Examples of good partner A.I.?
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I really don't like when a game is designed as if an AI is going to carry the weight of a human player, because they never do. Games designed around the player doing most of the work with AI companions offering support tends to put them in their best roles. It would be easy to go with Elizabeth from bioshock or something but I think it's more good game design than good AI in that case.
It'll be Earned in Blood. I've been playing Road to Hill 30, and the improvements made in Earned in Blood are quite glaringly clear...not_you said:
Though they're not exactly bad, they don't exactly react dynamically without you giving them orders; but maybe that's the point.
Now hear me out, but I'm going with Ashley from Resident Evil 4. You can tell her to go in the garbage bin and she's smart enough to not move from there and let you clear out the area before you tell her to come on out.
I was going to say Ashley too. People give her a lot of shit but she was actually very smart and competent. She would always try and stick behind you, out of the way of the camera, on the few occasions she did get in the way she would duck as soon as you aimed towards her so you could shoot enemies behind and she would actually try and escape from enemies in not-totally retarded ways.Arslan Aladeen said:
Basically if an enemy ever did grab and carry her off, it was probably because YOU fucked up.
Fuck the Geonosians right back to their egg hatcheries. That final leg of Kashyyyk where you fight through an implanted nest solo was one of the most frustrating moments of that game. Thankfully, the bullet sponge enemies were rather rare, or at least had hard counters. SBDs will go down to anti armor, Trando Heavies will drop to Sniper shots and concussion grenades, and Geonosian elites can fuck right off.shrekfan246 said:
I'll add on to that (since those were the first games that came to mind that weren't Kingdom Hearts 2) with Tails from Sonic 2...FangStiltzskin said:
Yes, I said that right... But, I was mostly thinking about the bonus stages when I thought of that... Also, your tag partner in Tag Force 4, especially when they seem to know what you have in mind during a tag battle...
If I want to get REALLY obscure on "good" AI partners... Nicktoons Unite! (...I'll just leave it at that...)
Echoing: L4D1 is great partner AI. L4D2 is the same partner AI in a much more complex situation (rolling crescendos) and doesn't work at all.
Elizabeth is AWESOME.
Republic Commando was great in its day. (I still like that game. Screw You.)
Alyx Vance is competent but ugly and forgettable. Screw Alyx.
Elizabeth is AWESOME.
Republic Commando was great in its day. (I still like that game. Screw You.)
Alyx Vance is competent but ugly and forgettable. Screw Alyx.
Sometimes AI in RTS games can be competent, but, then I run into situations where I'm playing CnC3: Kane's Wrath Skirmishes, and my AI ally is building defenses on the wrong side of their base. The right side of their base is then heavily defended, while the left side is barren of defenses, save for any units they may have in the area. The enemy is always on the left side, my base is on their right side.not_you said:
Then, when their Harvesters and War Factory are inevitably destroyed, they'll usually attempt to rebuild once, then if their Harvesters and War Factory are destroyed a second time, they sit there doing nothing, even if they have excess structures to sell to get the funds to rebuild again. Then, they're nothing more than a meat shield for me.
Not to mention the many times that their AI builds only a certain type of defenses, while neglecting the other two types. I have seen my ally build nothing but Anti-Infantry defenses, which will be okay against lightly armored vehicles, but will do dick and poo to the more heavily armored ones. And of course leaving themselves massively open to air attacks unless I supplement their defenses with my own. Fortunately, my Ally AI is not the only one afflicted with this kind of stupid, the Enemy will do this on occasion as well.
This is while my Ally's difficulty is on Hard, and all the Enemy AI is set to Medium, and I've had too many battles go by where it seemed like their difficulty settings got swapped.
Watching my AI Ally build a Refinery (Harvester comes with each Refinery built), and immediately sell it just to get a Harvester, when they could have built one from their Vehicle Production Structure for half the cost of a Refinery is amusing... and frustrating as all fuck.
Can people please stop saying Ashley from RE4 or Elizabeth from Bioshock Infinite? Neither have any AI whatsoever. There is no active decision making of any sort, neither actively take part in combat and they don't adapt in any way. Neither are even valid combat targets. I can sum up Elizabeth's entire behaviour in a handful of lines of psuedo code:
If Booker.IsUsing(Vigors) AND Booker(Salt <= 25%) THEN Booker.GiveSalt
If Booker.IsUsing(Weapons) AND Booker(Ammo <= 25%) THEN Booker.GetWeapon(AmmoType) AND Booker.GiveAmmo
Count(360 seconds) Booker.GiveCoin
And Ashley:
If Leon.IsAiming THEN Leon.DuckBehind
If Ashley.IsBeingCarriedAway THEN Ashley.ScreamForLeon
If Leon.PointsToGarbageContainer THEN Ashley.GetInWithoutComplaining UNTIL Leon.CallsAshleysName
If Leon.IsTryingToLookUpSkirt THEN Leon.Admonish
An AI partner or opponent will alter behaviour based on the results of evaluating a number of things. The better AIs can use more criteria, have better behaviours and varied tactics. What is the best weapon for the situation? Can I and a friendly AI flank player? Where is nearest cover? What are player's weaknesses? What skill is most useful to use right now?
Dragon's Dogma has interesting AI, insofar as "programming" our Main Pawn is actually an in-game mechanic. It includes a few different packages that dictate pawn behaviour in combat with two-three different priorities. For example, the Medicant would focus on healing above all else, even if it's just a scratch. The Scather would charge at the toughest enemies first while the Challenger would go for ranged foes and so on.
With the various options and combinations, it was possible to get generally quite useful pawns. My main pawn was my tank and I ran her with Mitigator (Weakest foes first) and Utilitarian. Her Shield Drum attracted the ire of all foes in range anyway and avoiding Scather (which instinctually one would think is the best option) meant she didn't try climbing large monsters and therefore not doing her job (the side effect of scather primary). Utilitarian meant she tried to make herself useful to the rest of the party by launching the ranger in the air or holding a goblin in a lock.
Dragon's Age Origins allowed the player to more or less program their desired behaviours by having party members perform specific actions under specific conditions. Even without, I thought they were pretty good at doing their jobs but with some time spent fine tuning the bahviours (more of which are unlocked as a side effect of levelling) they could become very useful indeed. Although it's not a fully realised AI in its own right, the programming behaviours, evaluating conditions and making decisions based on them is quite close...and better yet, is in the player's control too.
If Booker.IsUsing(Vigors) AND Booker(Salt <= 25%) THEN Booker.GiveSalt
If Booker.IsUsing(Weapons) AND Booker(Ammo <= 25%) THEN Booker.GetWeapon(AmmoType) AND Booker.GiveAmmo
Count(360 seconds) Booker.GiveCoin
And Ashley:
If Leon.IsAiming THEN Leon.DuckBehind
If Ashley.IsBeingCarriedAway THEN Ashley.ScreamForLeon
If Leon.PointsToGarbageContainer THEN Ashley.GetInWithoutComplaining UNTIL Leon.CallsAshleysName
If Leon.IsTryingToLookUpSkirt THEN Leon.Admonish
An AI partner or opponent will alter behaviour based on the results of evaluating a number of things. The better AIs can use more criteria, have better behaviours and varied tactics. What is the best weapon for the situation? Can I and a friendly AI flank player? Where is nearest cover? What are player's weaknesses? What skill is most useful to use right now?
Dragon's Dogma has interesting AI, insofar as "programming" our Main Pawn is actually an in-game mechanic. It includes a few different packages that dictate pawn behaviour in combat with two-three different priorities. For example, the Medicant would focus on healing above all else, even if it's just a scratch. The Scather would charge at the toughest enemies first while the Challenger would go for ranged foes and so on.
With the various options and combinations, it was possible to get generally quite useful pawns. My main pawn was my tank and I ran her with Mitigator (Weakest foes first) and Utilitarian. Her Shield Drum attracted the ire of all foes in range anyway and avoiding Scather (which instinctually one would think is the best option) meant she didn't try climbing large monsters and therefore not doing her job (the side effect of scather primary). Utilitarian meant she tried to make herself useful to the rest of the party by launching the ranger in the air or holding a goblin in a lock.
Dragon's Age Origins allowed the player to more or less program their desired behaviours by having party members perform specific actions under specific conditions. Even without, I thought they were pretty good at doing their jobs but with some time spent fine tuning the bahviours (more of which are unlocked as a side effect of levelling) they could become very useful indeed. Although it's not a fully realised AI in its own right, the programming behaviours, evaluating conditions and making decisions based on them is quite close...and better yet, is in the player's control too.
As the other's have said, Delta Squad from Republic Commando are awesome team mates. There's also some good banter going on, to lighten up the feeling of slaughtering bugs, lizards, and robots.
To add one thing about Dragon's Dogma...as interesting and useful as the different behaviour packages were, the mistake Capcom made in the game design was having the pawn "learn" or "adapt" and change their behaviours accordingly. For example, if the player is always picking up loot, they will eventually switch to Acquisitor secondary, prioritising loot collection over combat.
Worst however, is if the player uses the pawn commands often they switch behaviours too. For example, constantly ordering them to "Go" eventually makes them "Pioneers" who range ahead and do their own thing. Shouting "Help Me" a lot makes them into "Guardians", by far the worst "Inclination" in the game, which makes them your bodyguard to the point they'll do nothing in combat, at all, until you are threatened.
Experminenting with different combinations for the main pawn is an interesting gameplay mechanic, but being unable to search for other pawn by inclination is very frustrating. Most pawns are sadly Guardians due to player's spamming "Help Me" or "Come" and you have to inspect them and cycle through their info to see their inclinations. Any with Guardian or Nexus were dismissed immediately as being useless.
In short, the Inclination/AI packages would've been better if the player could just set them in stone and the learning thing removed entirely. I did however appreciate the ability to control their behaviour.
Worst however, is if the player uses the pawn commands often they switch behaviours too. For example, constantly ordering them to "Go" eventually makes them "Pioneers" who range ahead and do their own thing. Shouting "Help Me" a lot makes them into "Guardians", by far the worst "Inclination" in the game, which makes them your bodyguard to the point they'll do nothing in combat, at all, until you are threatened.
Experminenting with different combinations for the main pawn is an interesting gameplay mechanic, but being unable to search for other pawn by inclination is very frustrating. Most pawns are sadly Guardians due to player's spamming "Help Me" or "Come" and you have to inspect them and cycle through their info to see their inclinations. Any with Guardian or Nexus were dismissed immediately as being useless.
In short, the Inclination/AI packages would've been better if the player could just set them in stone and the learning thing removed entirely. I did however appreciate the ability to control their behaviour.
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Nah, they're pretty much the same AI. I've had all the same problems with the AI in both games. Sometimes they can be downright brilliant, and sometimes they're about as smart as a brick.TheSteeleStrap said:
In fact, hell, the AI in Left 4 Dead 2 might actually be better since it can actually use molotovs and pipebombs, unlike the Left 4 Dead 1 AI.
Delta Squad and Alex Vance. Don't get me started on Persona 3 (Ahem: "Marin KARIN!").
It's mind numbingly bad if you're trying for any level of stealth. "Ok, it looks like the line's just starting to turn into an eye, so they have the barest inkling that something's out there. If we just wait for about five sec- ...or we could just run right in like a pair of berserkers. THANK YOU, Mercer, for ruining my sneak attack bonus! >_>"MinionJoe said:
the ones that stay out of the way and dont require a set flag to be in a location to continue. I swear, the amount of times ive waited by a door, or in an elevator for the ai to take its sweet time trying to get to me by walking through a wall....
+1 for tales games.FangStiltzskin said:
I haven't yet had any "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING" moments while playing a tales game, even in their earlier iterations.
Recently finished my 100% completion of Xillia and was thoroughly impressed by the party AI at times, especially in the big fights when I fucked up and got myself killed every now and then, Rowen would storecast (he has an ability to stop casting and save it for later) as soon as I went down so he could use a life bottle to revive me, then continue with his assault.
Pretty advanced stuff for AI to be pulling off when lazy programmers could have either made the AI finish the cast before using items or having them prioritize items by cancelling their cast completely.
And I have to give props on how the AI uses linking between themselves too, always set it to "link sometimes" and they just seemed to get it perfect every fight, especially when I was using Milla(me), jude, rowen and elize. They would unlink so they could both spam cast massive spells then rowen would initiate a link to use elize's ability (which is stealing mana and giving it to her link partner) when he got low on mana.
I agree about Dragon Age: Origins. In fact, it's one of the things I liked most: dictating companion actions given specific situations.
You can argue all you want about Elizabth vs. Alyx. Alyx is a loser man-girl in jeans with no personality. Elizabeth is awesomesauce on a stick. It doesn't necessarily matter how useful they were in any given situation (although, Elizabeth tossing me salts was far more useful in any situation than Alyx "might hit something with a pistol... maybe... sorta.") Elizabeth was also attractive and interesting. Alyx was .. well, a loser man-girl in jeans with no personality and a tentative attachment to the plot.
That's right. Alyx is, without a doubt in my opinion, the most obnoxiously over hyped useless POS character in the history of gaming. She sucks. She's terrible. She does nothing useful, ever. She has a robotic dog-thing that is infinitely more interesting than she is.
Ha, it's an opinion, which can't be countered. Suck on it.
You can argue all you want about Elizabth vs. Alyx. Alyx is a loser man-girl in jeans with no personality. Elizabeth is awesomesauce on a stick. It doesn't necessarily matter how useful they were in any given situation (although, Elizabeth tossing me salts was far more useful in any situation than Alyx "might hit something with a pistol... maybe... sorta.") Elizabeth was also attractive and interesting. Alyx was .. well, a loser man-girl in jeans with no personality and a tentative attachment to the plot.
That's right. Alyx is, without a doubt in my opinion, the most obnoxiously over hyped useless POS character in the history of gaming. She sucks. She's terrible. She does nothing useful, ever. She has a robotic dog-thing that is infinitely more interesting than she is.
Ha, it's an opinion, which can't be countered. Suck on it.