AI is seeing ever-wider adoption across the game industry, and many major publishers such as CAPCOM are making it clear with their future plans that there’s no turning back for the entire industry. As of now, we haven’t seen any great usage of AI in game development, which is mostly limited to the development workflow and the generation of assets of very dubious quality, but a new PlayStation patent filed earlier this month could represent one of the best usage of AI and machine learning to date for actual gameplay features, one that could completely revolutionize certain genres, including the soulslike genre created by FromSoftware with its Dark Souls series.
An AI System That Would Rewrite NPC Behavior On The Fly
“The techniques disclosed herein pertain to improving video game systems and, particularly, improving video game systems using an artificial intelligence-adapted non-player character,” the patentdiscovered by Patentlyze filed by Sony Interactive Entertainment (which recently also filed a patent detailing how controllers could be used to pay for digital content), and published on October 1 reads. “In some examples, player data and video game data from at least one of a video game console and a video game device are collected. The player data and the video game data represent at least one encounter between a non-player character and a video game player during execution of a video game. Input data for a machine learning model is generated from the player data and the video game data, and the input data is used to obtain non-player character content from the machine learning model.”
Going from the patent, this new system works in four steps. After collecting the player data, specifically on the interaction with the NPC, and the game data, the system sends this data to a machine learning model that would generate NPC content to adjust character behavior, dialogue and appearance changes, and then modify the game content. The patent doesn’t list any specific model architecture, so the system supposedly could work across different AI systems, thus could be used by developers other than PlayStation‘s own studios.
A System That Could Take Soulslike and Action Games To The Next Level
While the patent outlines different uses for this technology, the first genre that came to mind that would benefit greatly from it is action games in general, and more specifically, soulslikes.
In many ways, the sub-genre of action role-playing games that spawned from the Dark Souls series developed by FromSoftware has many commonalities with fighting games – namely, knowledge of movesets and their best counters, proper positioning, and recognizing windows of opportunity. However, enemies in a single-player game do not react to the player’s actions and instead stick to programmed patterns that can be learned and exploited to make enemy encounters extremely easy.
With AI rewriting enemy behavior on the fly, however, enemy encounters in a soulslike could become even more intense, with enemies dynamically adjusting their strategies based on how aggressive or defensive the player is, their tendencies and so on. In multi-phase boss encounters, the enemy could go into its more powerful second phase even earlier if the player is pressuring it, mimicking the comeback mechanics that many modern fighting games have (like Street Fighter V‘s V-System or Street Fighter 6‘s Critical Arts mechanics).
Obviously, a system like the one outlined on the new PlayStation patent would require some tweaking to avoid some games becoming too difficult to complete, but still, this could be a great way to tackle the difficulty issue many modern action games have, allowing for a greater yet fairer challenge that doesn’t involve just turning up enemy health or damage, which is often the antithesis of fun.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack.
After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi “Suda51” Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA’s president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3.
When he’s not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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