Artificial Intelligence in a game/MMORPG?

[doomdragon6]

I was reading a manga called iDentity, which is basically about an MMORPG. Kind of like dotHack, only it doesn't make me angry.

It's supposed to be "futuristic technology" that allows for better control and interactions, you know, to make it not boring to a reader. But they also have fully interactable "intelligent" NPCs that they can have conversations with and learn info from, aside from "Hi!" and "Come back soon!"

So it made me think-- we have plenty of "smart buddies" that you can IM or message out in the 'net that will carry on what can seem like a half decent conversation with you. They'll even greet you by name and remember if you offended them or whatever. "I'm not talking to you until you apologize!" So why don't we have that in games? You could just strike up conversation when you're bored, which happens often. You could get various info like, "Have you see -name of character-?" and if they had stopped by, maybe they could tell you if they had been there recently, and maybe even what you had talked about.

Sure it'd be flawed, but it'd be no worse than a 3D model that serves only to sell you crap.

I dunno, what do you think?

If that dies, what are some of the most immersive games you've played? Looking to get into something.

 

[CynicismKills]

Funny enough the only MMO I ever played that managed anything near this was EverQuest. To continue conversations with NPC's to get quest info or complete quests, you have to use key words and phrase them somewhat properly. For example if NPC JOE says:

"Greetings! I see you have ITEM OF POWER #34-622! You know, I hear NPC WILLY is looking for the hero who managed to find it."

Later in the game's life, certain words had brackets so this would be easy, but early on you had to figure out how the conversation should branch. So if you said:

"ITEM OF POWER"

nothing happens. But if you said:

"What ITEM OF POWER?"

Joe would reply, continuing the conversation.

I know this isn't exactly what you're talking about, DD, but it's more than most MMO's current "click to continue" style of quest progression in text.

 

[Hailey Knight]

Streamlining brings in more people. Having the player have to figure out what to type would remove a lot of the core playerbase from games like WoW.

I think the Old Republic MMO's choice system, with repercussions, makes better sense economically.

 

[doomdragon6]

Well, there would be the menu of course, to keep things simple. But if you wanted, you could type, "How are things, Jill?" or "What's up?" or "What's going on?"

Depending on the day and time, you could get

"Yaawn! Just opened an hour ago. Not too many people yet." / If the spot is popular, "Wow, I just opened an hour ago and so many people have come in!"

"How many people?"

"Oh, I think you're the 12th." / "Oh, about 50 or so."

"That's a lot!"

"I know!"

"What time is it?"

"It's 10:17 am."

Well, there's no point typing a whole convesation, but you get the idea. There would be a menu to streamline things, and you could chat just for the hell of it. If you've ever talked to one of those chat bots, you know it can be done. Though I assume giving each NPC their own "knowledge packets" would be time-consuming.

Oh well. Maybe someday.

 

[Chibibar]

I have to agree with Ame. I don't think typing will work due to many "lazy hands" way of doing. I believe having many different choices and those choice changes depending on the situation would be pretty cool.

 

[Dave]

Fuck the lazy hands. I could see this in WoW as Easter Eggs. So there's an area that is password protected (such as the Mines of Moria) and only saying a certain thing to the right people could bring it up.

I'd dig it, truthfully.

 

[Dave]

Okay, maybe saying the right thing gets you a key to a closed door in an instance. So you'd HAVE to search the guy out. People would start by seeing the door and wonder how to get into it. Once they got it figured out it would be broadcast but until then it would be a discovery.

 

[Chibibar]

Fuck the lazy hands. I could see this in WoW as Easter Eggs. So there's an area that is password protected (such as the Mines of Moria) and only saying a certain thing to the right people could bring it up.

I'd dig it, truthfully.

the solution to those 'easter eggs' would be broadcasted over every chat channel within an hour of implementation ruining the entire concept. (Just like most things that would be more fun in WoW)[/QUOTE]

Hmmm... I guess if we do have a true A.I. it could counter it and "create" new way of doing things or maybe mix up the quest or something.

 

[GasBandit]

Anything that discourages AIM/TXTspeak is a good thing.

 

[Dave]

And the passwords themselves, when unscrambled, spell out another clue for a treasure.

 

[Chibibar]

So.... lets say there is a NPC that give out this quest that gave a cool item. Lets make it limited number of item (say only 100) now, of course the quest is not lost to the other 14,999,900 players (15 mil from earlier example) once the item are given out, the quest giver will go

"Sorry, I am out of the X item, maybe you can check with Y NPC" Of course the quest could "rotate" with like 20 NPCs around the kingdom.

the hint could also change per day by "rumor mills" per hour. A player has to go to the inn to get the "hint" of the hour and use the correct unscramble word to the RIGHT NPC (could be part of the hint)

That could be fun.

(that was just thought up in a few minutes, but I might add more once I flesh it out more)

 

[Chibibar]

Limiting the number of 'golden' award for completion could potentially discourage people from sharing what they have found out so far, which I see as a good thing. Maybe even add more direct incentives with lines like "I wouldn't blab this information around if I were you. Someone might just beat you to the prize!".

well, not limiting the actual prize, but change it up so the "answer on the web" won't be correct for more than say.... an hour

Lets say that Roland Demise have about 1000 golden hammer of awesomesauce available. The quest starts with an innkeeper but you have to use the word " Hey, got any news on a new item?" (keyword news, new item in that order) and the innkeeper will reply
"Yea, but I wouldn't pass this around, but I heard that Roland know something about it make sure you say 'Sake' and I send ya" Of course at this time, Roland can hand out 1000 quest to the first 1000 people who can complete it and get the reward but if anyone else come by Roland would deny anything about the reward and send them to another NPC or back to a different innkeeper Of course it would be cool if the message between the player and Roland are in private chat (whisper or whatever) so the public doesn't see what is going on

The game will have like 20 NPC the players can go to but only get 1 reward. After it cycle all 20, Roland will have it again and can go like, "I just got a new shipment of this stuff, would you be interested of doing X thing for me for it?"

 

[CynicismKills]

Oh believe me, I wouldn't want EQ's way of quest NPC progression back. Even knowing what to type wasn't enough, you had to be standing just close enough and sometimes they bugged and wouldn't register the phrases. It wasn't a reliable system at all. WoW has the flavor in quests that most games don't seem to get right though, thanks mostly to coming from a pretty rich history that's been easy for Blizzard to build on.