Cognitive Models for Virtual Characters
Pierangelo Dell’Acqua
[email protected]
March, 2011
Virtual world:
• dynamic
• unpredictable
• physics-based (possibly)
Characters:
• situated
• autonomous
• rational
• reactive
• perceptive
Aim of the project
1. To design and implement the virtual world
- design depends on the character’s behavior
2. To design and animate characters:
- to reason, perceive and act on the world
- to interact with each other
3. To design and implement a general architecture for characters
- modular to be extended with more capabilities, e.g. learning
Characters’ modelling hierarchy
Virtual world
1. Virtual world
- simple (to start with)
- representation
- define which parts are dynamic
- graphical rendering
- add components (sound, smell, etc.)
2. Ideally, same representation for different character’s behaviors
Modelling characters
1. Start by exploring simple, basics behaviors:
- graphical rendering of characters
- motion
- character’s representation (partial) of the world
- reasoning (uncertainty)
- perception: ability to perform sensing if something is unknown
- reactivity
- spatial reasoning
- sound reasoning
- ability to follow a scent trial
- social behavior (interaction, cooperation, etc.)
- planning
- vision
2. All these basics behaviors require:
- an understanding of the world
- ability to reason
3. Towards more complex behaviors:
- character’s architecture (modular, extensible, etc.)
- interplay rationality, reactivity and perception
Diploma work
1. Several diploma works are possible – they are research oriented
2. You may decide which behavior to model:
- check state-of-the-art
- design and implement the behavior
- test implementation and compare with related work
3. More challenging than external diploma works:
- freedom to choose which aspects to address
- how to carry on the work (new suggestions and ideas are welcome)
- project impact on gaming