Sajt wrote:It's fun to theorize about more realistic and complex AI, but there's probably a reason many games don't include such things.
Deadlines, engineering budget, performance budget (consoles versus average PC versus high end PC), scope, lack of pre-implementation design covering these details, and/or focus on "story" so autonomous NPCs are a liability rather than a tool. Some are aspects of reality, some are reasonable choices, some are fashionable but bad choices, some are aspects of reality distinct to video games as a business rather than an art or passion. Also sometimes the coder just doesn't know how to do it, or the coder's he is working with setup a bad architecture for getting much of anything done.
Sajt wrote:I always hate the heavy-handed approach of games like FEAR, which has somewhat "advanced" AI, but the enemies always tend to announce all their decisions out loud: "Flank him!" or "I see a flashlight!".
The announcement of a flashlight can be explained as just surprise, but things like 'flank him' is more of excitement in the heat of battle. Granted, in FEAR most of the sound clips were used to usher the player into a scenario that was simpler for the AI. "I'm being flanked? Better get on the move" and the player might go into an easier area for the AI to work with. Another example of such a thing is in Call of Duty 4, which had hardcoded regions where if a player idled in them, the game would spawn a live grenade near them to get the player to run out of the region - and into line of sight for the AI.
Urre wrote:What I meant earlier though, was that the guards might not even have thought of you entering the ventilation system, or the floorwell in the above example, so they won't include those waypoints in their searches. Once they've spotted you to do such a thing, they will attempt to figure out where the vents can lead. I'm thinking that they'd have more trouble figuring out where you've gone if you enter a vent, but they'll atleast be on the lookout for vent entrances/exits, and guard those a bit more if possible.
Player modeling. The AI comes in with an expectation of player behavior, "player flexibility is 2" meaning that they will use hallways AND doors. But waypoints through vents, storm drains, etc are flagged with a 4. When the player is seen by the guards, they will evaluate the value of the nearest waypoints to the player, and the highest value will then be attached to the local guards model for the player. The guard if he survives the encounter will then use his radio to update the central commander's player model, which updates all guard's player model - to suspect storm drains and vents. This can then be used by the player in terms of spreading their focus thin, as they now have a wider range of waypoints/portals to cover, the player can count on classic hallways and doors being a little less observed.
For player expectation, each reported player encounter or dead guard found should raise expectation levels. If the player is reported at a location, they have a high expectation of the player being around those waypoints. There is a value tied to this which rots slowly, if they reach those waypoints before the value rots down, intelligent guards may then analyze nearby waypoints above the value of the player model - "Where could he have gone?" "There is a service vent access point in here..." which would result in a short term global issue to investigate waypoints that meet that value. If it leads to nothing, the global issue expires, and the player model remains the same other than elevating general expectation and estimated skill of the player.
frag.machine wrote:For example, dropping a coin in the guard path could (randomly) make him grab it and try to buy something in that vendor machine mentioned while back
This should only apply for guards with a very low expectation, or if they have a higher expectation, particularly low intelligence.
frag.machine wrote:You can make the player being easier to track while using the radio, so the obvious advantage is partially compensated by the guards having a bigger chance to find him. In other words, the player is discouraged to keep the radio on all the time. Using it sparingly can provide enough information without revealing his position.
Simple, radio static, clicking sounds, the sound of chatter. If its on, the player is transmitting these sounds to the local environment, which acts as a point of interest to any nearby guards.
...and all around me was the chaos of battle and the reek of running blood.... and for the first time in my life I knew true happiness.