Sony Blog Responds to 'PS3 Can't Handle AI As Well As 360' Options

[PS3Scene]

Sony Blog Responds to 'PS3 Can't Handle AI As Well As 360' Posted by XanTium | 15-8-2007 0:06 EST

From n4g.com: [QUOTE] A poster on the Official PlayStation Blog by the screen name of "Free" had this to say on recent article posted on the Blog. "Would you guys mind commenting on the recent statements by a Ubisoft Developer claiming that "the PS3 can't handle AI nearly as well as the 360? "PS3 can more than handle AI, as you will see with Heavenly Sword, which has hundreds of on-screen enemies with different AI routines at one time thanks to the power of CELL." - responded Dave Karraker Sr. Director of Corporate Communications. [/QUOTE] News-Source: n4g.com

[twistedsymphony]

right, because quantity of scripts is the most important AI feature

I've always found you can see the true quality of the AI when you're dealing either 1 on 1 or against a small group of 2 or 3 with the difficulty cranked up.

When you're dealing with a large group there really isn't all that much strategy involved... it's usually run in and start smashing buttons. the AI's job becomes little more than making the enemies not move in exactly the same way.

When you're dealing with a single opponent or a small group of 2-3 you get to see how good the AI really is... can you easily predict their moves? if it's a small group do they share knowledge and if so do they share it realistically or does it work like a hive mind. And most of all can they analyze your own moves and stay one step ahead of you.

Dead Rising has hundreds of enemies on screen at once all running different AI scrips but it's also increadably stupid AI that consists of various flavors of
::shuffle around::
::if enemy is in range lunge forward and start biting::

Dynasty Warriors, Ninety Nine Nights and may other games also have massive amount of enemies with unique scrips... but I've never been terribly impressed with the AI in those games.

There are few games where the AI impresses me but when I crank up the difficulty I want to feel like the computer is genuinely outsmarting me, not just that there are more enemies that are more powerful and more accurate.

Splinter Cell is a spy game that relies heavily on strategy and outsmarting the AI... Heavenly Sword is not. If Krakker really wanted to impress he would have pulled an example from MGS4 seeing as it's a similar game.

...unless of course the AI in MGS4 really isn't all that impressive.

[grim_d]

...unless of course the AI in MGS4 really isn't all that impressive.

well based on the fact you can makes the enemies go "HUH, what was that noise just there?" forever, i'd say it wasnt great.

[Kamasutra318]

I haven't heard of any game currently out that has inferior AI for the PS3. Has anyone else? I'm wondering if the basis of the claim is purely theoretical or if Ubisoft is just having a difficult time doing it considering the many developers complaints about the programmability of Cell. As far as I know, artificial neural networks and support vector machines should work quite well with Cell. I've heard claims that code which is heavily dependent on dynamic branch prediction may have problems on Cell, but Heavenly Sword seems to work fine with branching AI.

[Mojiba]

Hu? Using Heavenly Sword as an example of good AI? A bunch of bad guys in a claustrophobic arena bumping themselves and the environment while skating in a non gravity space with times when they are not even conscious of anything around them? Sure this is better than Lair where the troops just stay freezed in the horizon waiting for the player to come near by to start to move, but no way it's an example of good AI, in fact AI in Heavenly Sword seems pretty poor, it could have potential to turn the game really boring after you get tired of the graphics.

[Mr Invader]

When you're dealing with a large group there really isn't all that much strategy involved... it's usually run in and start smashing buttons. the AI's job becomes little more than making the enemies not move in exactly the same way.

Theres a point in game development where the creators have to dumb down the enemy AI to make it playable. Who wants a game that you can't beat; or a game in which your allies are so smart that you don't have to do anyting. Who cares how smart the AI is if the game is unplayable.

[ConteZero76]

Heck... I never heard of people having problems with IA.
I saw plenty of games with IA going from weak to awesome, and they ran ok on a PC, a PC with often less than 800MHz.
Now PS3 has a part (only one) that's quite similar to Xenon, it's a 3,2GHz PowerPC core... how comes that a 3,2 GHz processor cannot handle IA ?
I always heard of problem to fit physics in game, light effects, shader filters and other thingies... but nobody EVER had problems fitting IA.

So I can be sure enough that this guy is just spreading FUD.

[KaRiL]

right, because quantity of scripts is the most important AI feature

Sorry if I sound ignorant, what I know about programing A.I. is pretty much nothing, but if quantity does not matter as you say, then what is it thats so taxing to the PS3? if its not an issue of "processing power" then what is it?
from my experiences good A.I. has never had anything to do with a systems specs, more to do with the developer and what they decided to spend time on. I've seen games trashed in reviews due to poor A.I. and it wasn't because which ever console it was on couldn't handle it.

I guess what I'm asking is; in the past good A.I. was thanks to good programers, what's so good about this new splinter cell A.I. that it's now hardware restricted?

[anonim1979]

http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/cpu/xbox360-2.ars/7

"At any rate, Playstation 3 fanboys shouldn't get all flush over the idea that the Xenon will struggle on non-graphics code. However bad off Xenon will be in that department, the PS3's Cell will probably be worse. The Cell has only one PPE to the Xenon's three, which means that developers will have to cram all their game control, AI, and physics code into at most two threads that are sharing a very narrow execution core with no instruction window. (Don't bother suggesting that the PS3 can use its SPEs for branch-intensive code, because the SPEs lack branch prediction entirely.) Furthermore, the PS3's L2 is only 512K, which is half the size of the Xenon's L2. So the PS3 doesn't get much help with branches in the cache department. In short, the PS3 may fare a bit worse than the Xenon on non-graphics code, but on the upside it will probably fare a bit better on graphics code because of the seven SPEs."


Also coparation of PS3 and X360 whole architecture.
http://dpad.gotfrag.com/portal/story/35372/?spage=1

[ConteZero76]

There's something you may be missing here.
512K of cache is more than 1M when you've only 1/3 of the cores.
You also forget (not entirely, it's quite technical, you've to check on IBM sheets) that SPE haven't branch prediction, but have something like branch hinting, that could perform BETTER than branch prediction with optimized code.
More than this it's still a 3,2 GHz processor, a 3,2 GHz P4 can handle heavry IA.

PS: Is very suggesting when you use some doc back from 2005.

[Mojiba]

I can be wrong, but I remember from a long time ago that basically the PS3 has one 3.2GHz working brain with 7 acephalous units just to calculate things. I know, it's pretty technical =) Anyway, unpredicted things like what could happen with good developed and interesting games, like AI for example (and AI understanded as a good and realistic emulation of intelligence and emotion and not characters with ultra high IQ), cannot be handled by these units, just by the brain. This kind of architecture is very good to do things like working with high definition video or audio, like the ones printed in Blu-ray movies, but it's not as good to work with things like... let's say, games, compared with the competition. At least not in games that resembles things from 20 years old arcades with better graphics.

[twistedsymphony]

Theres a point in game development where the creators have to dumb down the enemy AI to make it playable. Who wants a game that you can't beat; or a game in which your allies are so smart that you don't have to do anyting. Who cares how smart the AI is if the game is unplayable.

oh I know, and I completely agree with you. But that's why I'm saying it's a shitty example.

A developer of a game with a small group of really intelligent Ai profiles is being compared to a game where the AI was ridiculously boiled down to almost nothing to support play in a large group... Making that comparison is just flat out bad.

[Exist2Resist]

AI consists of having an NPC for instance use objects around them to hide when shot at, peaking around the corner to see if you're coming out, when you're in the open shooting at you.
What if you blow that wall up that the NPC was hiding behind, well the NPC has to make a decision is it running away cuz all its buddies are dead or not there and come back with more.
Or will it jump in that jeep attempt to run you over, or will it hide in the house 20 meters behind it.

Basicaly all that stuff uses quite a bit processing power, and if it was written in code, you would have a shit load lines of code just for one part of the game. Or you write an AI engine and throw it into memory and let a seperate processor handle it. Think of it as a Physx engine but for a brain.

All Ubi said was that 360 handles it better, that does not surprise me at all. And does not mean it is non existent in PS3.
He also stated that it will be scripted AI. I don't believe scripting and AI can exist in a sentance besides each other unless seperated by a period.
Putting scripted part right infront of AI negates the fact that it is AI, it becomes just that a script.

This post has been edited by Exist2Resist: Aug 17 2007, 02:57 AM

[TaKktiX]

Cant say im suprised by that,GTA IV anyone?