GoogleTechTalks
Google Tech Talk
August 26, 2010
ABSTRACT
Presented by Soren Johnson.
Artificial intelligence is crucial to any strategy game, providing a compelling opponent for solo play. While many of the challenges of AI development are technical, significant design challenges exist as well. Can the AI behave like a human? Should it? Should the game design be adjusted to accommodate the limitations of the AI? How do we make the AI fun? Should the AI cheat? If so, how much? Do we even want the AI to win? This session suggests some possible answers to these questions using the “Civilization” series as a case study. Ultimately, developers must choose between a “good” AI and a “fun” one, with an understanding of the trade-offs inherent when deciding between the two.
Soren Johnson was the lead designer and AI programmer for Sid Meier’s Civilization IV. After working at Firaxis Games for seven years, Soren joined EA Maxis in 2007 to work on Spore as a lead designer/programmer. He is currently building web-based games with EA2D, such as the moddable strategystation.com and other unannounced projects. He also writes a design column for Game Developer Magazine and is on the GDC Advisory Board. His thoughts on game design can be found at http://www.designer-notes.com.
Download slides to this presentation here: http://www.designer-notes.com/PlayingToLoseGoogle.zip
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Who the hell do those two guys at 4:37 think they are, eatin noodles in the middle of a tech talk.
Good talk – but it's pronounced amph-i-bious, not amph-e-bious.
Acraplast video 1 hour and now this one?! sorry Goog im gone :/
im guessing this guy didnt work on civ 5
I believe they should work on future games sort of like Bethesda does in there elder scrolls games, and that is to specialize in a specific game concept or factor while simply transferring over everything else from it's successors. I personally agree with him. The AI "personalities" should be improved on. (im my opinion it's the most important feature) How would that leader react to this circumstance? This should be the overall goal to AI development in my opinion.
the guy speaking at 53:17 sounds like Microsoft Sam
It's impossible to make AIs that can beat you without cheating (mostly).
For example, in HOMM 6, easy AIs started with about 200% more resources and they had at least quadruple my amount of units.
So… this explains why Gahndi, Shaka, and Xerxes are cheating SOBs in Civilization…
I know…
In other words, we can agree that corporate games (or any other product) will never be perfected and thus we need to do something about the economics to fix this and make it profitable to release fully developed projects.
I realized the blatant cheating in Civ5 on prince mode! PRINCE! I won't ever play another Civ game ever again. What's the point?
Fascinating stuff
Putting a fake 10 turn limit on breaking alliances is a dumb, easy way to approach AIs. I would rather go with a "human trustwortiness" meter, and the AI would share that rating with each other, making it so the AIs would treat your word accordingly to how much value you put to it. If you were at peace since 50 turns it would evaluate the chances are low you will break it, and if you've broken up 3 pacts before it would treat your word like garbage.
Civ V might look pretty, but man they took steps back on AI. In the process of streamlining the experience, they eliminated a lot of the diplomatic modifiers that made the experience rich. Early on they went back to AI ganging up on the human, then, when the fans hated it, they scaled back to the point that only the psychos aren't completely passive.
So much was made that the AI was trying to win, but that is clearly not the case. Worse it's not even playing the same game. Developers need to treat AI as essential and valuable.
Would naval combat be improved by establishing rally points at sea? That way you reduce the pathfinding issues and timing issues. Have a loading rally point, a midway rally point in the ocean so that stragglers can catch up, and a beachhead rally point with some degree of variability for the invasion? Once disembarked, land units would behave as normal.
"Uhm."
This was a very interesting talk, the guy was very open and explained concepts well. Thanks
This is an interesting talk, but the AI has been the worst aspect of the recent Civ games. So it's kind of a talk about how smart people rationalize making poor design decisions in a massive title.
11:15 "Go AI is much much worse than Chess AI"
yeah it was 😀
, you know,
The last great civ designer.
This talk is truly awesome and one of the best talks on game design I've seen. Thanks for posting.