Game AI as Improv Theater: Or, Why Deus Ex's Cops Can't See You in the Elevator

When it comes to artificial intelligence behavior in games, the player and the developer often have to collaborate, to maintain the illusion of a world; then it feels less like a computer simulation, and more like improvisational theater, where the player and developer work together to keep the story going. I got a perfect example of this last night, playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution. As I mentioned Monday, the combat AI is really challenging, but that doesn't mean it's "real". During a mission in a heavily guarded police precinct, my character knocked a cop unconscious -- I'm a badass, goddammit, but I'm an ethical badass, zero bodycount! -- and dragged the guy into a nearby elevator.

Then something hilarious happened:

The cop's partner was standing right next to this dude when I karated the crap out of him, but the very moment I went into the elevator (which remained open!) he basically behaved like I disappeared into thin air. The same confusion happens when your character hides in air ducts. (Not sure how a 6'2" commando with a sniper rifle and a machine gun can squeeze into one so easily, but that's another question.)

Of course, intellectually I can make an educated guess why the cop AI is unable to tell I'm in the elevator. Maybe the developers had trouble controlling AI behavior up and down the Y axis of a level; maybe they just wanted to give the player a break, and scripted AIs to go blind when you go into an elevator, or an air duct. Whatever the case, this is a point where I as a player have to improvise, to keep the story going. Cop can't tell I'm in the elevator? Well, I'll just karate the hell out of him, then put him in there too.

Eventually, I had a pile of four unconscious cops stacked up in this elevator (which the cops upstairs somehow failed to notice.) Which was all pretty damn funny. If this were improv theater, it'd be like my fellow actor laying out a dramatic, heartfelt story -- which I then turned into slapstick. I actually felt a bit guilty doing this: Ubisoft spent all this time making a dark, highly detailed cyberpunk future, and I just devolved into Three Stooges. I almost thought about restarting this level, so I could do it more, well, respectfully.

Comments

[Arcadia Codesmith]

I was doing much the same last night in Lord of the Rings Online, engaging guards in protracted swordfights within easy earshot of the enemy camp, and then walking into that same camp unmolested as long as I stayed out of agro range.

It might have been more realistic to have the whole camp descend upon my head at the first clash of swords, but that would have quickly resulted in a greasy hobbit-sized stain on the forest floor -- not very fun or heroic.

I think designers could do a better job of presenting opponents that aren't blind and deaf idiots, but that must be carefully balanced to keep the game engaging and not too frustrating even for unskilled players.

[Ordinal Malaprop]

It does spoil things a little when there are these obvious AI flaws. It isn't simply that it makes things easy, more that it spoils immersiveness. (Immersivity? "Being convinced by the game as an experience", anyway.) I was playing a certain iPad RPG recently, for instance, which was fairly atmospheric until I discovered that one could just retreat a little from a fight and one's opponents would simply forget your existence and wander around as before.

One way of getting around it is to cast the AI opponents as, well, AIs. Discover a flaw in their behaviour? Why, that's a flaw in their programming in the game world! We meant to put that in so you could exploit it! Ahem.

[Vooper Werribee]

There's quite a bit of interest in making game play that draws more from a dramatic improv tradition by improving AI so that it is aware of dramatic story elements.
Nameste has had a lot of good feedback on their prototype of Storybricks and there is an interesting conference in Vienna this September on Storytelling and Games (known intriguingly as STAGconf!)
I'm looking forward to when games start to resemble interactive dramatic entertainment - I'm not sure that cop's colleague is going to get wise to your shenanigans any time soon though.