Games with programmable AI

Lieberkuhn

I used to play Ragnarok Online. I quite liked it, but the severe grind (amongst other things) got on my nerves and I stopped playing. Thing is, one of the things I liked most about it was the homunculus system: the Alchemist class could create a pet that followed them around and fought for them, and whose AI was completely programmable.

By "programmable" I don't mean there was a window with tick boxes that said things like "attack on sight" or "heal when below [ ]% hp"... I mean you had to open up notepad and write that shit from scratch in LUA. The default AI was intentionally made stupid, inconvenient, and prone to committing ban-worthy acts to encourage you to reprogram it. Can't program? Haha, let's hope someone who does has posted their AI for download on a fansite somewhere, noob!

It was awesome. I learnt a great deal about programming thanks to that system, though I quit the game in frustration long before I got the chance to tackle a rather ambitious project: an AI that could learn, akin to the Creature from Black and White. I doubt I could have achieved it, but I wanted to try! And I still do!

So my question is, H/A, are there any other games featuring a pet whose AI can be (legally) programmed from scratch?

SammyF

This is not actually an answer to your question, so I guess this is more "advice" than "help" by the standards of the H/A forum -- but if you're that interested in programming game AI, you should consider finding a friend to help you design, program and distribute a game.

admanb

The only thing coming to mind is Freedom Force, which is scripted in Python. It's not the same, but it's a similar idea.

Lieberkuhn

Thanks for the ideas, folks. They seem a bit too ambitious, though... I'm still very much a noob to programming, and I liked the narrow focus that a single creature's AI within an established game offered me.

I'm kind of tempted to return to RO, but I'm not sure it's worth it.

I still play WoW, though, and I've heard its player-generated addons are pretty powerful. I understand they're strictly an interface thing, but I wonder if I could create an intelligent pet of sorts using that?

Tofystedeth

Yeah, suggesting someone program a whole game is kind of silly. There was an old school game, called Robot Battle or something where you had to program the robots actions, but I don't remember if it was pure programming or using logic blocks.

jothki

You might want to look at Warcraft 3 or Starcraft 2, the triggering systems are pretty powerful.

Raiden333

Tofystedeth wrote: »

Yeah, suggesting someone program a whole game is kind of silly. There was an old school game, called Robot Battle or something where you had to program the robots actions, but I don't remember if it was pure programming or using logic blocks.

Robot Odyssey.

I loved the shit out of that game.

Also, a bit more simplified, but you might want to look into FFXII or Dragon Age, you can program party member behavior with a series of If-Then statements.

Orogogus

I played a demo for a game called Colobot several years ago where you got to order some robots around using a C++ like language. I do wish there were something like this with a broader scope, like spaceships or something.

Another was Mindrover: The Europa Project.

But I would submit that these are probably not worth $68 and $108, respectively, which is what they seem to be going for now.

Even older than those, I think in the pre-hard drive days, Origin also made a game called Omega where you had to program your cybertank in a BASIC-like language. It had a giant manual, and was pretty great.

Lieberkuhn

Raiden333 wrote: »

Also, a bit more simplified, but you might want to look into FFXII or Dragon Age, you can program party member behavior with a series of If-Then statements.

I had considered those, but if I understand correctly, all you can really do is arrange a set of pre-defined statements into a pre-defined structure? You can't, say, give your character the ability to recognise things they've seen before, or tackle a problem differently if they failed the first time?

jothki wrote: »

You might want to look at Warcraft 3 or Starcraft 2, the triggering systems are pretty powerful.

This sounds promising, thanks!

Daemonion

I am not completely sure of the extent or depth, but Garry's Mod for Half-Life 2 might have some stuff with LUA.

I would search for their official forums. Good luck!

Hahnsoo1

Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 allowed you to create your own AI systems from scratch in the editors. I've done a lot of work on NWScript personally (which is a lot like C), and it's a lot of fun to create behaviors like Blink Dog attack routines and self-destructing Goblins Suicide Bombers and whatnot.

Ioga

Starcraft 2's editing suite is supposed to be incredibly robust - I don't know if it's programmable but if you want a deep and nuanced control in the scripting of AI events, it could do you pretty well.

Klorgnum

This isn't exactly what you're looking for, but it's kind of similar. You have to use simple programming techniques to solve various puzzles (which are surprisingly hard).

Sir Carcass

What about Lego Mindstorms? Not a game, but seems similar to what you're looking for and might scratch that itch.

Æthelred

Robocode is a game/framework where you can write code for a robot in Java or .NET. Then, your robot fights against other people's robots! They run huge amounts of games between robots to determine whose is best. It's pretty fun, but meant to be educational.

Grundlterror

Orogogus wrote: »

I played a demo for a game called Colobot several years ago where you got to order some robots around using a C++ like language. I do wish there were something like this with a broader scope, like spaceships or something.

This game actually seems like it could have potential. Has anyone played the full game?

Smug Duckling

Klorgnum wrote: »

This isn't exactly what you're looking for, but it's kind of similar. You have to use simple programming techniques to solve various puzzles (which are surprisingly hard).

Wow, thanks for suggesting that. It's really cool. It also really helps to have taken a finite state machine course in college. :P

Sir Carcass

Smug Duckling wrote: »

Klorgnum wrote: »

This isn't exactly what you're looking for, but it's kind of similar. You have to use simple programming techniques to solve various puzzles (which are surprisingly hard).

Wow, thanks for suggesting that. It's really cool. It also really helps to have taken a finite state machine course in college. :P

I got the first two groups done, but now it's making my head hurt.

Klorgnum

This seems like what you might be looking for. It's just a guy's weekend project at the moment, but it might be worth following as he develops it.

Sipex

I'd also advocate returning to RO simply to complete your goal.

You don't actually have to play at this point, you have your creature and the ability to program it. All you have to do is program and take it out to the field to test once in a while.

Once you're done you don't need to keep playing.