Topics For Emily Short | Podcast 101

Oo yes, very true. Then queues that the NPC AI picks up on could be secret to the player, and wouldn't sever that link to the protagonist which let's game story telling really surpass other mediums. :-)

Paul Metcalf

There's also the very real possibility of the player speaking out loud and having the game recognize what you are saying. There would be no need to type in your answer and have a voiced character say it for you, you could just speak to the character in the game directly.

Resonant Arc

So, thoughts on the more robust dialog systems, even the input from the player has options, I think it's sorta stuck on multiple choice... Even if it's stat or relationship driven, the questions asked don't always provoke an answer the player would have... Perhaps it's my era of jrpg dialog with no voice acting in their tripple a games but I found that having to fill in the blanks of the tone or gestures of the NPC left me with more successful choices which I feel I would respond with. Not that I prefer reading, but idk, this detachment of player to the player's character got even worse when someone voice acts and gestures your character... This stuff was touched on in the podcast, not all at once, but I thought I'd chime on that. And if a voice actor can't successfully portray me, why would a text to speech do it better... It would be nice for developers to have more variety of text and lower dialog budgets, but this detachment... Again idk, perhaps if I grew up with a generation more connected with voice from text rather than a generation getting into the very first video game RPGs... which were replacing straight up novels as a go to medium. Hopefully I'm not talking in circles, enjoyed the discussion though, thanks!

Paul Metcalf

1. First, to piggy-back off of Chris’ question a bit: When it comes to modern games that try to simulate intelligent NPC characters, I really don't like how the conversations often feel like you are just “poking” the NPC character for the information or desired result that you want. The conversations with these characters often feel way too "gamey". Where the dialogue options I select are dictated by a goal or "win condition" that I enter the conversation with (make this character like my character or get this character to help/join me). Or perhaps even worse, the NPC is effectively just a dialogue wheel who stands there awkwardly until I have selected each dialogue option available. How can we use A.I. programming in games to pivot away from these type of NPC interactions? To make the characters feel more like actual people rather than game systems for the player to simply “solve”? 2. Have you created any simulations where the player’s silence or indecisiveness can be considered an actual input in the conversation that changes the A.I. character’s behavior? Some games have an NPC give a scripted response like “Is that all?”, but allow the player to continue the conversation as if there was no awkward silence. In real life, if I start a conversation with someone, but can’t decide what to say after a while the other person might get annoyed, puzzled, try to ask me a leading question to keep the conversation going, change the subject entirely, or perhaps just leave. Have you ever programed an A.I. character to change the flow of the conversation based on the player input of “silent” or “idle”? 3. Have you ever attempted to create simulations where A.I. characters are not used primarily to react to player input? Like for example, if the player-character is sitting on a bench and an A.I. character walks up to the player and initiates a conversation based on their own goals instead of the player’s goals? Now it’s up to the player to respond to the A.I. rather than the other way around. Perhaps this A.I. character knows the player just completed a difficult quest that they need to complete also. So they have questions that they want to ask the player for their own benefit. Or maybe a more antagonistic scenario where the Player is on a witness stand and the A.I. is the attorney that is trying to get the player to admit or reveal something. I think these types of NPC interactions are needed to make an NPC feel more like a real person and make a game world more immersive. Do you agree/disagree? And do you think this type of interaction can realistically be programmed into a game as a random event rather than a scripted one? Are we anywhere close to that kind of human to A.I. interaction in videogames?