Don't Let it Slide: An Open Letter to the Game Industry Press
A certain game came out recently that I'd been looking forward to for a long time. I read countless articles that promised all kinds of amazing things from the AI.
Here's what I actually experienced:
I can stand on the other side of a pillar, and an attacker with a ranged weapon will fire right into the wall .. and keep firing ... and keep firing ...
I can try to escort two NPCs on a quest, and immediately during the first encounter, they'll fall off the bridge into the lava (at which point the game tells me I have to fetch the NPC's ring as proof of his death, now that he's 20 feet below the lava ... what, are you kidding?!?)
I'm standing in an office, and the NPC next to me is continually walking into a desk. She's not moving, but her legs are, and she never seems to notice the discrepancy.
I'm walking through a town, and NPCs turn to me and say "Hello, I'd love to talk to you," and then when I actually go to talk to them, they angrily tell me they don't have anything to say to me.
I fight a ranged attacker and a melee attacker, and the ranged attacker continually fires into the melee attacker's back. The two make no attempt to coordinate.
I'm escorting an NPC in combat, and he continually rushes at every creature I try to fight, inserting himself directly between me and the monster.
Later on, the same NPC decides to target a creature on a rock outcropping, and the creature can't pathfind off the rock, and the NPC can't find a path to the creature and doesn't have any ranged weapons, and I'm hopelessly stuck since I can't get the NPC to his destination but I won't be able to complete this part of the game unless he gets there.
And then I go onto the forums and a lot of the people playing this game apparently think this is state of the art and it's the best the industry can do!
This is a big problem. These are basic, basic things.
The fancy AI features that were promised don't matter very much if the fundamentals aren't done right. Don't we have some basic standards for AI in our industry?
Pathfinding? Ranged weapon combat? Tactical maneuvering and basic spatial competence? Yeah, I think there might be a just a couple of folks on this blog who have solved some of those problems one or more times.
Being an "immersive simulation" is no excuse. Developers need to hire enough AI engineers to get the job done right.
Games like this lower the bar for everybody. Weak AI is not OK. As a gamer, I am looking at this game and thinking how much much better it would be if these problems were solved; as a developer, I'm looking at the same game and worrying about how it will affect the public's perception of game AI.
This is where it comes to the game industry press.
I apologize for this unpleasant analogy, but game studios are a little bit like dogs. They leave a little poop on the carpet, and if you ignore it, they'll think it's not a problem and do it again. As much as you may love the dog, somethimes you have to stick their face in it.
All of the reviews I've read have raved about the game's graphics, the physics, the emergence, the immersiveness, and the huge scope (and rightly so -- those aspects of the game are fantastic).
But very few of the reviews have gone into much depth on the AI or mentioned that it fails at a lot of basic things -- things that plenty of other games do without a problem.
I'm not saying anyone should lower this game's score, but game developers need to know that the press gives a damn about AI. You folks are a huge driver in this industry, and your words make a big difference.
AI has become far more important than it used to be and it requires a lot more work to create and to review. More importantly, consumers and developers rely on your judgement to help form their opinions of the AI.
Think what Halo or Halo 2 would look like if the Covenant fired into walls and fell into lava pits, or if the F.E.A.R. AIs shot each other in the back and got hung up on desks. I know, it's ridiculous -- I haven't seen any of those things happen, either. Then think how much better the game I'm referring to would be with AI on the level of Halo or F.E.A.R.
If you're in the game industry press and you're reading this, I want to remind you that you have the power to make a difference. As someone who enjoys so much of this game, all I want is to see the AI reach its potential. But I'm just a developer and there are only so many things I can do.
Nothing will change unless you raise your voice. Let developers know you care.