Let's talk AI.
An aspect of gaming that has been there for almost as long as there's been games, Artificial Intelligence fleshes out the world in MMOs, provides training dummies for competitive PvP games, and for many single player games is the entire reason they exist.
Yet, AI in the gaming sense is not AI in the academic sense. Let's get this perfectly clear, because that's a rather important distinction. In games, the Artificial is clearly artificial, and the Intelligence is a misnomer, whereas the academic AI definition seeks to make Artificial Intelligence indistinguishable from regular human intelligence. There's a good reason for that.
Remember, what is the game being made for? One would hope it would be for the enjoyment of its audience. If the only one enjoying themselves are the creator, that's simply a mockery, not a game. Academic AI isn't made for the audience to enjoy themselves, even people can certainly derive that via wonder at the advancement of technology.
Game AI is for the enjoyment of the user however, and as such often means intentionally flawed AI, very often due to being direct competition for the player. A perfect AI in an MMO would realize he has no chance winning against the player character whatsoever, and as such would run away immediately upon spotting a player. This might be fun for awhile, until the AI realizes that the only winning move is not to play, and simply decides not to respawn. Suddenly fun times are over.
Even not going as far as that, an AI with no intentional flaws has an absurd advantage over human players in that there is hardly any reaction time. Gauging a threat and determining a course of action happens over the span of ~16ms, versus a human reacting blindly out of reflex taking ~160ms, ten times slower than the computer. A machine won't mentally tire from stress or fatigue either, making random "dumb" mistakes. So gaming AI will often have artificial limitations set on their artificial intelligence.
It could be said that part of the reason why is so that it'll be more fair. This is a mistake of what the goal is. Rather, the reason why gaming AI will often have artificial limitations is because it is more enjoyable to play against, not because it is fair. Sometimes it's really fun to smack around very dumb AI, as Valve found out when they were making Left 4 Dead and discovered that mowing down hordes of mindless zombie AI was actually really fun, instead of small amounts of tactically placed enemies. Sometimes it's really fun to challenge yourself and play against very unfair AI as it becomes a tightrope of trying to stay alive while discovering the AI's Achilles heel, and you search for the Achilles heel because you know full well it's impossible to win a straight out fight.
Put in other words, AI from an academic standpoint is meant to be like a human, whereas AI from a gaming standpoint is meant to be a puzzle for the player to try and solve.
So don't be worried if your AI isn't perfect. The real question is, is it fun?
Nice post. I appreciate what you are doing here Student in Blue. Some of the most devious game AI I have ever seen is in Heroes of Might and Magic III. Panzer General I, also had really ruthless AI.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
ReplyDeleteSomething I didn't mention that needs to be said about ruthless and devious AI is that it can present a rather steep learning curve for new players.
I can see arguments for why you would want this in your game, and why you would not, most of it along the lines of having the game itself be a knowingly challenging experience from the get-go. For example, the Souls-series, of which you could say that Sekiro is the latest.
Yeah, absolutely, in HoMM3, the best AI, isn't on, depending on the difficulty setting. PG, has weather and supply, toggled off to start, I believe, which makes it a lot easier to learn. I haven't played the Souls games, but just looking at some reviews on yt, seems like an awesome game, especially that death mechanic losing the souls. The current game my friends and I play a lot of is Conan Exiles, was much harder and more rewarding, when it was in early release. They nerfed it too far, so there definitely is a balance.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately I haven't played any of those games. I've watched a review of HoMM3 however, and it looked like one of those games which are one of those labors of love. Those kinds are always gems.
Deleteto be fair, the hardest challenge in designing the AI for some shooters is not making them hit... That's easy, nor is it making them miss... easy also.
ReplyDeleteIt's making them miss REALISTICALLY.