Hello! And thank you for taking your time to read my first dev blog for this project!

My name is Martin Olin Holm and I’m the main AI Designer.
My number one focus is to create an AI that “learns” from the players behaviors and game styles.

It shall, visually and/or audibly, mediate the players of its new chosen actions. This way the players will still have a fair chance to act on their newfound information and use it to their advantage.

But enough of that, let’s talk about the good stuff! What have I managed to create during these two weeks this project has been alive?

Since 2017-11-27, I have created two different AI with each special functions.

AI 1:
This AI is quite the simple one. I have been using Unreal Engine’s own navigation mesh to create an AI that roams. It basically chooses a random place where the navigation mesh allows it to go… and goes there.
This AI is, of course capable at “shooting” the player. As of now, it does not have any kind of weapon on it. So it is currently using “Line Trace” to simulate where it would shoot with its gun…

“But Martin…” You may be thinking. “This is all… Boring. It’s so basic!”
And you are right, this is boring and totally un-radical.

So let me introduce: AI 2.0!
This is not your ordinary ground-walking, dead-panned AI! This one can fly by using 3D navigation!
But as you all may know, Unreal Engine 4 does not, yet, have any kind of Navigation Meshes that supports 3D movement in the same way it supports 2D movement. So how did I do it?

I used “DoN´s 3D Pathfinding for Flying AI”. (OBS! This plug-in can be downloaded on UE4´s marketplace for FREE! It even has a MIT-license, so feel free to use it however you wish!)

But what does this plug-in actually do?

It allows your AI to navigate in a complete 3D environment with its own 3D Navigation Mesh. Which means that it allows your AI to calculate, in real time, which way is the fastest way to its destination.
Here is a picture that shows how it works:

As you can see, the AI uses the blue dots as “Check points”, so to speak. The AI follow each dot until it gets to its goal. And when it is done, it calculates its new path to its next goal.
But that is not all! Not only can this AI patrol between two nodes in a, somewhat, intelligent manner. It can also chase the player and follow it wherever it goes. I will show you all a more in-depth of how that works next week. But here is a sneak peek on how the Behavior Tree looks like.

Want to know how exactly “DoN´s 3D Pathfinding for Flying AI” works?
Do you wish there was a Youtube video where the creator of said plug-in demonstrate and explain his creation? Quite the specific wish, but here it is:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Tr_K551zvI&t=1s