Help deciding on books
by Morrie · in Technical Issues · 10/04/2006 (8:49 am) · 3 replies
I'm creating a FPS like Fear and Doom 3 put together. I currently own:
AI game programming and wisdom 1 & 2. These books are all basically theory. I'm looking for a book that will help me jump in to programming AI into the engine.
Questions:
1) What books should I try for programming AI in the engine?
2) What types of AI should I use for a FPS?
3) Is this a good book to use to create a tool set Like AI. Implant. (Game Engine Toolset Development).
AI game programming and wisdom 1 & 2. These books are all basically theory. I'm looking for a book that will help me jump in to programming AI into the engine.
Questions:
1) What books should I try for programming AI in the engine?
2) What types of AI should I use for a FPS?
3) Is this a good book to use to create a tool set Like AI. Implant. (Game Engine Toolset Development).
#2
01/17/2007 (11:42 am)
Another good book is AI Game Engine Programming by Brian Schwab. It goes through some of the basics for setting up an AI game engine. I am new to AI programming so I don't know how well it discusses the more detailed advanced topics.
#3
Programming Game AI by Example (Matt Buckland)
Artificial Intelligence for Games (Ian Millington)
These two are at the top of my list. Matt's book has more C++ code in it; he basically takes you through a whole engine, but also explains a great deal of theory. Ian's book is mostly pseudo-code, which I actually prefer, and it's more comprehensive. It is a bit more academic, but not so much that it becomes impractical. Both are great reads. If I was a beginner, and I had to choose one book, I'd probably go with Matt's. Then I'd save my money so that when I was finished with it, I could buy Ian's. Sure, a lot will be repeated, but sometimes it's really helpful to hear the same thing in different ways.
AI Techniques for Game Programming (Matt Buckland)
Also an amazing book; you can actually probably learn all you need to know for 99% of your AI needs from this book. But it's not as comprehensive as the other two. On the plus side, this book's Genetic Algorithm-trained Neural Networks rock! For certain circumstances, that is. Something like this would usually be overkill, but I did the AI for a one-on-one fighting game using this technique, and I was very pleased by the results.
AI Game Programming Wisdom 3
This book is part of a series; they all contain collections of articles collected from industry AI programmers. Some of the articles are _really_ good, but I don't think this is a good series to start learning AI from. They're much better reads _after_ you already have a grasp of the basics.
03/13/2007 (8:13 pm)
I've read:Programming Game AI by Example (Matt Buckland)
Artificial Intelligence for Games (Ian Millington)
These two are at the top of my list. Matt's book has more C++ code in it; he basically takes you through a whole engine, but also explains a great deal of theory. Ian's book is mostly pseudo-code, which I actually prefer, and it's more comprehensive. It is a bit more academic, but not so much that it becomes impractical. Both are great reads. If I was a beginner, and I had to choose one book, I'd probably go with Matt's. Then I'd save my money so that when I was finished with it, I could buy Ian's. Sure, a lot will be repeated, but sometimes it's really helpful to hear the same thing in different ways.
AI Techniques for Game Programming (Matt Buckland)
Also an amazing book; you can actually probably learn all you need to know for 99% of your AI needs from this book. But it's not as comprehensive as the other two. On the plus side, this book's Genetic Algorithm-trained Neural Networks rock! For certain circumstances, that is. Something like this would usually be overkill, but I did the AI for a one-on-one fighting game using this technique, and I was very pleased by the results.
AI Game Programming Wisdom 3
This book is part of a series; they all contain collections of articles collected from industry AI programmers. Some of the articles are _really_ good, but I don't think this is a good series to start learning AI from. They're much better reads _after_ you already have a grasp of the basics.
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2. That depends on the level of complexity you want. Unintelligent monsters can easily be done with FSMs and work fine, but to make something of more human-like intelligence you may want to look into techniques like neural nets.
3. I don't know if any book is specifically. It just shows you how to program AI, not necessarily as a toolset.