Category Archives: AI

Intelligence upgrade

The RTS testcase is slowly being implemented (due to lack of time). The intial magic + crystal system is working. This system allows the player to store magic energy and transport it using crystals. The system should allow for building energy transport networks. But beware what might happen if you focus too much energy in one place 😉

The goblins have received upgrades! Now they can receive commands through the use of command orbs. The player can pick up these orbs and place them somewhere or attach them to containers. The can even use carts to store their items in. The implementation is still a work in progress, but so far it is looking promising.

Goblins performing all sorts of tasks with command orbs
Goblins performing all sorts of tasks with command orbs

Goblins have a lot more to do, so their brains should get somewhat larger. Since scalability is very import in the wizards, I opted to use behaviour trees for implementing their AI. This will not give us goblins that invent time travel, but allow for easy adding and adjusting behaviour in a scalable manner. Currently the behaviour tree’s implementation is pretty basic, but I am eager to learn if they are as scalable as they seem to be :).

References

http://aigamedev.com/open/article/bt-overview/

Progress update

The last couple of weeks, i’ve started working on some basic gameplay play-tests. The current setup features a sort of RTS, but where you can walk around the world in third person view. Skinned animation support is currently missing from the engine, so the primary agents in this testcase are barrels :). I added some very simple crowd control to make them more realistic. Check this video: Crowd control

Pathfinding was added to the engine to support this gamemode, here are some pics: Big objects pathfindingjump search astar

Goblins are able to accept commands from the player, which makes them move resources, powering basic factories.

Now it’s time to combine these features into some more challenging gameplay 🙂