Sentience: VB Game (comments please)

Well the way I would do it is that I'd have a few different AI scripts for different styles of play.

So you'd have KillKillKill.ai, Defender.ai, ResourceGather.ai, Scout.ai etc.

And basically these scripts say where things should be placed, and when things should happen and what to respond to and what not to respond to, how daring the player should be etc.

So sentience.exe would then just look at the appropriate .ai file and control the computer according to how the script says it should...

Ya follow ?

thats exactly what the governor is for - it chooses which AI script it runs next...

you follow?

sorry, thaqt last post of mine sounded really sarcastic - trust me, it wasnt meant to be...

Didnt sound sarcastic to me ....

Anyway, so I would suggest then that you write the .ai files manually. So something like ...
(Im sort of using Settlers IV as an example, as im not as au fait with sentience, nor am I with your future plans).

Code:

---

#KillKillKill.ai
makeRandomArea1=rand1
makeAreaNearBorderInDirectionOfEnemy=area1
makeAreaNearCentreOfBorder=area2

Build0=WoodCutter,Around(rand1)
Build1=SawMill,Around(rand1)
Build2=Forester,Around(rand1)
Build3=SmallTower,area1
Build4=Barracks,Around(area1)
Build5=LargeResidence,Around(area2)

AttackIfEnemyWithinRangeAndAmOutNumbered=True
AttackIfEnemyWithinRangeAndNotOutNumbered=True
SendRaidingPartiesToEnemyBase=True
MinimumRaidingPartySize=10

---

That kind of thing.
Maybe not as elaborate, but ya know.

my screen if ****ed up cuz of that program!

Hey, Arbiter, here's the feature that's gonna make your game different from all the others:

Ok, all you do is have the computer choose between all the previous experiences (AIs, whatever you wanna call them), saved in files (preferably small :p ). Each saved AI will have the build order the computer used, what kind of micromanagement AI each mech has and the time the computer managed to survive. There's also info on if the computer won or not.

The computer will value higher AIs where it took only a few minutes to defeat the player, and value lower AIs where it lost in fewer time. It will choose between them randomly (but still taking the above into account, like, better AIs will have a higher chance to be chosen) and elaborate a bit each time. When it has enough AIs in its database (like 20 megs :p ), it would sometimes delete the worst games so they don't take up precious space.

This is called genetics AI, and it would fit pretty well in your game ;)

(I heard about an experience where they used this technique in robots simulations and the last robots were a million times better than the first ones)

Btw, here's a pic with some things I'd like to point out ;)

(Sorry, I had to blank out some parts so that the file could be under 100kb :( )

Hey Sunburn, you should give Arbiter more precise info on the error...

Jotaf me old bean!

Behemoth and I were talking about your hydrogen trees in the pub last night - I think he's going to make a start on them today.

Thanks for the info on AI's. The only thing is, each game is designed to be different for a new experience each time. The computer would have to take wildly differing tactics if they started on a small island or were on a mostly sea map for example.

Also, if any changes to the script were made (such as removing high explosives if suicide mechs are banned for online tournaments) then computer AI would be making flawed descisions.

At the moment, I want to concentrate on putting in a broad AI which can deal with a large number of circumstances.

Thanks for the pic as well, I'll reply to all the comments in my next post!

Sunburn,

Could you be a little more precise?

The worst thing Sentience has done so far is not restore a screen resolution or refresh rate. If it's done anything worse, then for Gods sake let me know!

Anything else I can be doing in the meantime ?

Yeah go on email me whatever.
My email addy's in my sig ... I think

eMail's on the way...

Now's your chance to produce a tremendous manual so never again shall the words 'I don't know what I'm doing' be heard!

Hmmm.... the only person to have their name mentioned more than once in the credits besides Ian and I.

(D*mn, vb-world ate my whole post!)

Hey, I think you should put my name in the "Concept and Design" section too ;) :D

I can give you some nice ideas for the pods when I get back from the encampment... I'm a boyscout, you know? I'm going tomorrow and I only return in 8 days... it's cool but it's too much time away from my computer :D

I wasn't talking about the health bar (but yes, it's cool :) ) I was talking about the Relocate Building feature! ;)

And I didn't mean you don't need a confirmation, just make it look more professional, like "Are you sure you want to quit?" :)

Oh, here's the shadow image I promised ;)
(Note: White should be transparent)

Ok. It looks a little dark, but it might just be me. I can't run S at work.

You know you can plug this into your copy by overwriting the existing FoW.bmp in the game directory.

I'll whack it in when I get back home and have a squizz...

hello...o...o...o...

phew. quiet around here.

anybody got anything to say?

hows the current version operational status?
I'd like to have a look at it :p

Out of memory :Eek: Run time error 7 :eek:

What?

Rubbish - it works perfectly. ;)

Try restarting your machine if it's been running for days on end and close some of the porn you have open in the background.

my bad, was out of resources :p ok windows fault. lucky you can blame on it.

Anyways, the "course-plotted" algoritm seems to malfunction, i tried to move it to a place and it jumped 10 squares to the left on it, then when i tried to move it back it discovered the water area as if it had walked on it.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Arbiter

Try restarting your machine if it's been running for days on end and close some of the porn you have open in the background. [/B]

---

How did you know? :eek: :p

Quote:

---

Originally posted by kedaman
my bad, was out of resources :p ok windows fault. lucky you can blame on it.

Anyways, the "course-plotted" algoritm seems to malfunction, i tried to move it to a place and it jumped 10 squares to the left on it, then when i tried to move it back it discovered the water area as if it had walked on it.

---

You've lost me now Kedabloke.

It found it and walked there the first time but wouldn't go back? What water squares? What are you on about? Got a screenshot?

First it had me register fm20.dll and that file wasn't on win98, that's weird because it worked the first time. Next i couldn't load my save file, it said it was wrong version :confused:

What the hell is fm20.dll?

I don't use that.... :confused:

I have no idea but that's what it wanted. the thing was in xp's system folder so i just registered it :p Anyways, your game put a odd signature on my savefile and didn't recognize it later :eek:

when i exit the game the screen size doesnt revert back to the original resolution

Bwahahahah more bugs ;)
Oh yeah, craft's updated too :)

There's a nice feature.
If you fly down right, and goto the second set of co-ordinates on bottom left of screen. Then when you see the very badly drawn space station, put pointer over it and press 'd'.
Then put pointer over lables. Mmmmmmm ;)


And happy birthday by the way.
Have a good one :)

I built, moved, then tryed to park a sensor chip building tingy, and I got a script out of range error. I tryed to use your couse plotting thing on a whooping map, and a 500X500 map, and both times I got an overflow run-time error. This time around, I could move my first rmv. What is up with the fact that the energy seems to be reversed. It seems to be -my income - my outgo on the energy (income=20, outgo = 6 is -14 to energy). You can only select the top chip for the mechs. The rest are off the bottom of the screen. What are the terraform pods?

I also think that having the map files would be good, along with an editor. The best idea for the format would be to have 2 picture files. One for the terrain, and one for the resources. Then have the editor combine them into one file, and possibly compress them if there bitmaps. To help reduce the size, you would probly want both the files in gray scale, unless you have more then 255 terrain types or resources (which I know you don't). You may even want to let the maps include a system like Starcrafts for the units, and possibly include a map scripting system (like the triggers). Although I know this is way ahead of where you are, just thought I wouldlet you know some ideas.

If you want, I would be nice enough to make a simple editor for it. Although I will be gone for one week in one week, then I start school again in 3 weeks. :(

By the way, this thread grows too fast, around 50 posts in 2 days. It makes it very hard to keep up to date on it.

I got a subscript out of range when i clicked once on Components at the begining of a game. I got a screenshot now, The fog of war isn't suppose to be white right? Also there's white blended background on each building. The laser turret i'm building left of little rock with green on top of it (btw is it something i should slurp eh?) isn't visible, it flickers sometimes, but it's not visible. Why is one of mechs sitting there (the one to the left) all the time, i put it on slurp-AI. How do I know how much they have slurped? How do I get more Energy? I got -28 right now.
http://www.vbforums.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=468990

This looks like a really cool game even though I only discovered this post now I would like to be a part of it need any help? if you do e-mail me at [email protected]

Is arbiter asleep or summin ?

Arrrghhh!!

Cool, lots of comments - right let's answer them...

Gaming,

No idea about the subscript out of range, I'll try and duplicate it.

I'll sort that overflow when I get chance. I'm debating whether I should limit the searching or use bigger variables... Hmmm.

That energy's just a silly thing. Rats. Thanks for pointing it out.

The terraform pods will provide you with funky bonuses when you discover them. They don't at the moment though. I'm still trying to compile a list of bonuses they can bestow - anyone got any ideas?

Thanks for the offer on the map editor, I may get back to you on that.

Kedadude,

The components thing will crash first off. This is a known bug - I've done nothing on that screen for months, I guess I should tidy it up some.

Ok, the flickery turret is because I added the animation engine to the game, but as 29 frames of the auto generated buildings are blank it's going to be largely invisible. When Behemoth does some graphics for them, this will no longer happen.

The graphics have gone bonkers. They do that every now and again - I have no idea why. I'm planning a workaround for that.

The slurper ain't moving eh? Did you remember to set its slurping priorities from the context menu? If it has no priorites, it won't go anywhere.

You get more energy by building reactor buildings. As there's no cut off on energy at the moment you'll never run out and it will have no ill effects. This is for a number of reasons, mostly testing.

All,

Thanks for your support guys, keep the comments coming!!!

By the way arbiter, I got bored earily today, and started work on the editor. It was nearly finished after 7 hours. I could use some code that you have delopved and some pictures to respersent the resources so I can finish it. Also, to keep the size down (below 100K at the time) I have a compression rotine. So if you do use my map editor, you will have to add a class to your game. I figured you wouldn't want map files exceeding 494K (this would be the appox size of the largest map (500X500) when I add in the resources. With compression, they shouldn't be much bigger then 163K. That is around 67% compression rate(better then winzip, which is around 65% :))

On the terraform pods, I found out what they did half an hour after posting, when I ran across one. I may have some ideas, but I want to know what yours are first, to help me better my ideas.

With the script out of range, that hasn't happened seince I posted that. Now, all it does is flicker a little, then disapper. It only lasts for about 1 second, so I woun't be able to get a screen shot.

My God.

You must have been chronically bored to spend 7 hours working on a map editor.

I'm interested in seeing how you've recorded the resources as there are about 7 or 8 resources per square, all of varying amounts.

Tell me what you need to finish it and I'll either send some stuff across to you or plug it in myself. It'll be in about 8hrs time though as I'm in work at the moment.

I'd also like to see the compression you're putting on the picture files. It would have to be a non lossy compression wouldn't it? Is it one you wrote yourself or did you whip it from somewhere else?

If you whipped it from somewhere else then I wouldn't use it. Sentience is all 'home coded'.

Behemoth and I are going to thrash some ideas around, probably in the comms forums. If you wish to chip in then that's where we'll be!

The compression is around 90% home made. I had to take parts of the arglohin from elsewhere. It does include a modules (1 funtion, 12 varibles/declares) from somewhere on vbworld. It is the fileinfomod. I use help insure that the file is compressed. I have attempted to modify the parts that I did take, to make them heavily unquie. And, I am not using pictures. I discovered that text was a lot easier. And, at the point of writting this, I have not added in any of the code for resources, but from what you said, this will be harder then I expected to add in.

To finish it, I need the code to create the mapfiles that you use in your game. At this point I just randomly set the tiles (works, but looks ugly). I could also use the code to figure out what type of the terrain to place (which file to get it from). Currently, It takes a random one from 1777.bmp, or if it is water, uses 1000.bmp. This also looks somewhat ugly. But hey, it works.

Sentience currently stores the map data in with the save games (which are binary files).

I think it would be best if I send you the type declarations for the map details. That way you know what you're working with. I'm somewhat confused as to how you're managing to write a map editor without a definitive list of the way the game holds the map data.

Must take some real talent... ;)

It is called guessing, I figure out the most likely ways to hold the infomation, then I use that. Basicly, I just do it the way I would. If you wish to send me the infomation, send it to [email protected]

And while you're at it, send me the entire source ;)
And take a look at Craft, I've my own implimentation of the Streamtext yokie. Might be of intrest to you.

No-one's getting any code.

Especially not lunatic Irishmen!

I'll take a look at Shaft when I get home. What Streamtext yokie? You mean the text on the select player screen?

Chances are yours is going to be much better than mine, mine flickers after a couple of paragraphs.

You need to come up with a better name than 'craft' - it's toss.

What I meant by "code" was "the type declarations for the map details".

I was talking to Plend. ;)

He's been haranguing me for the source to Sentience for ages.

He'll have to pry it from my cold, dead fingers! :D