Toyota can atest to what happens when a company switches its focus from making the best product possible to making the most money possible.
Animal crossing was actually a pretty fun and highly polished game, anyone remember Mr Resetti?
still the challenge must come from somewhere(something).Yes, that's my point. So is Farmville. But they aren't strategy games. If people aren't interested in making strategy games, and all of the things that come with that (which means either a decent AI, or a game design that makes it interesting to play strategically without a great AI), they should just go make games in one of those other genres that can be very successful and don't require that.
Yes, that's my point. So is Farmville. But they aren't strategy games. If people aren't interested in making strategy games, and all of the things that come with that (which means either a decent AI, or a game design that makes it interesting to play strategically without a great AI), they should just go make games in one of those other genres that can be very successful and don't require that.
Before anyone blames Jon or Firaxis for that attitude, they need to examine their own habits. Games are the feature bloated messes they are because that is what gamers ask for.
Ben "Yathzee" Croshaw said:Fans are clingy complaining diphorsehockys who will never ever be grateful for any concession you make. The moment you shut out their shrill, tremulous voices the happier you will be for it. Incidentally, why not buy a Zero Punctuation t-shirt?
I find it wonderful that people with no AI experience say these things are trivial or just the matter of hiring the right people. They aren't. If they were, we'd have nothing to research.
I love it when someone cites, say... XCOM as an example of wonderful AI. It just proves my point. XCOM aliens aren't a threat because their AI is great, it's because the aliens get such an absurd number of resources and advantages on their side it's amazing they ever lose. If a human had what the aliens had on a terror mission, they wouldn't just win, they'd make XCOM look like the AI on settler.
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Also, the state of the art in a formation-dependent game like Go essentially boiling down to simulating a lot of random moves. But it still requires wonderful things like well-tuned evaluation functions.
I mean, yeah, the game industry is miles behind in AI. I mean, a few years ago they touted A* as the holy grail for pathfinding and we've known about A* since around the time the first things you could consider video games came out. But that doesn't mean the problems they're trying to solve are trivial or anything.
Consider the state of the art. The best AIs for say, Brood War? (that's the new thing nowadays since someone cracked the API) Scripts. Very, very, very good scripts, but scripts nonetheless. No algorithmic fanciness or anything (okay, the good ones have some small amount of algorithmic fanciness, but all the legwork is in the script). Now, do you hire someone to spend hundreds of manhours developing a finely tuned script they have to toss out every time you make a balance change or do you crank up the little variable that says "let the AI cheat more"? Guess which is easier.
in general there are 3 types of opponents(challenge-providers):
1) AI controlled(aka civ. other nations are AI-controlled)
2) other humans(aka MP civ)
3) yourself (tetris, minesweeper, etc.)
relating to civ 3) is not possible. therefore the devs must either provide a decent AI or a decent MP.
It is interesting that from a list of games you picked XCOM. However, I did not say it has a "wonderful" AI I said that compared to what Civ 5 has even that game had a vastly better AI, especially if you take in account hardware and budget resources. Plus, the AI at these games at normal level do not possess huge advantages.
Oh i agree, it may not be a strategy title but despite appearances it is a surprisingly deep, long lasting game with huge polish and attention to detail, i'm just thinking that to make a similar game in that genre that could even approach animal crossing's quality may not be all that easy either, it's a bit of a gem.
You're just wrong. XCOM has hardly any AI, and the scenarios are designed with truly gigantic advantages for the aliens. The only thing that makes it remotely playable despite the total lack of AI competence is that huge asymmetry. Civ5 has way, way, way more invested in its AI than XCOM ever did.
Exactly, my friend! XCOM has hardly any AI! But what it matters is that it looks like the Aliens are smart when tracking down targets and they had included other aspects that made the game competent.
The point is not how much you invest, but how smart you do the programming!
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I personally would enjoy playing an asymmetrical version of Civilization, which simply gives up on the idea that you are contending against other civilizations that start and develop in the same way that yours does. You could build a scenario-based version of Civilization, that would be asymmetrical like XCOM, in that as the game goes on you would come up against tougher and tougher foes, who are more and more advanced, but not because they built up as you did but just because the designer preconstructed them to create the correct level of difficulty. But I think this game would never have the broad appeal of Civilization, because it doesn't have the immersive element that Civ does.
I see that there is a lot of confusion about how much money should someone "pour" into programming a "great" AI...
I have been playing strategy games for years and I can say that the first ones I played (Sid Meier's Colonization, Empire II, XCOM-TFTD, XCOM-UFO Defence, Fantasy General, Panzer General, Steel Panther etc) had a vastly better AI, while they had to cope with much lower budgets and much lower computer resources.
THIS IS SIMPLY NOT TRUE. I played all those games extensively, and still play a few of them, and in all of them the AI is benefiting from massive statistical bonuses, setup bonuses of much more material, and setup bonuses with positioning on the set maps. It is completely not comparable to a game like CiV. Sure I could set up a hard scenario in CiV, that doesn't mean its a strong AI. If you played a random map on fantasy general with EVEN settings, it is pretty much impossible to lose.
Thanks for posting this.
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The biggest concern I have with Shafer's quote is not the idea that you can make good games in other ways than investing huge budgets in AI. The biggest concern I have is that he doesn't seem to have any understanding of those other ways, either. He just seems interested in making games that don't go beyond the 10 year old level. The other quotes in the article tend to suggest that also. That may well be where the biggest business opportunity is, but, if that's your attitude, why put any strategy in your games at all? Why not just make Farmville or Animal Crossing?
Toyota can atest to what happens when a company switches its focus from making the best product possible to making the most money possible. Further proof that the MBA syllabus does not challenge the brain.
I find it wonderful that people with no AI experience say these things are trivial or just the matter of hiring the right people.
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Now, do you hire someone to spend hundreds of manhours developing a finely tuned script they have to toss out every time you make a balance change or do you crank up the little variable that says "let the AI cheat more"? Guess which is easier.