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A-Life, Emergent AI and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: An Interview with Dmitriy Iassenev (article restored from defunct AiGamedev.com)
article restored from defunct AiGamedev.com (February 25th, 2008)
Ever since it was first announced, the game S.T.A.L.K.E.R. has captured the imagination of avid gamers fascinated by the idea of a massive world populated by an A-Life system. The game also piqued the interest of AI developers here at AiGameDev.com, making it into the finalists for best AI and runner up for technical innovation in the Game AI Awards for 2007.
It’s therefore a pleasure to announce this exclusive interview with Dmitriy Iassenev, the mastermind behind the AI and A-Life system in S.T.A.L.K.E.R., who agreed to answer some questions about the engine and its implementation. As it turns out, there’s some pretty amazing technology under the hood to — and not only on the surface!
Alex Champandard: Hi, Dmitriy. Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions. Could you introduce yourself briefly and tell us about your background in AI and game development?
Dmitriy Iassenev: Hi, Alex. I am the lead programmer at GSC Game World on S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky.
The first thing I got acquainted with in this matter was the intelligence for the board game filler at the AI course in the university. Further on, this interest grew into the creation of a program that can play othello(reversi); it did not become the best, though it had won one championship on a synchro-random games (opponents play the same position for white and black simultaneously, after finishing both games the winner is determined by sum of the results). After graduating from university in 2002, I started working at GSC Game World as the artificial intelligence programmer on S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl.
AC: One of the key features of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is the A-Life system. Could you describe what you think is the essence of A-life, and how it can be applied?
DI: The gist of the A-life is that the characters in the game live their own lives and exist all the time, not only when they are in the player’s field of view. It eventually runs counter to the customary optimization processes used in games development (why perform operations…
