Game AI Uncovered Focus

Paul Roberts’ Game AI Uncovered Focus: Character AI brings together twenty chapters from the first six volumes of the Game AI Uncovered series into a handy single volume that focuses on the many different aspects of character AI in game development.

The techniques covered in these pages cover the underlying development of a wide array of published titles, including City of Gangsters, The Survivalists, Sackboy: A Big Adventure, The Persistence, Alpha Beta Gunner, Luna Abyss, Assassin’s Creed Nexus, The Sims, Zoo Tycoon, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Alien Isolation, amongst others.

Contained within these pages are overviews and insights covering a host of different game character AI techniques, including defining the context within which a character exists and how to test for believability, utility AI, animation driven behaviour, buddy AI, simulating social norms, simulating player behaviour, environmental cues, boss behaviour, and dumbing down AI.

Beginners to the area of game AI, along with professional developers, will find a wealth of knowledge that will not only help in the development of your own games but also spark ideas for new approaches.

This anthology includes chapters written by Dr Nuno Vicente Barreto, Dr Vicky Bloom, Richard Bull, Michele Condò, Sarah Cook, Steven Dalton, Dale Green, Johan Holthausen, Tobias Karlsson, Vincent Breton Kochanowski, Dr Fernando Penousal Machado, Alessia Nigretti, John Reynolds, Matthew Reynolds, Lisa Ridley, Paul Roberts, Dr Licínio Roque, Huw Talliss, Dr Tommy Thompson, David Wooldridge, and Dr Robert Zubek.

Paul Roberts is a Senior Lecturer and Course Lead for BSc (Hons) Computer Games Programming at the University of Staffordshire. Prior to this he was Technical Director at his own independent game studio Grinning Cat. He has worked in a variety of Principal/Lead AI Programmer roles for a range of studios in the UK including Sumo Digital, Team17, Traveller’s Tales, Activision, and some smaller indie studios. Paul has a range of published titles including Worms Revolution, Pitfall!, Call of Duty: Strike Team, The Lego Movie: The Video Game, Pixel-8, and Power-Up. Paul has a Master’s by Research in Computer Science (with Artificial Intelligence), which focused on pathfinding, the development of the DRS algorithm and ways to test the believability of generated paths. Paul is currently a PhD candidate exploring believable decision-making based on memories for boxing games. Paul set up the GameAI Discord channel that has brought together hundreds of game AI professionals, where approaches are shared and ideas discussed. He has recently started the GameAIUncovered YouTube channel, which explains how different game AI concepts work, has written several books, some fiction, others academic, and is the editor for this Game AI Uncovered series.