
Three States and a Plan: The A.I. of F.E.A.R. (2006) [pdf] - danso
http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~jorkin/gdc2006_orkin_jeff_fear.pdf
======
angersock
There are some other helpful reads in the field of games AI:

 _Killzone 's AI: dynamic procedural combat tactics_ (interesting for its use
of tactical analysis): [http://www.cgf-
ai.com/docs/straatman_remco_killzone_ai.pdf](http://www.cgf-
ai.com/docs/straatman_remco_killzone_ai.pdf)

Misc. coverage of the HL1 AI stuff:
[http://aigamedev.com/open/article/halflife-
sdk/](http://aigamedev.com/open/article/halflife-sdk/)
[http://twhl.info/articulator.php?art=29](http://twhl.info/articulator.php?art=29)

 _The Quake 3 Arena Bot_ (interesting for use of fuzzy logic and GA in
training): [http://fd.fabiensanglard.net/quake3/The-Quake-III-Arena-
Bot....](http://fd.fabiensanglard.net/quake3/The-Quake-III-Arena-Bot.pdf)

 _The AI Systems of Left 4 Dead_ (interesting for focus on player state
modeling):
[http://www.valvesoftware.com/publications/2009/ai_systems_of...](http://www.valvesoftware.com/publications/2009/ai_systems_of_l4d_mike_booth.pdf)

 _Steering Behaviors for Autonomous Characters_ :
[http://www.red3d.com/cwr/steer/](http://www.red3d.com/cwr/steer/)

 _Artificial Stupidity: The Art of Intentional Mistakes_ (interesting for how
it helps you train players):
[http://www.liden.cc/lars/WEB/Resume/Papers/2003_AIWisdom.pdf](http://www.liden.cc/lars/WEB/Resume/Papers/2003_AIWisdom.pdf)

------
agapos
F.E.A.R.'s AI is often cited as an example to follow for FPS/TPS games, so
this PDF is going to be an interesting read for many players and enthusiasts.

Also, I cannot but think of the A-Life of the Stalker series, as a similarly
exceptional thing. I wonder if that one also has a PDF about it.

------
theandrewbailey
This reminds me that we should have sufficient power to pull off very
realistic AI in videogames, but the research and implementations are
insufficient.

~~~
dkersten
I don't think its really that much to do with research and implementation and
more about the goals of AI in games. Mostly its the illusion of intelligence
while not actually being intelligent.

I was reading about game AI again just yesterday and an exmaple of this is in
this aigamedev.com article about things you can learn from Halo's AI, they say
that "when you make the AI tougher (e.g. with more health points), the players
believe they are smarter": [http://aigamedev.com/open/review/halo-
ai/](http://aigamedev.com/open/review/halo-ai/)

Game AI is a careful balance between:

    
    
        1. Providing a challenge
        2. Not being too difficult to be frustrating
        3. The *illusion* of intelligence
    

Non of these really have much to do with "AI" as such and certainly don't need
fancy implementations or research.

For shooters, being a good shot and having fast reaction time (ie things that
make a good player) make for frustratingly terrible AI (and is super easy to
implement). What makes a shooter AI feel smart is advanced combat tactics:
teamwork, flanking, tricks to flush their enemy out, whatever. A lot of this
can be implemented as a mix between behaviour trees and pre-scripted events.
But as the Halo guys say, if the enemies don't live long enough for this to be
visible, then it doesn't actually matter.

Having said that, I personally wish games had more of an A-Life simulation
(agapos mentioned Stalker, a game whose AI I quite liked). Combat tactics is
nice and all, but I want the games to feel alive when I'm not fighting the
inhabitants. This, I believe, is where realistic interesting AI comes in.

~~~
theandrewbailey
I was sorta hinting at the last part of your comment. RPGs are filled with AI
characters. I've read some crazy things the AI was doing in some of the Elder
Scrolls games before release, aside from running into walls (someone kills his
neighbor because he needed a rake, neighbor had one; chickens reporting
crimes).

~~~
dkersten
Ah, we are on the same page, then :)

