2000 IAAI/AAAI Invited Talk
Human-level AI’s Killer Application: Interactive Computer Games
John Laird & Michael van Lent
University of Michigan
August 2, 2000
Game AI Resources
Interesting games to check out
The Sims (www.thesims.com) – Autonomous Characters
A people simulator with state-of-the-art autonomous characters.
Unreal Tournament (www.unrealtournament.com) – Tactical opponents & partners
An action game with great graphics and state-of-the-art tactical opponents and partners.
Half-life (www.sierrastudios.com/games/half-life/) – Tactical opponents & partners
An action game with many story elements, state-of-the-art graphics, and fair tactical opponents.
Age of Kings (www.microsoft.com/games/age2/) – Strategic opponents & units
A strategy game with good (editable, rule-based) strategic opponents and typical units.
Baldur’s Gate (www.interplay.com/bgate/) – Tactical partners & opponents
A role-playing game with good (editable, rule-based) tactical partners and fair tactical opponents.
Blade Runner (www.westwood.com/games/bladerunner/) – Support characters
An adventure game based on the Bladerunner movie with goal-driven support characters
Escape from Monkey Island (www.lucasarts.com/products/monkey4/) – Support characters
A cartoon-style adventure game with many scripted-support characters. Available Fall 2000
Madden NFL 2001 (www.easports.com/games/madden2001/) – Strategic opponents & units
A sports game with state-of-the-art (for sports games) strategic opponents and units.
Halo (http://halo.bungie.com/) – Tactical opponents & partners
The action/adventure game everyone is waiting to play. Coming soon on the Xbox.
Games with software interfaces that can support AI research
Quake II (www.quake2.com/dll/) – C language interface
The action game Quake II allows you to add to or modify the game by writing a DLL.
Half-Life (www.planethalflife.com/botman/MOD_FAQ.shtml) – C language interface
Half-Life uses the Quake II game engine but the interface is changed significantly.
Descent 3 (http://www.outrage.com/4_downloads.html) – C language interface
Another action game with a DLL based C language interface.
FreeCiv (www.Freeciv.org) – Open Source
An open-source clone of the classic strategy game Civilization.
Age of Kings (http://ageofkings.org/downloads/utilities.shtml) – Editable rule-based AI
A strategy game that allows you to edit the rules that control the strategic opponent
Baldur’s Gate (www.bgchronicles.com/content/bg/customize.shtml#scripts) – Editable rule-based AI
A role-playing game that allows you to edit the rules that control the members of your party.
Game AI Web Sites
www.gameai.com
www.gamasutra.com/features/index_ai.htm
www-cs-students.stanford.edu/~amitp/gameprog.html
www.ai-center.com/projects/excalibur/
www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article784.asp
www.red3d.com/cwr/
Magazines
Game Developer Magazine (www.gdmag.com)
The August 2000 edition focuses on the current state of Game AI
Next Generation (www.next-generation.com)
An excellent magazine that focuses on upcoming games and future industry directions.
PC Gamer (www.pcgamer.com)
An good magazine for game reviews.
Conferences
Game Developers Conference (www.gdconf.com)
The conference/tradeshow for the game development industry.
AAAI Spring Symposium on AI and Interactive Entertainment
(http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/vanlent/AAAI-SSS-2000.htm)
Annual symposium bringing together game developers and AI researchers.