Getting a decent AI system to work is very tough. What are the tricks to make the NPCs seem to have an AI (Artificial AI) (or seem to have a much better AI system than in reality)? One idea I have is that if the level of interaction betwen the player and the AI is reduced, the AI is less tested and its mistakes are less likely to happen and to be observed. Some ways to do this: - physical separation: the beyond the glass scenes from HalfLife - this doesn''t even need to be AI - scripts work fine. This way immersion isn''t damaged by scripted movie sequences when the player looses the control of his character(rendered with the game engine or not). - reduced communication skills of the character: Examples: the player''s character is a dog or a mech robot or anything else that cannot talk. This way his interaction with the humans is limited to very few actions (barking, or doing that follow me act dogs do) - all the AI has to do is "Nice doggie", "Are you trying to tell me something", "Do you want me to follow you", "Go away you stupid dog", but all of these seem perfectly human, exactly like every other action the AI performs (the other actions that the player cannot influence are scripted and faked of course - example: the guards talking in Thief) - gameplay tricks: if the player is punished everytime he uses the features of the AI, he won''t generally play with the AI like a cat with a mouse, hunting down all the flaws. The great example is Thief: most of the time, the player tries to avoid the AI. While playing the Thief II demo I went berserk once and ran around the whole mechanist castle for minutes. Dozens of guards followed me around, and I just loughed at them, ran around and went up the chimney in the kitchen and watched them move haplessly through the kitchen, then went down and made another castle tour. Normally I never do something like this (also, normally the AI kills me when I do, but generally I try not to find out if I can help it).

Good observations. I think physical seperation is especially effective, as it cuts down drastically on the variables an AI needs to deal with.

How about reduced player expectation? If the AI is a different species or culture (Half-Life's aliens, for example) then we don't expect as much as we expect from a human.

And a variation on physical seperation combined with the above might be: Reduced ability / interface. If you don't give the player an attack ability, for example, then your AI don't have to worry about responding to attacks. (No One Lives Forever or Voyager did this during the briefings)

EDIT:
Just thought of another - Deterministic sequences. When you shoot a guard in the head during a training mission in Opposing Force, the game fades to black. In the Wing Commanders, when you attacked an ally, you where arrested when you got back. This help cut down on some of the detail in terms of consequences.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Edited by - Wavinator on August 29, 2001 9:08:08 PM

Just wanted to put in, its not Artificial AI, its just AI. I think the key to making a good NPC is to give it the qualities of a playable charecter, without the input. AI is my favorite part of games, once I learn OGL, then I will be focusing mainly on AI.

Since most gamers are anti social, you need to make the NPC interact with them. Ever played Baldurs Gate? When you get an NPC in your group, its usualy by talking to them. Some people aviod conversation, I do sometimes, anyway, theres one part where this wierd kid comes up to you and start asking you if your annoyed by him, and he follows you around an everything. You dont want that to be for every charecter of the game, but they should approach the main player. Some NPC''s, at least.

"I''''ve sparred with creatures from the nine hells themselves... I barely plan on breaking a sweat here, today."~Drizzt Do''''Urden

quote:
Original post by Wavinator

How about reduced player expectation? If the AI is a different species or culture (Half-Life''s aliens, for example) then we don''t expect as much as we expect from a human.

Good idea! The mindless zombies (both in HalfLife and elseware) also qualify.

LOL, actually, we could explain any bugs in the AI for robotic creatures. Just add in the game some physically separated AI scientists using a language mostly strange to both the player and the character arguing about the possible causes for the flawed behaviour (path-finding failures, blocking in a wall, shooting each other, etc.) of their creations.

thatwasme

Edited by - Diodor on August 30, 2001 10:29:44 PM