Artificial Intelligence in games

[Konjad]

Most games have extremely basic AI. In RPGs as well as other games NPCs or enemies just stand in place to talk to a player or attack him in the most direct way the moment they ‘see’ the player.

AI is extremely underdeveloped in games. In my opinions for three major reasons.
1. It’s not ‘worth it’ for advertisements since you cannot show the AI before a game’s release: Screenshots are static, trailers are short and focus on action. Therefore you cannot build hype based on AI at all.
2. Players don’t care about AI. People often discuss graphics, stories, atmosphere or quests, but I find it extremely rare that an AI is discussed. Players are engaged in a game due to fluid or challenging combat, fascinating stories or atmosphere i.e. of a horror. AI? It doesn’t happen.
3. Money. I have no idea, but I guess developing AI is much more complex than most other game features. It would need lots of work, and therefore investment. Gaming companies usually don’t pay well in comparison to IT, but require similar skills. Somebody who could develop a good AI will likely move to an IT company that pays much better.

In consequence there were few attempts to develop a decent AI in games. By ‘decent AI’ I mean an AI that attempts to adapt to the situation in some ways. This is not case in i.e. Gothic with its NPCs walking around and having a day-cycle of work -> eat -> rest -> sleep. It’s a great feature, but it’s just scripts that run in a loop every game day.


‘Decent AI’ would be one that adapts to the situation or even caused either by the player or another trigger.
Here are the few attempts at developing AI I can think of:
1. F.E.A.R.
2. ArmA series
3. Stalker series
4. Oblivion


F.E.A.R. had the best combat AI for close quarters. Enemies attempted to attack in groups, constantly move so you can never be certain where they are if you don’t see/hear them, react to downed enemies (don’t go to the place an ally just got shot like happens in 99% of shooters), try to quickly overrun you so you don’t have plenty of time to reload, try not to come out twice from the same corner, and probably more I can’t remember. It’s important to note the following games in the series ditched the AI because consoles wouldn’t be able to support it, so there are dumbed down versions of it that are not as smart. I will mention also that due to nature of the game (basically railroaded shooter) there aren't really situations where AI (group) interacts with anything but the player.


ArmA series is a bit difficult to describe due to complexity of all in-game systems, but the AI can simulate combat, even large scale one (although the more units there are the dumber AI gets due to CPU thread limitation), they change position and once alerted stay on high alert for quite a while. AI shoots through walls in general direction where the enemy might be. In ArmA 3 AI can call reinforcements through radio, so attacking a checkpoint can result in AI calling reinforcements from nearby bases or i.e. a helicopter from a viccinity. This works both against the player as well as other AI. Of course it’s all vanilla, if we include mods then AI can get even better. That said, it was clearly never developed to handle close quarters very well, and in that aspect it falls short in comparison, although is still way above vast majority of shooters. AI can also manage driving or flying vehicles quite well, adapting to the surroundings. The only major drawback I ever felt with is that it doesn’t use grenades often, but I’m nitpicking. ArmA 3 is probably the peak of this AI, as ArmA Reforger abandoned it altogether having very simple AI that currently is neither able to flank nor drive vehicles. It will surely be improved in ArmA 4, but I suspect it will take a long time before it’s on the level of ArmA 3… if ever in the series.


S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl (originally titled Oblivion Lost) made a big deal about its AI before release and it turned out to be… better than in most games. It is certainly not on the level of ArmA 3 or the first F.E.A.R., but it has its own strengths. Flanking is known since at least the first Far Cry, but STALKER seems to have enemies being able to sneak on the player. Human enemies can handle combat alright both close quarters and from afar, although they don’t seem to be able to work in teams, unfortunately – although they attack together I don’t think there’s any communication between them. Animals have their own AI, hunting other animals (also seen in Gothic 3), and actually pulling out forming and attacking in packs. It is important to note that the developer who worked on the AI in the STALKER series, Volodymyr Yezhov, died fighting in Bakhmut at the end of 2022. How it affects STALKER 2 is to be seen yet.


Finally, the last on this list is TES IV: Oblivion. Unlike previous mentions it lacked any decent AI for combat as well as fauna, but it attempted to create randomized dialogues between characters and to have some kind of AI awareness of what it sees (hence bucket on the head), as well as having the typical scripted actions, but with AI left to determine itself how to achieve it. It’s more advanced than simple scripts in Gothic. Unfortunately the systems seemed to be very basic at the time leaving to mostly hilarious results. Overall, it felt to me personally as an early version of an AI that wasn’t finished on time. I didn’t play Skyrim much, but from what I’ve seen it seemed to me that Bethesda mostly abandoned the idea. Instead of developing the Radiant AI further, Skyrim focuses on simple scripts and prepared dialogues more to avoid the random aspect and make the experience more “cinematic” and repetitive. This certainly saves some development time.


Well, that's just my random thoughts about it, I'd be interested in hearing your opinions and especially about other examples of attempts at creating a decent AI in games that isn't there just to interact with the player and that's it.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

The bit with Oblivion is that AI had to be dumbed down because NPCs would follow their own schedules, their own actions and take their own decisions, which led to them messing things up for the players' intended route and making progress impossible. I think I remember them saying that NPCs would kill other NPCs, including quest relevant NPCs, which probably explains why some are tagged as essential and therefore won't die.
It's nowhere near the worst example of AI being dumbed down in games, though. It has to be done, because otherwise games would be impossible to complete.

Simulating a working world is hard. I always think about Ultima Online's ecosystem when this comes up. The designers had simulated a whole chain where dragons, wolves and sheep would exist. The feeding chain included these animals and their presence or absence would represent an encounter for the player: in an area with few sheeps, the player would encounter wolves looking for them too. In an area with few wolves, the player would meet dragons. The issue here is that dynamism is completely unpredictable. The designers expected the ecosystem to survive and function throughout the entire game and emulate real nature, because they were always testing things as intended, but then players destroyed this carefully crafted system in like half an hour.

 

[NecroLord]

Most games have extremely basic AI. In RPGs as well as other games NPCs or enemies just stand in place to talk to a player or attack him in the most direct way the moment they ‘see’ the player.

AI is extremely underdeveloped in games. In my opinions for three major reasons.
1. It’s not ‘worth it’ for advertisements since you cannot show the AI before a game’s release: Screenshots are static, trailers are short and focus on action. Therefore you cannot build hype based on AI at all.
2. Players don’t care about AI. People often discuss graphics, stories, atmosphere or quests, but I find it extremely rare that an AI is discussed. Players are engaged in a game due to fluid or challenging combat, fascinating stories or atmosphere i.e. of a horror. AI? It doesn’t happen.
3. Money. I have no idea, but I guess developing AI is much more complex than most other game features. It would need lots of work, and therefore investment. Gaming companies usually don’t pay well in comparison to IT, but require similar skills. Somebody who could develop a good AI will likely move to an IT company that pays much better.

In consequence there were few attempts to develop a decent AI in games. By ‘decent AI’ I mean an AI that attempts to adapt to the situation in some ways. This is not case in i.e. Gothic with its NPCs walking around and having a day-cycle of work -> eat -> rest -> sleep. It’s a great feature, but it’s just scripts that run in a loop every game day.


‘Decent AI’ would be one that adapts to the situation or even caused either by the player or another trigger.
Here are the few attempts at developing AI I can think of:
1. F.E.A.R.
2. ArmA series
3. Stalker series
4. Oblivion


F.E.A.R. had the best combat AI for close quarters. Enemies attempted to attack in groups, constantly move so you can never be certain where they are if you don’t see/hear them, react to downed enemies (don’t go to the place an ally just got shot like happens in 99% of shooters), try to quickly overrun you so you don’t have plenty of time to reload, try not to come out twice from the same corner, and probably more I can’t remember. It’s important to note the following games in the series ditched the AI because consoles wouldn’t be able to support it, so there are dumbed down versions of it that are not as smart. I will mention also that due to nature of the game (basically railroaded shooter) there aren't really situations where AI (group) interacts with anything but the player.


ArmA series is a bit difficult to describe due to complexity of all in-game systems, but the AI can simulate combat, even large scale one (although the more units there are the dumber AI gets due to CPU thread limitation), they change position and once alerted stay on high alert for quite a while. AI shoots through walls in general direction where the enemy might be. In ArmA 3 AI can call reinforcements through radio, so attacking a checkpoint can result in AI calling reinforcements from nearby bases or i.e. a helicopter from a viccinity. This works both against the player as well as other AI. Of course it’s all vanilla, if we include mods then AI can get even better. That said, it was clearly never developed to handle close quarters very well, and in that aspect it falls short in comparison, although is still way above vast majority of shooters. AI can also manage driving or flying vehicles quite well, adapting to the surroundings. The only major drawback I ever felt with is that it doesn’t use grenades often, but I’m nitpicking. ArmA 3 is probably the peak of this AI, as ArmA Reforger abandoned it altogether having very simple AI that currently is neither able to flank nor drive vehicles. It will surely be improved in ArmA 4, but I suspect it will take a long time before it’s on the level of ArmA 3… if ever in the series.


S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl (originally titled Oblivion Lost) made a big deal about its AI before release and it turned out to be… better than in most games. It is certainly not on the level of ArmA 3 or the first F.E.A.R., but it has its own strengths. Flanking is known since at least the first Far Cry, but STALKER seems to have enemies being able to sneak on the player. Human enemies can handle combat alright both close quarters and from afar, although they don’t seem to be able to work in teams, unfortunately – although they attack together I don’t think there’s any communication between them. Animals have their own AI, hunting other animals (also seen in Gothic 3), and actually pulling out forming and attacking in packs. It is important to note that the developer who worked on the AI in the STALKER series, Volodymyr Yezhov, died fighting in Bakhmut at the end of 2022. How it affects STALKER 2 is to be seen yet.


Finally, the last on this list is TES IV: Oblivion. Unlike previous mentions it lacked any decent AI for combat as well as fauna, but it attempted to create randomized dialogues between characters and to have some kind of AI awareness of what it sees (hence bucket on the head), as well as having the typical scripted actions, but with AI left to determine itself how to achieve it. It’s more advanced than simple scripts in Gothic. Unfortunately the systems seemed to be very basic at the time leaving to mostly hilarious results. Overall, it felt to me personally as an early version of an AI that wasn’t finished on time. I didn’t play Skyrim much, but from what I’ve seen it seemed to me that Bethesda mostly abandoned the idea. Instead of developing the Radiant AI further, Skyrim focuses on simple scripts and prepared dialogues more to avoid the random aspect and make the experience more “cinematic” and repetitive. This certainly saves some development time.


Well, that's just my random thoughts about it, I'd be interested in hearing your opinions and especially about other examples of attempts at creating a decent AI in games that isn't there just to interact with the player and that's it.

Unreal and Unreal Tournament also showed a lot more focus on enemy AI than the usual game.
In UT99, you can see enemies piston jumping to get access to powerups, retreat when low on health in order to find health boosts and switch weapons depending on the situation.
F.E.A.R is another game in which enemies are not your typical dumb goons just standing still and shooting.
They will try to flank you, throw grenades in order to flush you out if you are camping, stuff like that.

 

[Lokiamis]

Rumor has it that the Combine soldiers in Half-Life 2 have pretty good AI, but they die too quickly to ever properly show it off. Similarly, cops in GTA V will allegedly drag their wounded friends to cover, but I didn't see this even one time when I played the campaign.
The guards in the newer Assassin's Creed games will actually take bodies they discover to a designated area when they're not actively hunting you, instead of just leaving them to rot like most games.
Typically in Rimworld the giant insects will just kill your colonists on the spot then ignore them. I used a neat mod that overhauled their behavior, allowing them to actually hunt your guys and drag them back to their lairs where they would slowly convert them into a jelly substance for food, giving you a chance to rescue them.

Half-Life 1 has a weirdly in depth sense of smell system for the AI

 

[flyingjohn]

It’s not ‘worth it’ for advertisements since you cannot show the AI before a game’s release: Screenshots are static, trailers are short and focus on action. Therefore you cannot build hype based on AI at all.

Irrelevant. You also don't market that most doors door hinges have a unique creak and yet money is wasted on it.
Plus, in modern e-sports obsessed times, having good ai can be used as a marketing ploy.

Players don’t care about AI

The ones that don't are going to buy the game anyway yet the ones do will not so you lost somebody there. Even the most causal of civ players complain about ai.

Money. I have no idea, but I guess developing AI is much more complex than most other game features

Making AI is the most cost effective part of game development. You are dealing with one-two people at best.
The modern interpretation of "server farms" learning to play the game to create good AI is a meme that will neve happen and will actually produce worse results then one guy who can play the game good.

There are two reasons AI sucks in modern games:
-People making AI are not good players so they have no idea how to make competent AI.
FEAR/Arma devs knew their game inside and out.

-Modern designers do not know how to program. In the old days designers made the AI. This meant that the people making the Ai knew the damn rules and knew what future changes they wanted.
Now everything is broken into a hundred small pieces, so the AI guy has no idea what the designer is thinking and has to implement features in a small timeframe because things change quickly.

Company of heroes 3 random bugs with tanks clipping is directly tied to this. The pathfinding was never intended to have to navigate all the extra shit they added. So clipping through stuff become a easy solution.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

Wasn't there a big buzz about the AI of the Mercs in the first Far cry game as well? I remember reviewers praising it.

 

[Konjad]

Wasn't there a big buzz about the AI of the Mercs in the first Far cry game as well? I remember reviewers praising it.

I remember they flanked, but I can barely remember anything else about the game except cool open world which was something still fairly new at the time. Did they do anything to actually adapt to anything except attempting to flank the player in every firefight?

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

The bit with Oblivion is that AI had to be dumbed down because NPCs would follow their own schedules

sure. exactly same vibes as "simcity must be always-online because the game is so complex your computer is not enough to make all the calculations". just one word: bullshit.

 

[PapaPetro]

As long as they don't cheat (or feel like they are cheating).
Kinda the ethical turning test for opponent AI.

The goal of AI in games should be Verisimilitude: the AI should make the game more authentic and immersive. When it "cheats", it takes you out of the game (and it can always cheat since it has access to the game's memory and you don't e.g. innate aim botting or wallhacking). The bots can kill you at any time and have be programmed to pretend to miss you to make it look authentic (and give you a chance to kill them and have fun).
It's like Westworld without the malfunctioning part where the robots don't miss and kill you.

 

[Konjad]

The bit with Oblivion is that AI had to be dumbed down because NPCs would follow their own schedules, their own actions and take their own decisions, which led to them messing things up for the players' intended route and making progress impossible. I think I remember them saying that NPCs would kill other NPCs, including quest relevant NPCs, which probably explains why some are tagged as essential and therefore won't die.

I've played Oblivion a lot right after the release, so an unpatched 1.0 version, and I've never encountered such issue with the AI. If it indeed happened then it must have been rare, unless I was extremely lucky, but I haven't seen complaints about it anywhere.

 

[Sjukob]

Advanced AI is not necessary for the game to be good. I would even say that simple AI is underappreciated and it seems like people don't think about the positive effects it has. For example, you woldn't be able to have such great slaughter gameplay as in Doom, if AI was complex.

And if you actually care to implement it, you risk to enter a neverending spiral of complexity. Let's say you want to program AI to avoid various hazards, like fire, for example. So if AI detects some burning objects it will try to walk around them, pretty simple, right? But what if somebody is purposefuly throwing fire under it's feet? Should it recognize it as a hostile action, should it flee, fight, or just keep silently avoiding hazards? What if AI absolutely must get to a certain point and walking through fire is required to get there? What if it is completely surrounded by fire and can't get anywhere without burning itself? Should it attempt to escape and where, or should it just stay in one place and wait for fire to go away? How can it decide which path is better, how can it detect if fire is going to go away at all? May be it's a permanent type of hazard, you know.

You can keep coming up with various situations endlessly. My guess is that advanced AI will not be common, unless it's process of decision making can be largely automated somehow. You can see that neural networks are on the rise nowadays, so may be that will be the solution.

 

[Lemming42]

They toned down Radiant AI in Oblivion because the NPCs were doing odd unexpected things - I think there was a famous example where hunters would kill a deer, one would take the meat from the deer's corpse, and then the rest of the hunters would attack him, identifying him as a deer because he had deer meat in his inventory.

That's not to say that the unchained version of Radiant AI would have been impressive - if anything, it'd just be more fucky than the version included in the released game - but it was a pretty cool idea for NPCs to have dynamic shedules, especially if you're a thief character who wants to learn when people will be out of their houses and such (not that it matters since there's no actual consequences for breaking into people's houses other than being told to leave).

 

[Vic]

I find AI creepy. Combat encounters should be on “animal” level where the behavior is obvious and logical, so I’m fine with current combat “AI” in games. A simple if/then clause with a set of abilities. Anything more is weird and creepy.

For more complex interactions I want to play against humans.

Given how easy and fun it is to play online I honestly don’t see the need to create creepy simulations of human behavior.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

The bit with Oblivion is that AI had to be dumbed down because NPCs would follow their own schedules, their own actions and take their own decisions, which led to them messing things up for the players' intended route and making progress impossible. I think I remember them saying that NPCs would kill other NPCs, including quest relevant NPCs, which probably explains why some are tagged as essential and therefore won't die.

I've played Oblivion a lot right after the release, so an unpatched 1.0 version, and I've never encountered such issue with the AI. If it indeed happened then it must have been rare, unless I was extremely lucky, but I haven't seen complaints about it anywhere.

It happened during development. It's part of the differences between what was shown and promised and what was delivered. Console limitations also played a role in this.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

I finished F.E.A.R two time and i never felt like the AI was any different than in others FPS, the game was just corridor after corridor where you face the same squad of units over and over again and it was very easy, in my second run i did not use the slow motion ability and playing on the hardest difficulty and still very easy and samey. Whatever complex shit the AI was doing it did not impact my experience with the game, it's a mediocre FPS imo.

But if you like F.E.A.R you might like No One Lives Forever 1 and 2, it was made by the same developers and it's supposed to have a complex AI as well, maybe a prototype of F.E.A.R AI:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_O... artificial intelligence,helicopters.[31][34]

 

[DJOGamer PT]

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FEAR's AI complexity just the product of the devs planning for most actions that the player might make in a given area?
Isn't it even why the game is mostly set in linear tight spaces - to make it easier for the devs to account for player's strategies?

 

[DJOGamer PT]

Advanced AI is not necessary for the game to be good.

Depends on the game.™

Sure in simple action games, devs can get away with primitive AI because there's no need for anything more advanced than - enemy A has X task and performs Y action when player executes Z input

But more sandbox experiences require more complex and dynamic AI to simply deal with fact these "actors" are set in complex and dynamic enviroments - then on top of that there's the design demands of whatever type of gameplay experience

 

[Hammer Of The Heretics]

We don't want the AI to be smart. We want the AI to make us feel smart when we beat it. It's a balancing act. Too stupid and we get no sense of accomplishment in victory; too smart and we get no victory at all.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

The radiant AI was the best thing about Oblivion:



this is incline, might look cringe but in what other game you have a non scripted bar fight?

In open world games, it's good to have an AI that react and interact with things in a way that was not planned to, take Gothic vs Morrowind as a example, i might be wrong about this because i played them long time ago but i think in Gothic i could lure strong monsters and have the guards/civilians kill them, or they would die and them i would finish the monsters with low HP and loot the dead guards. In Morrowind the guards ignore the monsters and just stand there doing nothing, but i might be wrong. I think in Gothic human enemies would climb stuff too when chasing you, but i don't remember correctly if it's Gothic or other game that enemies do that. These random interactions with the AI makes the game more dynamic and fun.

I think there are two kinds of open world RPG, the party based isometric one and the one person third or first person one, AI of NPCs in the former really does not matter much, i never thought Baldur's Gate or Fallout 1 and 2 needs complex AI or interactions, the NPCs there are just quest givers that stand there doing nothing. Then there's the Elder Scrolls, Gothic, Fallout 3/NV/ ones where random interactions with the NPCs enhances the games, that's why i think these games are kinda of an immersive sim. I would put Morrowind in the former(NPCs are dead quest givers) and Ultima in the latter.

Good stealth games usually have good AI, since the entire genre is designed around the AI, if you fuck up the AI in a stealth game you fuck up the game. Of this genre i've played Thief and Metal Gear, they have good AI, the enemies react to a lot of things and you could manipulate them in a lot of ways and it does not feel like bullshit when they spot you. I don't remember if Deus Ex had good or bad AI.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

We don't want the AI to be smart. We want the AI to make us feel smart when we beat it. It's a balancing act. Too stupid and we get no sense of accomplishment in victory; too smart and we get no victory at all.

I don't know why you equal smart AI with difficulty, like i said FEAR has good AI but the game is easy, smart AI could mean knowing how to use all the mechanics in a strategy game and with effeciency depending on the difficulty, how to navigate in a map/level, to react to random interactions and situations(like the Oblivion NPCs killing each other), to switch task priorities in certain situations(the Imps in Dungeon Keeper) etc..

Good AI does not automatically mean playing the game optimally or in inhumanely way so it becomes impossible for the player to stand a chance. There's a huge difference between the bots in Counter Strike knowing how to navigate in the level and rescue hostages/plant bomb, to insta headshotting the player. There's a difference to an functionally RTS AI that knows how to use ships to transport units on water, to a AI that plays like a pro Starcraft player. There's a difference between 4X AI where diplomacy works, to a 4X AI where they take the same strategy of warmongering cause it's effective. In FEAR the AI might flank you, retreat, take cover etc.. but they do not have 100% precision aim with insta reaction time, so there's a huge difference there.

You want to know a game with shit AI but super difficult? the first Hidden and Dangerous game, the enemies would insta shot and kill you if you appear in their line of sight, even on easy difficulty, almost 0ms reaction time, but the enemies are almost static and just stand there after finishing their scripted movement, so the enemy AI is non existent in this game.

 

[Konjad]

The bit with Oblivion is that AI had to be dumbed down because NPCs would follow their own schedules, their own actions and take their own decisions, which led to them messing things up for the players' intended route and making progress impossible. I think I remember them saying that NPCs would kill other NPCs, including quest relevant NPCs, which probably explains why some are tagged as essential and therefore won't die.

I've played Oblivion a lot right after the release, so an unpatched 1.0 version, and I've never encountered such issue with the AI. If it indeed happened then it must have been rare, unless I was extremely lucky, but I haven't seen complaints about it anywhere.

It happened during development. It's part of the differences between what was shown and promised and what was delivered. Console limitations also played a role in this.

But they fixed these things, didn't they? Oblivion's Radiant AI was sometimes hilarious, but did not have major flaws, definitely was not breaking the game. It should've been a base to build upon, but instead got removed and we get banal scripts in Skyrim. Imagine if Bethesda actually improved it a bit for Skyrim and then continued to work at it for further games. Eventually it could be something unique and their games would be interesting for that aspect alone despite otherwise being boring. It would probably be better than stalker's a-life, especially since bethesda has a lot of money.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

But they fixed these things, didn't they? Oblivion's Radiant AI was sometimes hilarious, but did not have major flaws, definitely was not breaking the game. It should've been a base to build upon, but instead got removed and we get banal scripts in Skyrim. Imagine if Bethesda actually improved it a bit for Skyrim and then continued to work at it for further games. Eventually it could be something unique and their games would be interesting for that aspect alone despite otherwise being boring. It would probably be better than stalker's a-life, especially since bethesda has a lot of money.

He said that Oblivion NPCs would kill important NPCs making the game impossible to complete, there a lot of bandaids for that: adding a exception so NPCs would not target main quest NPCs, making NPCs fights about knocking out instead of straight up killing it(sorta like Gothic), making main quest NPCs immortal(Skyrim did) or give a warning that the game is impossible to complete now after an important NPC died(Morrowind).

Those are some of the possible bandaids but the real and good solution would be to design a main quest that does not need any NPCs alive to be completed. In Morrowind the main quest should be to kill Dagoth Ur and that is, is up to you to make your own path to reach that goal, you should not need any NPCs to be alive in order to progress, if a NPC hold a important item for a door or some shit, but died randomly to something(because AI), you loot his corpse and that is(or could be multiple ways to get around that door). This is the best solution and could open possibilities for emergent ways to complete the game.

I think in Fallout 1 you could complete the game regardless if any NPC is alive or not, but i could be wrong. Talking about open world RPGs, why should the game world be so open but your path through it so linear? scripted linear quests(main or not) are the cancer of open world RPGs(and RPGs in general).

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

Dumbing down AI is something that has to happen in order to make the game beatable. You have to keep some weaknesses that the player can exploit. Otherwise you'd never be able to beat any game, ever.

But they fixed these things, didn't they? Oblivion's Radiant AI was sometimes hilarious, but did not have major flaws, definitely was not breaking the game. It should've been a base to build upon, but instead got removed and we get banal scripts in Skyrim. Imagine if Bethesda actually improved it a bit for Skyrim and then continued to work at it for further games. Eventually it could be something unique and their games would be interesting for that aspect alone despite otherwise being boring. It would probably be better than stalker's a-life, especially since bethesda has a lot of money.

He said that Oblivion NPCs would kill important NPCs making the game impossible to complete, there a lot of bandaids for that: adding a exception so NPCs would not target main quest NPCs, making NPCs fights about knocking out instead of straight up killing it(sorta like Gothic), making main quest NPCs immortal(Skyrim did) or give a warning that the game is impossible to complete now after an important NPC died(Morrowind).

Those are some of the possible bandaids but the real and good solution would be to design a main quest that does not need any NPCs alive to be completed. In Morrowind the main quest should be to kill Dagoth Ur and that is, is up to you to make your own path to reach that goal, you should not need any NPCs to be alive in order to progress, if a NPC hold a important item for a door or some shit, but died randomly to something(because AI), you loot his corpse and that is(or could be multiple ways to get around that door). This is the best solution and could open possibilities for emergent ways to complete the game.

I think in Fallout 1 you could complete the game regardless if any NPC is alive or not, but i could be wrong. Talking about open world RPGs, why should the game world be so open but your path through it so linear? scripted linear quests(main or not) are the cancer of open world RPGs(and RPGs in general).

In Fallout, killing or sparing NPCs trigger different endings. However Tandi has to live because she'll grow up to be the founder of the NCR. That's a canon path. You can have her die and the game will show you an ending for that. Still, in many occassions FO's endings are triggered by binary resolutions to events in every location you visit.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

Dumbing down AI is something that has to happen in order to make the game beatable. You have to keep some weaknesses that the player can exploit. Otherwise you'd never be able to beat any game, ever.

Not necessarily as i said already. AI is designed in multiple parts, in FPS games for example, there is a script for pathfiding, for precision, for reaction time, in some: for flanking and taking cover. In Counter Strike the bot AI precision works based on the distance you are from them: in the hardest difficulty if you are 1 meter from the enemy bots, i think they have like 90% precision, if you're 16 meters it decreases to 50% or something like that, their reaction time depends on the difficulty level as well. All parts in the script matters(pathfiding, rescuing hostages, opening doors, allies responding to your commands) but the only part in the script that is going to increase the difficulty drastically is the bot precision and reaction time, the others parts to make them more functional and fun to play against. I think you can change it and put 100% precision and 0ms reaction time, if you do the bot will insta headshot if you appear in their line of sight(like what happens in Hidden and Dangerous), that does not make them smart though, but inhumanely good.

For me a good AI is not necessarily a difficult one(though it should give at least a reasonable challenge). But one that does not feel robotic, repetitive, artificial or incomplete(many AI's in strategy games don't know how to do certain basic stuff), imo the bots precision and reaction time in Counter Strike are not done well, in the hardest dificulty if you are near them, they're too good in killing you and if you are far from them it's a lot easier for you. Here some ideas: It should have a random element instead, think about it, the best players could insta head shot you but could not do it consistently 99% of the time, the difference between an AI and a human is that an AI is consistent(if you program that way). Instead the bots precision should vary from 70% to 90% if you're near them, based on random chance and other factors. In the game some bots prefer certain weapons, i know this cause i always remember a bot named Zed with a sniper type rifle, so my idea is if a bot is using his type of weapon, his precision should increase, if not it should decrease. His precision should vary depending if he saw you first or if you did, and if he spotted you recently his precision and reaction time should increase a bit if you appear again, and if its been for a while since he spotted an enemy his reaction time should decrease. These are some ideas to make it feel less artificial.

Anyway, here's the actual Counter Strike bot script, taken from botprofile.db:

Spoiler

Default
Skill = 50
Aggression = 50
ReactionTime = 0.3
AttackDelay = 0
Teamwork = 75
Cost = 0
Difficulty = NORMAL
VoicePitch = 100
Skin = 0
End

This is for normal difficulty, i don't know what AttackDelay is, Teamwork i assume it's how often they follow your commands(each named bot have their own individual teamwork value as well), Skill should be the precision(i know it's based on distance cause it is very noticiable in gameplay), notice that ReactionTime is fixed at 0,3 milliseconds. The voicepitch increases the harder the difficulty, probably because each named bot only appear in certain difficulty levels. I assume Agression is how often they leave the starting base, but staying at base only makes sense for Counter Terrorists in bomb missions, and Terrorists in rescue missions, so it could also be how often they chase enemies they've spotted as well.

Also:

Spoiler

End

Expert+Sniper Zed
Cost = 5
VoicePitch = 105
End

I knew this motherfucker always use snipers.

This is all well done imo, even if not perfect like i said. I had a lot of fun playing against bots in CS 1.6 and it's fan made i think(like the game itself lol).

Talking about robotic AI, in the first Heroes of Might and Magic game if you leave your castle undefended for a turn, all the AI players would immediately rush to your castle, even if your units are close, that's make easy to bait them and it's not much fun, feels robotic and repetitive. Later games in the series improved this. Strategy games started adding AI personalities/strategies as well, like in Age of Mythology there are agressive and defensive personality, and they do exactly that, the agressive AI rush while the defensive AI builds walls and focus on the economy. This all good. Of course the agressive AI is harder to play against, but having variation is fun.

Not all games need that of course, in a platformer is mostly preferable to have a predictable and simple AI, if Mario enemies did random moves the game would be chaotic, it would be less about memorization and more about improvisation and luck. Most games are in between 2 design philosophies, challenge based on map/level design with handmade encounters and challenge based on AI on more loose maps, take a game like Fire Emblem from SNES era, the AI is predictable but the challenge comes frome the handmade map/level design, you could watch a walkthrough of someone playing it and replicate 100% of it, not really since there are random elements like crit chance/dodge but the AI would react the same way. In certain games you could not do that, cause of random elements whithin the AI, i know that cause there a lot of cases i got stuck in a strategy game level, tried to replicate a walkthrough and it did not work cause the AI reacted differently.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Artificial intelligence was always a myth.

The focus should have always been on clever scripting and trying to "fool" the player into thinking the AI was smart instead of trying to make the AI actually smart and end up with janky radiant shit, which is always terrible.

 

[Caim]

I find AI creepy. Combat encounters should be on “animal” level where the behavior is obvious and logical, so I’m fine with current combat “AI” in games. A simple if/then clause with a set of abilities. Anything more is weird and creepy.

For more complex interactions I want to play against humans.

Given how easy and fun it is to play online I honestly don’t see the need to create creepy simulations of human behavior.

So when does this cross from animal into creepy? When they start doing things that you can do? When they successfully manage to encircle and pin you? Or when they bunnyhop towards you shoot you, call your mom names and teabag you?

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FEAR's AI complexity just the product of the devs planning for most actions that the player might make in a given area?
Isn't it even why the game is mostly set in linear tight spaces - to make it easier for the devs to account for player's strategies?

How I understand it is that the FEAR AI is larger, not smarter. It still works on IF-THEN logic, but there's a lot more to do and things it can interact with. There's also a lot of voice lines that change depending on the environment so there's a few dozen lines that all go HE'S BEHIND THE (insert object here), which makes them appear smarter than they actually are.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

Artificial intelligence was always a myth.

The focus should have always been on clever scripting and trying to "fool" the player into thinking the AI was smart instead of trying to make the AI actually smart and end up with janky radiant shit, which is always terrible.

A smart AI would require contant updating delivered by human interaction and a dynamic feed of information.
There is a catch though: there are people out there who are smarter than you. If you want to apply this model, you have to be ready to face that fact.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FEAR's AI complexity just the product of the devs planning for most actions that the player might make in a given area?
Isn't it even why the game is mostly set in linear tight spaces - to make it easier for the devs to account for player's strategies?

How I understand it is that the FEAR AI is larger, not smarter. It still works on IF-THEN logic, but there's a lot more to do and things it can interact with. There's also a lot of voice lines that change depending on the environment so there's a few dozen lines that all go HE'S BEHIND THE (insert object here), which makes them appear smarter than they actually are.

yeah, so essentially FEAR's AI is not like that of games like Chaos Theory or MGS3/5 where they're "dynamic"
i.e. - in CT or MGS5 you could design 100 different maps, drop the npcs and they would automatically figure out how to interact and read that enviroment; while in FEAR you would have to program their behaviour for all those 100 maps, as their AI is far more "specific"