Intense Ai: Free Pathfinding

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so realtime search means you can use entity levels too? levels without blocks?

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String pulling
(a rubberband function?)

I guess this works (a bit similar) like B-Slines. To smooth the movement.

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I wonder though, if you might do better right now to push hard and finish the Intense AI.

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LarryLaffer!
What number of messages we have to post in this thread ?

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much less than what you did I didn't expect that much of a response..

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As you probably already know by now Aris, I've been writing a plugin .dll (pv)

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Hiya,

Glad you all liked it.. Now about your 'little complains'..

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The only hiccup was when the player got stuck under the stairs.

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Also, if you continuously click the left mouse button, it will increase the function count by one for each click. So, if I press the button 50 times before the player gets to the spot, there will be 50 functions running on top of whatever runs all the time. If you click a null spot, it zeros out(except for those 6-7 always running functions), and the player stops moving.

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Anyway, congratulations...this is perfect for a point & click game..adventure or otherwise.

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Thanks

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http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g182/obinkmalmsteen/Clip_2.jpg

When I click the ground bellow
Why he pick the straight line and jump, instead the stairs?

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Because falling down makes a shorter path than going down the stairs. In a game like Quake3 would you jump directly off a platform or try to find the stairs?

Anyhow, I hear what u say.. Sometimes it might be preferable for the NPCs to take the longer but safer route.(might take damage if they fall down big distances). So I made an is_ai_MaximumFall constant that you can define the maximum that your NPCs are ready to fall down.

Graph re-made with is_ai_MaximumFall==100 pixels (instead of 500)



And here's a path



However, I like it better when the NPC takes the shortest route in this level, so is_ai_MaximumFall is originally set to 500, but feel free to change it to whatever, it's in the is_IPathfinding.wdl(don't forget to re-build the graph, when you do). More on this on the Documentation coming up..

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http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g182/obinkmalmsteen/Clip_3.jpg

he's not takes the shorter way!

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That's a case where String Pulling (responsible for making smoother paths) fails due to tricky ground(bridges and all), exactly like we talked with Damocles a few posts ago. You can usually overcome this by re-arranging the waypoints in the level.

I fixed that for the case you found. But maybe it can happen somewhere else as well. I'll give out some good tips on laying out your waypoints in the Documentation.




And a new version with the new fixes.. The original link a few posts ago is updated as well though.

Intense Pathfinding 1.01

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Fixes from 1.0
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Fixed function leakage when attempting to take a new path before the old one is finished.
Added functionality to choose between falling from big distances to take the shortest path, or take a longer but safer(no falls) path.
Rearranged the Waypoints of the level for smoother paths.
 

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Thanks all for your comments. Keep ep coming!

Aris

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Sometimes, if you click on the side of a block, the player will try to move there and sometimes it won't. Ideally, you're going to want it to never do it or do it everytime(unless certain conditions are met...see below).

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You're a hell of a beta tester.. I'll see what I can do about that, probably drop the target spot to the ground and attempt to pathfind there, if there is a path. Nice catch again..

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PS. why did you choose the dijkstra algorithm? What are the advantages over say, A*?

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There aren't any. A* is better, it's as simple as that. The reason I haven't upgraded from Dijkstra to A* yet(it won't be more than 3-4 extra lines of code), is that Dijkstra is doing ok. You won't get any decrease in the performance from running that algorithm several times per frame, so I put my effort into optimizing other things instead.

Don't forget though, that the actual search algorithm(breadth-first, depth-first, Floyd, Dijkstra, A*) is only half the picture. The underlying data structure is also critical, if not the most important part. The first pathfinding I made for 3dgs was inspired by Philipp Walser's tutorial and did a run-time A* search on a dynamic square-grid search space around the NPC. Needless to say, all these useless nodes that were being placed in stupid positions and flooded the whole level made up for a terrible search space and it's no wonder that no real game ever used this kind of technique. Intense Pathfinding is at least 100 times faster than my earliest attempt because of it's improved Search Space, even though it uses a slower search algorithm(Dijkstra instead of A*).

Hope I made some sense. I never know for sure when I ramble like that.. Good luck in your research on pathfinding anyway. It's hell.. you're gonna love it


immersionfx, geia sou file mou (ksexasa to onoma sou, lol ), pos paei to paixnidi?? Eides vlakeia, tora eimoun 1 mhna ellada, kai de sinenoi8ikame na pame kamia volta. Prox8es gurisa pali skotia alla ama einai kanonizoume kati gia to kalokairi Ego esy kai o Hellcrypt


Cheers all,

Aris

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You're a hell of a beta tester.. I'll see what I can do about that, probably drop the target spot to the ground and attempt to pathfind there, if there is a path. Nice catch again..

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Thanks...I try.

If you want to checkout first hand what I'm talking about(although you know what I'm talking about but showing is better than explaining), then check out one of the Bone demos(Out of Boneville is a smaller d/l but The Great Cow Race is a better example). Another would be Ankh. Those are good examples of full, realtime 3D games that are set up exactly like your demo. I'm not sure if the Ankh has Starforce included, so if that's a problem then it's something to avoid.

http://www.telltalegames.com/
Ankh English demo: http://www.gamershell.com/download_12202.shtml

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What kind of credits I have to write on a game title ?

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I am sure documemtatition must be a pain - I was wondering if you or another member could post a quick guide on the forum, as to how you could implement this into a project.

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Aris, I am not sure to understand, but the Intese Ai will be released or not?

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Orange Brat: Are your sure that the AI is released. I thought this release is the pathfinding and is for free. And after that the AI will be released to be purchased from customers.

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Hello all!

There's a new Intense Pathfinding update, making this version 1.03! I made sure everything still works for both A6 and A7 latest versions and re-compiled the demo with A7.5. I've also fixed a feature where if you're to click on a vertical surface, the player will now move to the nearest legal point instead. Useful for adventure games and the sort..

Grab the new version from here!

Btw, I've changed domains from intenseillusions.com to intense-i.com so most of the pictures in this thread don't work anymore. If you're new, you're just gonna have to download the file to see what this is all about.

Cheers all,
Aris

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AWESOME NEWS!!!! i am gonna test this right away.
does it create the nodes on the fly, or is it calculated from a look-up table ?

regards,

EDIT:

i tested this, but was wondering, does it work with terrain? cuz right now it's being showcased only on a flat surface, and what about more then 1 onstance, like a squad, is that supported?

regards,

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I think you have the same problem as in the old thread...
[img=http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/3843/unbenanntcg9.th.jpg]

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super contribution , will this work with a6 extra?

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f there's enough demand for it, I'll add an obstacle avoidance method to Intense Pathfinding and upgrade it to Lite-C

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I demand.