Automatic Customization of NonPlayer Characters Using Players Temperament

Automatic Customization of Non-Player Characters Using Players Temperament Kyle Li

REFERENCE Automatic Customization of Non-Player Characters Using Players Temperament Hector G´omez-Gauch´ıa and Federico Peinado Depto. Ingenier´ıa del Software e Inteligencia Artificial Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain

TABLE OF CONTENT l. INTRODUCING l. SOME l. THE GAME CUSTOMIZATION CONCEPTS MODEL l. CONCLUSIONS

INTRODUCING GAME CUSTOMIZATION

WHAT IS A VIDEO GAME? lthe goal of video games is evoking emotion in the player lit is well known that each player is emotionally affected in a particular way

NPC characters of the game which are controlled by the system, able to interact with the player’s avatar interchanging items and information

CURRENT APPROACH lmore related to the automatic adjustment of the difficulty level of action or strategy games – Max Payne lwe focus on Role-Playing Games (RPGs), characterized by strong emphasis on social interaction with NPCs

CUSTOMIZING NPCs lappearance e. g. race, clothes, . . . labilities e. g. AI, . . . lanimation e. g. way of walking, standing. . . linteraction e. g. content of speaking, . . . lenvironment e. g. weather, ambient light, . . .

NEVER WINTER NIGHTS Servant: Welcome home, sir. [Repeating fast worship movements] Drax: Hum, I feel so tired. . . Please, servant, prepare the bath. Servant: Immediately, sir. [Running to the bathroom].

WHY CUSTOMIZE IT? lprobably it is not the most appropriated animation from the point of view of a player with a serious temperament lcould be considered even offensive by some cultures or religions

SOME CONCEPTS

WHAT IS TEMPERAMENT? l. Temperament is defined as the part of the personality which is genetically based l. Regularity l. Intensity l. Distractibility l. Sensitivity l. Activity l. Initial reaction l. Adaptability l. Mood l. Persistence & Attention Span l. . . Wikipedia

DAVID KEIRSEY's THEORY four basic temperaments: l. Artisan, Guardian, Idealist and Rational leach person has a unique proportional combination of the four lnormally one of the temperaments is predominant le. g. Artisan 10%, Guardian 10%, Idealist 30% and Rational 50%. lwidely applied in psychology lfor interview job candidates l

REASON ABOUT TEMPERAMENT CASE BASED REASONING(CBR) + ONTOLOGIES

ONTOLOGIES lan ontology is a representation of a set of concepts within a domain and the relationships between those concepts. l. It is used to reason about the properties of that domain, and may be used to define the domain Wikipedia

TEMPERAMENT ONTOLOGIES

VARIATION ONTOLOGIES

CASE BASED REASONING Case-based reasoning (CBR), is the process of solving new problems based on the solutions of similar past problems Wikipedia

CASE BASED REASONING an auto mechanic who fixes an engine by recalling another car that exhibited similar symptoms a lawyer who advocates a particular outcome in a trial based on legal precedents or a judge who creates case law

CBR IN OUR DOMAIN CASES are all the assertions we made in the customization domain e. g. “a polite NPC with slow movements makes you feel calm”

THE MODEL

AUTOMATIC NPC CUSTOMIZATION MODEL

THE CUSTOMIZATION PROCESS l. Keirsey’s questionnaire gives us the following player temperament proportions: Artisan 10%, Guardian 10%, Idealist 30% and Rational 50% l. The reasoning cycle retrieves the most similar case e. g. Artisan 10%, Guardian 30%, Idealist 30% and Rational 30%

THE CUSTOMIZATION PROCESS lmeasure the similarity between cases by:

THE CUSTOMIZATION PROCESS adapt the retrieved case e. g. Artisan stays unmodified, make Guardian decreasing 20%, make Rational increasing 20% and let Idealist without modifications e. g. to make the retrieved case 20% more Rational we calculate that proportion in the list and we choose the element which occupies the position corresponding to the obtained proportion l

THE CUSTOMIZATION PROCESS lexecute the modified variations e. g. direct commands or embedded scripts lget the feedback of the player after the game session to remember the useful cases to be reused in further iterations

THE RESULTS Servant: Welcome to the castle, sir! Everybody has heard about your courage in the battlefield. Drax: I am tired because of the battle, servant. Prepare my bath. Servant: At your command, my lord. [Saluting him] A perfumed bath

CONCLUSIONS

LIMITATIONS lan out-of-game questionnaire is annoying lto construct the case base is time consuming

EXTENSIONS lcustomizing whole groups of characters as families, troops, or even the whole cast of the game is also possible lthe customization is independent of the game domain and genre lidentify dynamically values (e. g. player emotions) according to the actions of the avatar using specific heuristics

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