Enemy AI and self-preservation

[CaptHawkeye]

Unfortunantly it looks like the best thing we're ever going to get in terms of "NPC tech development" is one-by-one eliminations of blatently stupid decision making on the part of the AI. Frankly, we're be lucky if we even get that, since most developers would rather find ways to distract the player or draw him away from putting the AI in the kind of situation where a flaw or hole would be apparent. Look at how many people were gawking at how "awesome" Crysis' AI was? Yeah, Crysis had cool AI.....as long as you didn't do ANYTHING outside of the game's "run into base and press left mouse" formula. Actually, the blatent cloak on/off lightswitch exploit meant you couldn't even really expect it function for what it was DESIGNED.

Currently, my biggest gripe with AI is its obvious lack of self-preservation. Every enemy i've ever faced in a game was a die-hard, "glorious death" screaming fanatic that had zero concerns jumping into the meat grinder I had so lovingly built for and used on about 40 of his comrades.

It's even more hilarious when the enemies in the game are supposed to be "mercenaries" or other "guns for hire".

[Covenant]

Currently, my biggest gripe with AI is its obvious lack of self-preservation. Every enemy i've ever faced in a game was a die-hard, "glorious death" screaming fanatic that had zero concerns jumping into the meat grinder I had so lovingly built for and used on about 40 of his comrades.

I know some games have solved this--in part--but rarely for the enemy. So I'm inclined to believe the earlier hypothesis that it's about players enjoying easily murdered foes and less enjoying enemies that actually defeat the player and tactically withdraw to areas of strength. In Quake4 I spawned a bunch of friendly soldiers into an area with pillars to help me with a firefight I found long and boring, and to my amazement they actually located cover and hid behind it, firing out from the pillar as if it had been one of the obstacles in their normal spawning locations. Now, if the enemy not only did that, but had a higher avoidance rate, to the point it was very hard to ever fire on them at all, I could see that as being not only annoying but also very difficult to beat.

But I think that players would respect such an AI more. It should not be a challenge for the game-makers to do this and also allow the player to win. Players usually have firepower far in excess of anything the AI has, so at least in a First Person Shooter game, making the AI duck whenever it's visible to you only forces the player to exploit more of their arsenal. Honestly, stuff like drawing rays from the AI to check if it can see you, that's only necessary in a stealth game--and in such games we've already seen Thief manage to make it work. Why not check to see if the enemy is visible to the player? If I can see them, they should duck. If I can't, let them chase me. Such simple logic is much more obvious (drawing rays to the player already happens) and more functional. Sure, it would lead the AI to act as if it knows where you are even if it can't, but giving the AI a little "gut instinct" wouldn't break SoD except in sneaky games. Games where the player is able to sneak around, use cloaks, etc, sure--let them be braindead. In real life people act moronically when faced with an invisible attacker too. I suppose if you're going to let the player go invisible, you might as well stop asking the AI to intelligently handle it.

[Stark]

Even very old games had enemies that were either individually challenging or displayed simple self-preservation behaviours... but like so many other features from the late 90s, they were forgotten and dev teams are so stupid they constantly reinvent the wheel. Blade of Darkness had enemies that could individually kill you in 3-4 hits, would flank you, lure you, taunt you to try to get you to chase them, withdraw behind their mates to drink potions to restore their health, set ambushes around corners, etc. It was VERY simple stuff, just intelligently laid out options, but it gave the illusion of intelligence and that's all that matters. It WORKED, no semi-sentient AI required.

[Big Orange]

Perfect Dark had a irreverent and somewhat disjointed plot, but the enemy AI was great for it's time and still holds up well enough even today: you could steal a soldier's sidearm and he would surrender, while they could hide behind boxes and run for help (which was scripted). They acted differently and were slower to react in darkened rooms, while their damage from gun wounds was recorded and affected their mobility in a convincing manner (which hasn't really been seen since).

[Alan Bolte]

If I recall correctly, that HL2 massacre video is more of a single scripting mistake then a problem with the overall game. If you try to hide almost anywhere else in that level, the soldiers use grenades.

[Stark]

Yeah because otherwise the HL2 badguys have such realistic and sophisticated behaviours... oh wait.

Orange indirectly notes something important; players are dumb. If you play a sound file saying 'where are you spooky player' the player will feel like he's being hunted/looked for/tracked/etc even if nothing of the sort is happening and the NPC is actually simply taking a roundabout route to the player's position. NPC dialogue in combat works to make it seem like they're making human-like decisions instead of just working off a tree - games go to great lengths to give you this feedback, like in FEAR where the psychically-linked soldiers conveniently use radios so you can hear their 'tactical decision making' which was 100% nonexistent. It fooled millions of people, however.