Not all scenes, games, and visualizations are intended to be ultra-realistic or conform to the current ray-tracing lighting models. AO is a shadowing effect, and a modulation of lighting, so it’s certainly not a solution by itself to replace GI or other lighting methods. It could be utilized for some interesting and unique scenarios, and also fantasy / sci-fi stuff. I imagine it or something similar to it was used in Alien: Isolation, and it’s used in Fortnite (despite that I’m not a fan of the game) which is a stylized graphics game. Who would be arguing that AO is better than GI as though they’re the same type of thing?