I’ve finished the game (spoiler: I loved it!), but I have a few other things to say before writing a concluding overview. This post is spoiler free and addresses AI in the game.

Don’t have a ton to say about the enemy AI. The one act of what seems like cheating I noticed is that they’re (sometimes) unnaturally good at spotting you, even across large distances and if I’m looking at them from behind an object that covers most of me. Or worse: I sneak away from battle and around the building to ambush them, but as I turn the corner they’re already facing me and start shooting immediately. What the heck? But I suspect it’s not so much deliberate cheating (e.g. for the purpose of creating a bigger challenge) as much as the enemies simply lacking sophistication in this area. It isn’t a sneaker game after all, you’re not really supposed to take out enemies that way, so there’s not much point in having sophisticated code for detection.

Saw a video showing the exact opposite thing, the protagonist walking right behind an enemy (in a quiet area), and even in what seemed like the enemy’s field of view, without being detected. Again an example of unsophisticated and unrealistic detection algorithms, but in this case noticing less than what you’d expect (maybe they notice/magically know too much during battle and too little otherwise).

This is not especially detrimental to the gameplay but does break immersion to some little extent. It’s a great game, even downright fantastic, not trying to put it down, it’s just I’ve started to develop an interest in observing AIs, apparently.

The most important and groundbreaking AI in the game aren’t the enemies at all but, of course, Elizabeth, your companion. They’ve done a great job with her, she’s just awesome. I don’t know what to say that hasn’t already been said elsewhere many times, but she helps out a lot, she continually reacts to things in the environment, she has emotions and attitudes, she looks at things that interest her, she hides or otherwise protects herself during battle; she acts on her own. It’s not all just to make her real and relatable; she’s also useful in different ways: helps with supplies during and between battles, she picks locks, she solves riddles. And she’s of course an important part of the narrative (in multiple ways), whether she wants to or not. 

There are many videos on youtube where they talk about developing Elizabeth and where they demonstrate various things she does (some of which you might not even notice playing the game e.g. from rushing through an area), in particular all work they put into humanizing her, to make sure she doesn’t do “gamey” things like being to passive or reactive, such as just standing still and staring when you stop (real people tend not to do that, they have their own set of feelings and interests and act on them).

I’ll be back with an overview of the game.

So I finished the main quest recently, but I still have the DLCs to play. There is a lot to like in the game, and some things to dislike and the dislikes are more my personal opinion than objective faults.

The main attraction for me is sneaking around and either taking out your opponents one by one or just sneaking past them not even letting them know you were there. This is a choice; you can kill all your opponents if that’s your thing, but this is far less interesting and frankly it also makes the game too easy. That said, I still killed enough to have the dubious honor of getting the high chaos ending, which I half-heartedly tried to avoid. I was too impatient.

I don’t enjoy the game as much as Deus Ex: Human Revolutions, the game I can think of that Dishonored resembles the most, but they’re different enough to not really compete with each other directly anyway, the very different settings and stories. They end up feeling very different, but in terms of gameplay (sneaking, dealing with enemies, upgrading abilities and weapons, and so on) they’re similar, and if this is your thing you should absolutely play both.

I wasn’t entirely sold on the dark and grimy steampunk-ish setting of Dishonored. It’s right from the start striking and compelling in a twisted sort of way, but for me it gets old and depressing after a while, whereas the environment in Deus Ex remains attractive not only throughout the game but long after (to this day even, I’d like to visit that world again, but if I ever visit Dishonored again it’ll be for the gameplay and not the setting). I think I might have enjoyed it more if it was actual steampunk, although that would have made it less original I suppose.

The story is simple but good. It’s competently told, solid and fairly straightforward, which I much prefer to the convoluted unbelievable mess of so many other games. 

Don’t take my earlier posts on the game ai to mean it’s bad; it’s good as far as I can tell (the cheating I mentioned is rare).

Could write a lot more, about the character building aspect (decent but not impressive) or music (pretty good) or graphics (okay) and so on, but this is enough. 

Currently playing Bioshock Infinite, some hours into the game now. Expect a report.

Done with Dishonored, time for Bioshock Infinite. (There will be at least one more post on Dishonored.)

A game I expect to enjoy. And now that I think about it it’s the perfect follow-up game to Dishonored, because it’s so light and sunny whereas the darkness in Dishonored was wearing me down, especially the more I played. I expect to have nothing but praise for the setting in Bioshock Infinite, it looks gorgeous in all the videos I’ve seen. The setting in the first Bioshock was awesome, there is something really darkly and eerily poetic about a city under water, but like the setting in Dishonored it became kind of depressing even as it kept being fascinating (which the setting in Dishonored didn’t really, but the game has other virtues.)

I doubt the story will rival that of the first Bioshock, but I’m sure it’ll be good! It’s just that the story of the first Bioshock is among the best ever in a video game, it’ll be exceedingly difficult to surpass.

Not usually a fan of shooters, but the developers cram so many good elements into the Bioshocks that all is forgiven.

Lastly, I really like having a (likable) companion in a game which is another advantage this Bioshock has over the others.

I’ll have more to say when I’ve actually played the game, but that’s just the details. That I’ll like the game is a forgone conclusion.

Encountered another case of cheating (and of triggering), this time more subtle. Let me describe. So there was these two infected folks in a building, and one of them just standing in one place staring in a certain direction. I waited to see what would happen. Nothing, she just stood there looking down the hallway, the way I had planned to enter.

All right, so I started looking for another way in, which I found. So now I could approach her from behind instead, sneaking up on her putting her to sleep (actual sleep, not death), but… As I entered the building from that side she suddenly started moving in my direction.

She didn’t hear or notice me (the game tells you when that happens), but it’s unlikely she came up with this idea by herself, so to speak. More likely her new behavior was triggered by the game to not make it too easy for me to take her out, so she changed her behavior because of me even though she hasn’t noticed me.

The problem is it breaks immersion and elicits a feeling of inauthenticity, it’s saying: this world doesn’t exist for itself and it doesn’t follow ironclad rules like reality. The characters aren’t properly and neutrally simulated, but programmed to adapt to, challenge and entertain you the player (that is, programmed in accordance with what the developers think will entertain the player.)

But cheating and triggering, if it can be avoided at all, doesn’t entertain me as much, maybe because I notice them so clearly, I can see the wires coming from outside of the game world and their purpose.

Games could be made more neutral, more like true simulations.