Comments on: A.I. – no wait, just I.

By: KobukSohn

KobukSohn — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 23:42:27 +0000

A challenge is always good and all, but no one wants to play against Kasparov-level AI. Challenge is only needed to keep a player motivated. Video games are more about fun and social interaction if you’re playing online games, so it does indeed get a bit annoying to hear all these guys whine and moan about a game not being hard enough. Bad AI is one thing, but if you’ve mastered the gameplay and can easily beat the game on the highest difficulty with little effort, guess what? BUY ANOTHER GAME!
No point in complaining about a game that you’ve voluntarily exhausted.

By: Adam Creighton

Adam Creighton — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 00:45:06 +0000

OK, two things:

First: On the “kids in China” thing, in all seriousness, when I was working with online wallet technology in the late 1990s, we almost partnered with a now-defunct search engine company. While giving us a tour of their offices, they took us into a massive open space, crowded wall-to-wall with Indian programmers. They were taking search engine requests from users, doing searches across other search engines and forums, and spitting results back to the requesting user. No joke. They’re out of business now …

Second thing: I’m curious how the “ground-breaking AI technology for use in next-generation massively multiplayer online games” from places like Online Alchemy (http://www.onlinealchemy.com/) will pan out. I’ve also wondered that if there are “Physics Engines” (a la Havok) and the like, why there aren’t “AI engines”? Seems like it would be pretty useful, say, if Will Wright or Peter Molyneux could abstract, package, and license “Spore” or “Black and White” AI for repurposing in other titles. Nice little revenue stream, too.

By: Templar895

Templar895 — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 06:11:20 +0000

Actually, when I was about wee-high, I always day-dreamed about something like that, itd be hella tight to be fighting a horde of zombies controlled by some dude somewhere else.

By: Benjamin Strozykowski

Benjamin Strozykowski — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 15:34:44 +0000

Darn, can’t edit my post. I had another idea. With the general acceptance of graphics cards, sound cards and the rising of physics cards, could AI be left alone to the CPU? I know there are more things the CPU would be doing during the game, but maybe these advances in the other areas could lead to some real innovation in the area of AI. Or, we could just have an AI card…

By: Benjamin Strozykowski

Benjamin Strozykowski — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 15:32:11 +0000

Kind of a scary thought. But would it be cheaper to pay an AI programmer $100,000/yr for a year or so to complete some new AI, or pay 1000s of Chinese kids for the rest of their life to be the AI in a game? Ah, I guess it wouldn’t matter much, EA would still be making a boatload of money.

By: eileen

eileen — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 07:26:46 +0000

Smacks of “A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer” by Stephenson. Nice to find your blog by the way, I’ll be reading

By: Michael. B

Michael. B — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 02:22:19 +0000

Very Ender’s Game-esque. I like the idea.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sun, 05 Mar 2006 18:57:55 +0000

The problem isn’t even the effectiveness of the AI, its that the models of gameplay are stuck in the old cherodes of spatial action. One of my goals is to do an AI based platform for interactive drama and whatever complimentary sort of gameplay you’d want to design, a platform capable of taking genetic content and recombining it dynamically. Since challenges would be staged on this AI platform, its concievable that it could also balance constraints to be just as challenging as appropriate. Though I think we should stop thinking of challenge as something the player must overcome, and more of a “reality” we want to represent by having the player negotiate it.

By: Gwen

Gwen — Sat, 04 Mar 2006 15:23:46 +0000

Sounds like youre being kept busy!
I know this is real cheeky and I’m sorry for that but I was wondering how much it would cost if I asked you to design a tattoo for me? and also if you would do it?
I really adore your work and I totally understand if the answer is no. Can’t blame a girl for trying ! I also model for Suicide Girls and plan to submit a photoset based on your Alice, just incase you would be interested to know.

By: Jesse

Jesse — Sat, 04 Mar 2006 12:34:26 +0000

When I was really young I used to sometimes wonder if a real person somewhere far off was controlling the enemies in my video games. I swear I’m not that stupid anymore.