Visual fidelity will take care of itself but if anything is long overdue an overhaul it's A.I. This would usher in a true next-gen leap of gameplay because right now NPC A.I behaviour is so bad it's actually immersion-breaking.
Consider this scenario:
I approach an enemy base in stealth, I headshot a guard with an arrow and he squeals in pain. I stay in cover. The NPC's nearby continue to follow their guard patrol routes, while one NPC notices the guard is down and inspects. I headshot him. Another guard notices and walks over to inspect. I headshot him. I headshot him. Etc. I never once move from my position and watch as each guard approaches the increasing pile of bodies.....I move on and take a shot at a sniper in a guard tower....but I miss, my arrow hits the wall behind him. The sniper looks around quizzically and then after a few moments resumes his routine and this time I headshot him.
With proper A.I routines consider the same scenario again:
I approach an enemy base in stealth, the sniper in the guard tower has noticed me but I do not notice that he has. The sniper takes cover, signals one of his buddies and waits for an opportunity to shoot. I headshot a guard on the ground, his cry of pain alerts another guard. The guard notices the arrow in the head of his comrade and immediately goes prone, he knows from the position of the body and placement of the arrow...the general direction of where the shot came from. The guard shouts, alerting the base and putting every guard into a state of readiness, all of them assume cover. I now move because there is no clear shot on any target. The sniper fires and hits me. I scramble for cover. I aim at the guard tower but the tower is empty....or appears so....I wait for the sniper to pop his head back up but he never does because his position is compromised and any sniper with half a brain does not trade shots with another sniper in position. I move further into the base when suddenly I am being shot from both sides, the guards who were signalled to by the sniper have flanked me so I run back into the forest to lose them, I run and run because I know that after a certain distance they'll stop pursuing me. 3 of the guards don't have the stamina and give up but guard no.4 is smarter than the others...he finds a horse and rides after me but I'm in stealth...the guards return to the base. I decide to return to my entry point and am promptly head-shotted as soon as I emerge from the forest by the sniper who has been waiting for me. Mr.Sniper has been scanning the tree-line ever since I fled.
Now the second example is kinda extreme but I play out the exact same routine of version 1 when I play AC games, Farcry, Cyberprank etc etc. because the A.I is so shit. If I mess up I simply abuse line of sight and move back into stealth and that resets the encounter. It's dumb. History is not recorded, the fact that someone died on their team should completely change the encounter, the A.I doesn't use it's superior numbers to flush me out etc etc
Now before you start screaming: But I don't want realism, I don't want my games to turn into a military operation. We can balance these A.I routines by adding.....personality traits.....so elite fortresses will be patrolled by the best A.I versions and assaulting those bases will require actual thought because those bases should be challenging. Smaller bases will practice complacency and be staffed by less skilled guards. What does this mean for these encounters? Emergent gameplay! You could face a guard who has low bravery, so he panics and runs and hides or he unloads an entire clip at you but misses completely, or the dude just kneels and begs for his life.
What am I trying to introduce here? RANDOM CHAOS. We don't want robots guarding these bases, we want HUMANS and humans are unpredictable. This means no two encounters are the same. You could run into a guard who just came out of the toilet and he surrenders, puts his hands up but then he starts shouting for help. What do you do? He's behaving like a real human, not just following some NPC routine. These personality traits can spill into how they speak, what they say, the animations they access. Maybe next time that guard who just came out of the toilet will be ice cool, he'll tell you he has a family so you stand behind him to tie him up but he thinks you're going to execute him because you've stepped out of his line of sight so he soils himself and then he feels the rope being tied around his hands...so he starts calling for help because he knows you're weak.
In Cyberprank 2077 factions are only distinguished by their cosmetics and weapons, they don't actually behave any differently and require zero adjustment of strategy. But with with the A.I personality packages facing Maelstrom is now like facing a rushing pack of shotgun wielding psycho's and facing Tyger is having to deal with cyborg ninja's. Missing a headshot should induce panic...there's risk..there should be a reward for being accurate. But currently I miss shot, I try again. No one cares about the sound I'm making, no one gives a shit about where it came from.
Imagine applying these routines to games you've completed, how would they play differently? Imagine playing Dark Souls and the A.I guard having seen you parry his pal to death, changes weapons to negate this tactic. Imagine MGS remake with new A.I. Or Skyrim, or Fallout etc
Conversely this could be applied to your A.I companions, imagine them being actually competent and useful...
No more cheap kills. Who's with me?
Consider this scenario:
I approach an enemy base in stealth, I headshot a guard with an arrow and he squeals in pain. I stay in cover. The NPC's nearby continue to follow their guard patrol routes, while one NPC notices the guard is down and inspects. I headshot him. Another guard notices and walks over to inspect. I headshot him. I headshot him. Etc. I never once move from my position and watch as each guard approaches the increasing pile of bodies.....I move on and take a shot at a sniper in a guard tower....but I miss, my arrow hits the wall behind him. The sniper looks around quizzically and then after a few moments resumes his routine and this time I headshot him.
With proper A.I routines consider the same scenario again:
I approach an enemy base in stealth, the sniper in the guard tower has noticed me but I do not notice that he has. The sniper takes cover, signals one of his buddies and waits for an opportunity to shoot. I headshot a guard on the ground, his cry of pain alerts another guard. The guard notices the arrow in the head of his comrade and immediately goes prone, he knows from the position of the body and placement of the arrow...the general direction of where the shot came from. The guard shouts, alerting the base and putting every guard into a state of readiness, all of them assume cover. I now move because there is no clear shot on any target. The sniper fires and hits me. I scramble for cover. I aim at the guard tower but the tower is empty....or appears so....I wait for the sniper to pop his head back up but he never does because his position is compromised and any sniper with half a brain does not trade shots with another sniper in position. I move further into the base when suddenly I am being shot from both sides, the guards who were signalled to by the sniper have flanked me so I run back into the forest to lose them, I run and run because I know that after a certain distance they'll stop pursuing me. 3 of the guards don't have the stamina and give up but guard no.4 is smarter than the others...he finds a horse and rides after me but I'm in stealth...the guards return to the base. I decide to return to my entry point and am promptly head-shotted as soon as I emerge from the forest by the sniper who has been waiting for me. Mr.Sniper has been scanning the tree-line ever since I fled.
Now the second example is kinda extreme but I play out the exact same routine of version 1 when I play AC games, Farcry, Cyberprank etc etc. because the A.I is so shit. If I mess up I simply abuse line of sight and move back into stealth and that resets the encounter. It's dumb. History is not recorded, the fact that someone died on their team should completely change the encounter, the A.I doesn't use it's superior numbers to flush me out etc etc
Now before you start screaming: But I don't want realism, I don't want my games to turn into a military operation. We can balance these A.I routines by adding.....personality traits.....so elite fortresses will be patrolled by the best A.I versions and assaulting those bases will require actual thought because those bases should be challenging. Smaller bases will practice complacency and be staffed by less skilled guards. What does this mean for these encounters? Emergent gameplay! You could face a guard who has low bravery, so he panics and runs and hides or he unloads an entire clip at you but misses completely, or the dude just kneels and begs for his life.
What am I trying to introduce here? RANDOM CHAOS. We don't want robots guarding these bases, we want HUMANS and humans are unpredictable. This means no two encounters are the same. You could run into a guard who just came out of the toilet and he surrenders, puts his hands up but then he starts shouting for help. What do you do? He's behaving like a real human, not just following some NPC routine. These personality traits can spill into how they speak, what they say, the animations they access. Maybe next time that guard who just came out of the toilet will be ice cool, he'll tell you he has a family so you stand behind him to tie him up but he thinks you're going to execute him because you've stepped out of his line of sight so he soils himself and then he feels the rope being tied around his hands...so he starts calling for help because he knows you're weak.
In Cyberprank 2077 factions are only distinguished by their cosmetics and weapons, they don't actually behave any differently and require zero adjustment of strategy. But with with the A.I personality packages facing Maelstrom is now like facing a rushing pack of shotgun wielding psycho's and facing Tyger is having to deal with cyborg ninja's. Missing a headshot should induce panic...there's risk..there should be a reward for being accurate. But currently I miss shot, I try again. No one cares about the sound I'm making, no one gives a shit about where it came from.
Imagine applying these routines to games you've completed, how would they play differently? Imagine playing Dark Souls and the A.I guard having seen you parry his pal to death, changes weapons to negate this tactic. Imagine MGS remake with new A.I. Or Skyrim, or Fallout etc
Conversely this could be applied to your A.I companions, imagine them being actually competent and useful...
No more cheap kills. Who's with me?
Last edited: