I am not a programmer, I am especially not an AI
programmer. I am a Designer so my job is
to have visions and plant them in others….well sort of. But a game did this to me and I’ve had a hard
time shaking the curiosity of what if even after all these years. I don’t even know if it was a real moment but
it felt like one and that’s what’s important.
The game was Unreal.
The first Unreal. The single
player game. I was running from a Skaarj
which was a predator-type creature and common enemy in the game. I ran into a room and dove under a stairway
to at least give me time to collect myself.
The Skaarj ran into the room and stopped. Crouched under the stairway I was watching
him assuming he would spin around and shoot me using his “knows where the
player is at all times” AI knowledge, but that’s not what happened. Instead he stood there, looking around. Apparently coming to the conclusion that he
had lost me he slowly walked out of the room.
This may not seem like a big thing but this was 1998. Back then AI ran at you and then shot at you,
and not much else. I never saw an
example of this happening again in the game and even replaying it I never had
it repeat. What the heck happened at
that moment? Was it a bug? A happy
glitch? Whatever it was it left an imprint
on me and my approach to AI scripting. 
When I was on the Quake 3 team I spend several weeks at id
Software working as a preliminary production tester at both the beginning and
end of the project often focused on game play rather than bugs. One of the AI programmers there (Mr. Elusive)
and I got into a discussion regarding Sarge’s level. You were in a one on one match with Sarge and
when he was being balanced I said it felt like he was cheating. It felt like he was taking aim on me through
the walls and shooting me the very moment I came around the corner. Mr. Elusive assured me that it wasn’t
happening, that’s not the way the AI works.
I said but it feels that way and he again said that’s not what happens. So I explained, “Whether or not it is
happening doesn’t matter. What I’m
saying is it feels like it is. The
players will feel like it’s cheating.” That
is what AI is all about, feeling correct.
In 2001 I worked on Return to Castle Wolfenstein and strove
to make each AI feel unique, like they were an individual. Through the script I was able to make some
become more aggressive when their health dropped. I made some cower and run for cover when
their captain died. I wanted them to
feel real like had a sense of self-preservation mixed with a personality. I’m not sure it was achieved but again things
were pretty basic back then.
My next opportunity to put a stamp on AI was on Quake 4 but
thing had changed. Game play structures
had become more systemic. While Quake 4
AI was certainly not systemic there was no room for tinkering in the AI
structure. AI was setup to be
predictable. The guys with green armor
always throw grenades, the guys with red armor have more health, etc, etc. The archetypes were different but the
individuals were not. Once Quake 4
shipped I became a little obsessed with a Quake 4 mod I wanted to create called
Grunt Hunt. In Grunt Hunt it was you
against 1 Grunt, but instead of a mindless charging creature he would run from
you, pick up health and ammo drops, he would strive to live rather than be
mindless fodder essentially following the same rules as the player. Seek better weapons, ammo for weapons, and
health. However unlike multiplayer bots
the pace would be slower, with faster death and higher stakes for sudden
moves. I wanted to AI to experience the
world as the player did. The player
doesn’t know a heath pack is in a room until he walks in it, and I wanted the
AI to not know either. A health pack
enters their field of vision, they assess their health and determine if they
need it or not. Their health drops
dangerously low, they change tactics to a more hyper defensive mode, going
cover to cover in search of health over attacking. At least this was my vision. I was quickly told by programmers this couldn’t
be done. They said the processing power
needed to have an AI running around assessing their environment was too great. So that sucked.
On later titles I conceded to simply making the
AI appear smart however since coming to Ubisoft they use a fully systemic
system that designers have little control over. I can't really talk too much about the systems Ubisoft uses but I think there is room for improvement that can rise the average AI about the rank of fodder.
AI has become more of a person pursuit at this point. I have many titles rattling around in my head
with unique AI problem to solve. I would still love a chance to tinker around with AI ideas that go beyond the norm.
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