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In the Future, Video Games Will Care About You
Developers are experimenting with A.I. to learn from your moves and personalize your gaming experience
Eight years ago, game developer Bethesda attempted a radical experiment with its epic role-playing adventure Skyrim — and it went horribly, beautifully wrong. To make players feel like they were a part of a living, breathing world, the designers created an artificial intelligence system named Radiant, which gave computer-controlled characters (nonplayer characters, or NPCs) a range of needs, ambitions, and personality quirks and allowed them to act on those elements dynamically. Players were meant to be delighted when they encountered characters filled with life and emotion and who seemed to really react to the things you did.
Instead, the A.I. characters went rogue. To meet their needs, they started slaying merchants, shopkeepers, and each other. Even worse, characters addicted to an in-game narcotic named skooma would do anything to get a fix. By the time a human player showed up at a tavern or a meeting place, everyone was already dead — slain by artificially intelligent drug addicts who had figured out that killing was a more effective way of meeting their needs than buying stuff.
Video games are like those charming, boorish…
