Genetic Algorithm (GA)-Based NPC Making

Abstract

Non-playable characters have always been a special part of video games. Their appearance is more pronounced in role-playing games like the Elder Scrolls series and the Fallout series or in the open-world games like the Grand Theft Auto series or the Assassins Creed series. The presence of these characters is either to provide the player with objectives to complete or give a sense of a living world with people going on about their business. The variety of these characters is however lacking which takes the player away from the illusion of a believable world. This lack of variety is attributed to the amount of man-hours required to craft an individual character. With a tight budget, the number of these individuals remains small; hence, the same characters are repeated throughout the game. In this article, the utility of using genetic algorithm for creating non-playable characters in games will be discussed. The previous approaches regarding the use of genetic algorithm for creating characters will be explained first, and then the usage of this algorithm in modern games will be analyzed. Finally the advantages of this technique will be explained as opposed to the normally used method of character creation.