It’s another advert in the reflections series. What do you think of this one? What’s on your wish list?

Codemasters is growing. They’ve acquired former Activision Vivendi developers Swordfish Studios, and consequently have a new Birmingham site to add to their network. As you might know, they already have bases in Southam, Guildford, and slightly further afield in Kuala Lumpur…

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Hot on the heels of the relaxing of its content approval process, SCEE has taken another step to help foster the Indian games development community. SCEE is working with developer Vicious Cycle Software to make the Vicious Engine available to local developers, in the hope that this will help boost the country’s output of games – especially in terms of local content and sports titles. It is also believed that this move is part of a package of measures intended to promote uptake of the PS2 and PSP in the region.

More on that story here.

This is the controversial one. Emergent behaviours are non-scripted, un-planned activities that intelligent game characters learn through their interactions with the game world. Even the programmer won’t know what they’re going to do. There have been some amazing examples – the giant beasts in Black and White, the cute critters in the mid-nineties artificial life experiment, Creatures… But can true enemy unpredictability work in games? Today’s AI coders aren’t so sure.

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The guys at GameSpot got some quality time with the number two man at SCEE, Jim Ryan. Check out the interview here.

Beneath all the higher ambitions for artificial intelligence in games, one basic, fundamental task remains: pathfinding. Simply telling a character how to get from A to B is a complex mathematical undertaking, and the perfect, foolproof solution remains elusive.

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Programming advanced AI is only part of the equation for game developers - players have to actually appreciate the intelligence of their enemies in order for it to have value; for it to be fun. Today, we’re looking at how animation and audio are being used to accentuate great AI.

Because intelligent characters have to look clever too…

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Simulated sensory systems have been a part of enemy AI for several years. In the classic Thief series, guards were able to investigate noises and glimpsed movements, a feature later refined in the likes of Halo and Crysis. Nowadays, sensory data seems ever more complex, with enemies following blood trails (Alone in the Dark) or even sniffing you out on the wind (Metal Gear Solid 4). Is this a vital development? Where will it lead? Today we ask a selection of developers about bringing AI characters to their senses…

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Develop 2009, the Brighton-based gaming industry conference, will take place from July the 14th to July the 16th. For more info on what to look forward to at the conference check out this story in Develop magazine…

Keith Stuart brings us the first article in a five part series of expert round table discussions on the future of artificial intelligence in gaming…

We all know what bad AI is. That moment a soldier gets stuck behind a small piece of foliage, doomed to complete the same running animation for the rest of eternity. Or when a group of aliens just leaps at you, spurning any opportunity for cover, in order to sacrifice themselves to your whirring mini-canon. And even if they do disappear behind a clump of rocks, they’ll usually end up poking their heads up every eight seconds in exactly the same place, allowing you to pick them off like sickly elephants at an illegal safari hunt.

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