about 7 credits, charged on top of the turn that triggered it. Images fail silently if your credit balance runs low, if the generator is unavailable, or if the content is refused; the turn itself is never affected.

The AI is instructed to use images sparingly, and a per-journey cooldown prevents more than roughly one image every two turns. A typical journey on a turn-images world will have only a handful of illustrated moments, not one per turn.

How do images look?

Two layouts, picked automatically from what the AI asked for:

  • Side inset: a portrait of a single character (or the player character themselves) floats beside the narrative, with the text wrapping around it. Used when the moment is about a person, a face, or a reaction.
  • Inline scene: a wide shot displayed full-width above the narrative. Used for environments, action scenes, and moments featuring multiple characters together.

Both render with a subtle fade-in. Images are high-resolution WebP and tap to expand in your browser.

Turning images on or off

You have two kill switches, at different scopes.

For all journeys (account-wide)

Go to your Profile page and find the AI Images card. Flip the switch off to stop any journey on your account from generating images, even if the world allows them. Flip it back on to re-enable.

For one journey only

While playing, open Settings (top-right gear) and scroll to Scene images. The toggle there disables images for this journey only, without touching your other journeys. If the current world has not opted into turn images, the toggle still appears but is greyed out (there's nothing to disable). The setting is saved to your account and follows you across devices.

When either switch is off, the AI is instructed not to request an image for the turn in the first place, so no output tokens or image-generation credits are spent. You'll always save credits by disabling, never waste them.

For world authors

If you're authoring a world and want it to use turn images, open the editor and look under Advanced Features → Turn Images. Flip the Enable AI-generated scene images switch and save.

First pick an Art style: Anime (stylised illustration) or Realistic (photorealistic). The choice sets which image model the AI's prompts are sent to, so pick the one that fits your world's tone before you generate anything.

Right under that you'll find an Image guidance textarea. Anything you put there is a short hint to the AI about what to illustrate and how. It shapes both sides of the decision: which turns the AI chooses to illustrate and what booru tags it ends up writing. Keep it to one phrase (100 characters max). Useful examples:

  • ghibli-inspired watercolor
  • dark fantasy oil painting
  • cyberpunk neon, focus on characters
  • only illustrate combat and reveals

Leave the field empty if you want the AI to pick its own rhythm and style.

Two more things to know:

  • The AI decides when to illustrate. You cannot force an image on a specific turn today. Writing style that emphasizes visual moments (scene transitions, dramatic reveals, iconic character beats) tends to produce more images.
  • Existing journeys on your world won't suddenly start generating images after you flip the flag. Each journey locks in the world's settings at creation time, so only new journeys will pick up the change.