Date of Graduation

5-2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Degree Level

Undergraduate

Department

Computer Science and Computer Engineering

Advisor/Mentor

Gauch, John

Committee Member/Reader

Gauch, Susan

Committee Member/Second Reader

Fredrick, David

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence systems have come a long way over the years. One particular application of A.I. is its incorporation in video games. A key goal of creating an A.I. system in a video game is to convey a level of intellect to the player. During playtests for Halo: Combat Evolved, the developers at Bungie noticed that players deemed tougher enemies as more intelligent than weaker ones, despite the fact that there were no differences in behavior in the enemies. The tougher enemies provided a greater illusion of intelligence to the players. Inspired by this, I set out to create a project that captures the essence of this idea. An A.I. system was designed in the Unity game engine using the graph algorithm Dijkstra’s Single-Source Shortest Path that would direct a car around a small city-like area. More cars were then added to the level in order to set up the possibility for collisions. The measure of the cars’ intelligence is their ability to avoid these collisions. New systems and techniques were developed that would help the cars avoid collisions without making major changes to their fundamental behaviors, thus increasing their measure of intelligence.

Keywords

artificial intelligence; game design; distributed intelligence

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