BurnedOut
Your friendly neighborhood asshole
Today's coop games lack actual coop relying on capital leverages against the enemy and the team. You can go lone wolf but if you work with the team, you will have more score but non-coop with team won't penalize you in any way that will disincentivize your will to replay the game - csgo, cod, etc
We need a game engine that first and foremost takes player behavior into regard much like l4d2's director but in a way that still ensures coherence and some degree of linearity to maintain the characteristic atmosphere of that game. We can build a simple game engine that does the following:
Distributes information fairly among the players and the information disbursed at the beginning is equally significant for everybody. For example if a puzzle requires 4 pieces, each player will know the location of any single puzzle piece. This will ensure that goal completion requires information gathering rather than mindless running and gunning to a predetermined objective notwithstanding context for example - civilians in most fps shooters have no significance other than simply being present or serve as insignicant obstacles. That renders an emotional context useless because you are still going to pull out your gun and shoot. We don't want a game that is mere evoking our reflexes while the environment is a movie screen.
Information gathering involves significant environmental considerations but the algorithm can be greatly simplified for discussion. Sources of in-game info:
Players,
NPCs,
Geographical features - nearest artifacts relative to player position,
Sound design - player dialogue, NPC dialogue,
Dissemination mechanism - audability depending on distance and objects present; positioning of objects that enable player movement for such information gathering,
Player awareness mechanisms - line of sight, range of hearing, lighting and shadows, content of dialogues and most importantly
mechanisms to map the effects of player's and other player's actions and behavior.
All of this can be presented relative to the player with basic data structures that contain coordinates and basic metadata about an object. Now, these mechanisms are by default considered for game design but not to a significant aspect. What is gleaned over is causing ludonarrative dissonance. And that requires an overhauling of the game AI.
The game AI itself should do the following tasks:
Keep track of coordinates of everything in the game,
Know the relative coordinates of every player and interactive object nearest to the player,
Record player behaviors and update the NPC behaviors,
Ensure that externalities are properly mapped to circumstances. For eg killing an NPC in an isolated area should be different than killing them in front of other NPCs,
Interlink externalities with each other either via logical deductions or random events. For eg killing an NPC in an isolated area will not raise alarms but NPCs who had last seen you with the aforementioned NPC will spread rumours about you being the killer. Every action has a consequence and the game engine should not forget that,
Define NPC behavior in relation to player actions.
This will essentially create the basis of a procedural AI that can create unlimited possibilities but narrow them down according to player much like chess engines.
If this discussion continues, we can continue with
- discussion of AI-assisted map design
- the implementation details via pseudocode
We need a game engine that first and foremost takes player behavior into regard much like l4d2's director but in a way that still ensures coherence and some degree of linearity to maintain the characteristic atmosphere of that game. We can build a simple game engine that does the following:
Distributes information fairly among the players and the information disbursed at the beginning is equally significant for everybody. For example if a puzzle requires 4 pieces, each player will know the location of any single puzzle piece. This will ensure that goal completion requires information gathering rather than mindless running and gunning to a predetermined objective notwithstanding context for example - civilians in most fps shooters have no significance other than simply being present or serve as insignicant obstacles. That renders an emotional context useless because you are still going to pull out your gun and shoot. We don't want a game that is mere evoking our reflexes while the environment is a movie screen.
Information gathering involves significant environmental considerations but the algorithm can be greatly simplified for discussion. Sources of in-game info:
Players,
NPCs,
Geographical features - nearest artifacts relative to player position,
Sound design - player dialogue, NPC dialogue,
Dissemination mechanism - audability depending on distance and objects present; positioning of objects that enable player movement for such information gathering,
Player awareness mechanisms - line of sight, range of hearing, lighting and shadows, content of dialogues and most importantly
mechanisms to map the effects of player's and other player's actions and behavior.
All of this can be presented relative to the player with basic data structures that contain coordinates and basic metadata about an object. Now, these mechanisms are by default considered for game design but not to a significant aspect. What is gleaned over is causing ludonarrative dissonance. And that requires an overhauling of the game AI.
The game AI itself should do the following tasks:
Keep track of coordinates of everything in the game,
Know the relative coordinates of every player and interactive object nearest to the player,
Record player behaviors and update the NPC behaviors,
Ensure that externalities are properly mapped to circumstances. For eg killing an NPC in an isolated area should be different than killing them in front of other NPCs,
Interlink externalities with each other either via logical deductions or random events. For eg killing an NPC in an isolated area will not raise alarms but NPCs who had last seen you with the aforementioned NPC will spread rumours about you being the killer. Every action has a consequence and the game engine should not forget that,
Define NPC behavior in relation to player actions.
This will essentially create the basis of a procedural AI that can create unlimited possibilities but narrow them down according to player much like chess engines.
If this discussion continues, we can continue with
- discussion of AI-assisted map design
- the implementation details via pseudocode
