Multiagent Systems

Xaitment has just announced AI libraries for games. From their press release:

xaitment GmbH, one of the leading developers and service providers of artificial intelligence for the games and simulation industries, announced today that it has launched five new artificial intelligence (AI) modules ranging from standard to high-level AI functionality. The modules, which position the xaitEngine as one of the most flexible AI solutions on the market, will be shown at GDC 2008 in the German Pavilion (North Hall, Booth 6105).

The xaitEngine drives the predictable, and unpredictable, behaviors of computer-generated agents, and computer-operated applications and machines. It has primarily been used in interactive entertainment, though its applications are limitless - from the simulation of intelligent drivers in racing games, to resource management in manufacturing.

The xaitEngine handles all standard AI functionality, including pathfinding and simple AI behavior patterns such as movement. But while most other AI vendors stop there, the xaitEngine also handles more advanced AI. Such high-level AI can be found in the realistic interaction of the AI with its environment or the emotional intelligence of non-player characters (NPCs) in a game.

"Artificial intelligence has been offered in games for awhile," notes Dr. Andreas Gerber, CEO of xaitment. "But truly lifelike AI that offers emotional behaviors, autonomous actions and humanistic unpredictability, is something that almost no company has been able to provide, until now. What's more, we've been able to create our solution in a flexible manner that gives developers options so they are not locked into buying more than they need to enrich their own AI for their game."

As the marginal financial returns on graphical improvements decrease and the focus shifts over to playability, notice the popularity of the wii against the ps3 and xbox 360, we can expect to see more and more interest in using AI and multiagent techniques in games.

To me, the most interesting aspect of this development is that users will not want to battle infallibly intelligent opponents. That's boring. Instead the agents will need to incorporate emotional models, models of human-like non-rational behaviors (cf. behavioral Economics and Sociology for models), etc. They will also need to do this within a multi-player, thus multiagent, environment. In short, multiagent negotiation and decision-making techniques will find widespread adoption in the gaming domain.

The people at xaitment are betting on this, note their mission:

A spin-off of the world renowned German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), xaitment was founded in 2004 with the mission to create lifelike AI for games and simulations. Their mission led to the development of the xaitEngine, a highly customizable and highly modular multi-agent system that enables bots to learn from their mistakes, coordinate activities, compete with each other and achieve their goals with uncanny realism.