ATTENTION PD! How The AI Should Work In Gran Turismo (OP updated 4th April)

[ProjectWHaT]

I'm assuming the 3 people who voted no are trolls.

 

[86Debris86]

I'm assuming the 3 people who voted no are trolls.

Not sure about that but it would seem they don't want to explain their reasoning. With such one-sided results I can see why someone who disagrees may fear all the yes voters jumping on them if they explain why. Personally I'd like to hear why they think no, I'm genuinely intrigued.

 

[fredyellowone]

OP, I really like all your posts. But the problem is PD don't give a **** about your ideas. Or mines, for that matter.

 

[VBR]

Who won't say yes to this?

@Downhill Dino @Bluntified & @WalrusKart apparently!

 

[Streeto]

Nice idea, never gonna happen though.

 

[FormulaKimball]

Here's my 2 cents... I like the OP, voted yes, but I think it is optimistic to think PD might make the AI as sophisticated as we are suggesting. They can't even get the detection zones right (they "expanded" them because people complained the AI don't even know you're there, but that meant now they would park in corners when you were not near a position to attempt a pass, yet would still ignore you when you were clearly on the inside line next to them).

My feeling about the AI comes from playing Quake and Unreal Tournament - what's wrong with having a few set AI levels that work for all skills of players? Most people would play on the "I can win" or "bring it on" levels, some could take "hardcore", but there's always that "nightmare" level if you're feeling like getting your 🤬 kicked by bots that are not only good, but "cheat" (seeing you through walls, etc). You never get bored with the game because there's always another challenge that's far beyond your abilities, and you can always dismiss the highest difficulty if it's unwinnable, because you know they have to cheat, but keep playing at the next level down because it will always at least be somewhat of a challenge.

Amen to capturing true pace of the cars - the AI never drive at remotely the full capability at the moment... which is why many players who are reasonably good have to race in the next class down or drop tire grades... which is not the same experience as being able to race a car that meets the regs and be chased down by AI that can keep up. I'm fine with small tweaks to level the competition (weight penalties, slightly less power) but you shouldn't have to handicap yourself with completely different classes of cars or tires.

 

[Downhill Dino]

@Downhill Dino @Bluntified & @WalrusKart apparently!

I sort of accidentally chose No. I thought I'd post earlier but didn't feel it was necessary.

 

[Garland]

I voted no, because I either want an extremely well-designed career mode that's better than reality, or I want the AI to be gone altogether. The former is impossible, and the latter is far too easy, so...

 

[pyrates]

I voted no, because I either want an extremely well-designed career mode that's better than reality, or I want the AI to be gone altogether. The former is impossible, and the latter is far too easy, so...

What exactly is a "well-designed career mode that is better than reality" for you?

 

[Wide Boy]

Here's my 2 cents... I like the OP, voted yes, but I think it is optimistic to think PD might make the AI as sophisticated as we are suggesting. They can't even get the detection zones right (they "expanded" them because people complained the AI don't even know you're there, but that meant now they would park in corners when you were not near a position to attempt a pass, yet would still ignore you when you were clearly on the inside line next to them).

My feeling about the AI comes from playing Quake and Unreal Tournament - what's wrong with having a few set AI levels that work for all skills of players? Most people would play on the "I can win" or "bring it on" levels, some could take "hardcore", but there's always that "nightmare" level if you're feeling like getting your 🤬 kicked by bots that are not only good, but "cheat" (seeing you through walls, etc). You never get bored with the game because there's always another challenge that's far beyond your abilities, and you can always dismiss the highest difficulty if it's unwinnable, because you know they have to cheat, but keep playing at the next level down because it will always at least be somewhat of a challenge.

Amen to capturing true pace of the cars - the AI never drive at remotely the full capability at the moment... which is why many players who are reasonably good have to race in the next class down or drop tire grades... which is not the same experience as being able to race a car that meets the regs and be chased down by AI that can keep up. I'm fine with small tweaks to level the competition (weight penalties, slightly less power) but you shouldn't have to handicap yourself with completely different classes of cars or tires.

At the beginning VBR did state for a few players the AI would probably not be fast enough without a lot of work. Improving detection would also take considerable work.
Cost vs return for PD detection makes sense to improve as it effects everyone, very quick people are a minority though so probably wouldn't bother increasing AI levels all the way.
AI could be made better than virtually everyone if they wished, nail the breaking point every time, spot on power delivery zero mistakes.

However the AI could be boosted in performance in most if not all races right now, think back to GT5 & B Spec Bob

Your guy improved, even had rudimentary differences, good on the breaks etc from what I remember.
These different levels of AI already exist so why cant you choose the one that suites you?
Switch off last lap slow down & the racing should improve considerably.
If they did the job properly sure it would be a lot of work but this can be done now.

AIs can be made very good if the designers want to & can justify the time & expense.
FPS as you mention some just run off simple scripts, always knows where you are & reacts others are complex.
Models hearing vision the cover you are in awareness state etc etc, lot going on under the hood.

A good example of poorly executed scripting & AI is 24 minutes of Nurburgring which is far easier than the 15 minute race & gives a lot more money for 1 extra lap.

Pick any moderately powered car that wont need to pit but preferably can do 150mph
Now prepare to time trial if your lucky you might pass a couple of cars into corners on the first lap only to watch them pass you down the straights.
The AI cant do rain & pits so you can just drive smoothly & win by a big margin by just passing everyone as they pit.
Boring

 

[Bluntified]

@Downhill Dino @Bluntified & @WalrusKart apparently!

I read the op, not a real fan of it. I'm not saying I'm oppose to making the game harder it's just I don't like the idea of adjustable A.I, this is one of those games where (in my opinion of course) where you need a static difficulty.

This is driving - how in real life can you pick your opponents like that? You race who you're up against could be crappy or pro. In my driving game, I want the A.I (like many others have said) to mimic real life lap times, maybe adaptive, so as I go I will learn how to get faster rather than me just "turn the slider down".

To clear things up here, I am oppose to an adjustable slider, but not oppose to making the game harder. Maybe use laptimes of other drivers (uploaded from online)?

Edit: You know me so well .

 

[Whistle Snap]

The slider in Prologue was just a PP adjuster and nothing to do with the AI. It went up to 101, as that was for the Ferrari F1 car. This option was in the secret menu of GT5 and possibly still in GT6.

I don't want to race higher PP cars than my own car - so my simple quick fix would be to bring back the Quick Tune menu from GT4, but instead of adjusting our own BHP / Tyre compound we now adjust the AI's. This can be easily done and it will give the player the opportunity to fine tune the AI's speed to match their own for close racing, and you won't get silly scenarios like a Lotus Elise racing Super GT car, and that stupid rubber band can be snapped and thrown in the bin.


POLYPHONY PLEASE!!! It would make the Arcade mode so much better than it currently is.

 

[pyrates]

I read the op, not a real fan of it. I'm not saying I'm oppose to making the game harder it's just I don't like the idea of adjustable A.I, this is one of those games where (in my opinion of course) where you need a static difficulty.

This is driving - how in real life can you pick your opponents like that? You race who you're up against could be crappy or pro. In my driving game, I want the A.I (like many others have said) to mimic real life lap times, maybe adaptive, so as I go I will learn how to get faster rather than me just "turn the slider down".

To clear things up here, I am oppose to an adjustable slider, but not oppose to making the game harder. Maybe use laptimes of other drivers (uploaded from online)?

Edit: You know me so well .

But this way you make the game completely inaccessible to beginners.

I personally think a difficulty selector at the beginning of the career mode is the easiest and best solution.

 

[GBO Possum]

Here are my thoughts. I have not voted yet, but I would probably vote "no" if pressed.

What I do want is predictability of AI strength. Rubber banding destroys that. I want my AI opposition to be consistent within a range for the whole race. I don't mind if they become a little bit wearied by their efforts. However, I don't want them to start a race walking all over me in lap one only to become 10% slower than me by lap 3 or 4. So I am totally supportive of removing rubber banding.

What I also don't want is to have the strength of the AI drivers change from a level I set them to. So the proposal to have them learn from my behavior on the track and improve as I improve worries me. I'm happy about a certain amount of variance in AI skills and lap times within a race, but I don't want them all to be promoted to some unspecified skill level based on an assessment of my skills. I'd feel strange if suddenly the AI which I had learned to beat suddenly took a jump in skills and consistently trounced me. Would they slip back in skills if I was unable to best them at their new level?

I would much prefer to be able to choose my opponents' skills from a predictable set of skill definitions, be they numerical or descriptive.

What I've described above is progression "by choice". It may be attractive to add some component of "earned" progression. For example, it may not be possible to request one of the higher AI skill levels until it's "unlocked" by achieving some consistent level of success over AI drivers at a lower level.

 

[Wide Boy]

I have come to the conclusion that while this will work to a degree the simplest solution is the best solution.

Give us full control over setting up arcade races including the options to set grid type opponents & AI levels & save them for that specific race.

Reasoning is even on similar races the difficulty varies considerably.
For me taking GT World Championship as an example.
Laguna & Silverstone are a lot easier than the others so I would want to increase there difficulty more.

Once you have them set & AI would probably take a few races to fine tune you can make your race harder or easier just by picking a different car.

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[VBR]

I read the op, not a real fan of it. I'm not saying I'm oppose to making the game harder it's just I don't like the idea of adjustable A.I, this is one of those games where (in my opinion of course) where you need a static difficulty.

Like @pyrates said, if Career Mode had a static difficulty it would alienate all players who were not at the same level to which the static difficulty was set. That would be business suicide for PD, because a huge amount of players would then not even be able to win races. With my idea, the speed of the AI drivers would be automatically tailored to the individual player, so that we all get some decent competition from the AI, which is not something that GT6 offers at present.

The slider in Prologue was just a PP adjuster and nothing to do with the AI. It went up to 101, as that was for the Ferrari F1 car. This option was in the secret menu of GT5 and possibly still in GT6.

I just tested it again, & you're absolutely right. Thanks for pointing that out, I've updated the OP accordingly.

I'm happy about a certain amount of variance in AI skills and lap times within a race, but I don't want them all to be promoted to some unspecified skill level based on an assessment of my skills. I'd feel strange if suddenly the AI which I had learned to beat suddenly took a jump in skills and consistently trounced me.

With my idea the AI drivers wouldn't be able to consistently trounce you. There would be quite a lot of variance, especially in the beginner races as I already explained in the OP with regards to the speed differential ratio. With automatically adjustable AI set by the game based on your own performance, some of the AI drivers would be on the same pace as you, & as a result you'd get competitive racing. This would be true for all players regardless of their ability.

Give us full control over setting up arcade races including the options to set grid type opponents & AI levels & save them for that specific race.

That would be a great idea, but this thread is about Career Mode not Arcade. If we had the option to make the AI drivers a little faster in Career Mode as well, we could then further fine tune the automatic setting the game gives us to get the best possible experience. I've added that to the OP. 👍

I don't want the game to simply adapt to my skill level. It's been done before, and didn't work very well then either...this game...has to allow the AI to perform at or within a pretty small margin of what the cars used are really capable of.

You say it's been done before; when, & in what game?

Again, if the AI drove similar lap times that the cars are really capable of in the hands of real life race drivers, it would alienate huge amounts of players that were not at that skill level. Remember, my idea is to set the speed level of the AI drivers, not the AI cars. For instance; after practice the AI would be set to a similar skill level as you (give or take a certain amount according to the speed differential mentioned in the OP). Then, the AI drivers would be assigned their different cars for the race, which again would slightly differ in speed according to the performance of each vehicle. This would create a field of drivers where some would be the same speed as you, some slightly slower, & in different cars that were slightly different speeds too.

...you say allow the game to set AI according to some number of qualifying laps, but only the fastest ones; you sure about that? Do you really want an entire field running at your best speeds?

Yep! That's pretty much what I've been doing online since GT5 came out, adding real opponents to my friends list who are about the same speed as me. Some are the same speed as me, others slightly slower, & others slightly faster. That has given me some of the best competition I've ever had, & I'd like a similar experience offline. Wouldn't you? Anyway, the "entire feild" wouldn't be running at my exact same speed, just some of them, I did explain that in the OP with the speed differential idea.

If I were presented a game with what you proposed, I would have simply one strategy: drive my qualifying laps with stock suspension settings and crap tires then get to tuning once the field had been set.

If you really wanted to cheat the system so that you won each race by miles, then of course you could do that, & by doing so you'll be experiencing the kind of racing we already have in GT6 where the AI are so bad that you win by miles anyway. How ironic! However, it would just be a simple thing to lock tuning once qually had started, just like in the real world when cars go into Parc fermé. The point of my idea is to give all players a competitive racing experience in Gran Turismo, & not to try to stop people cheating. That said, pointing out potential problems with my idea is very useful as it helps me think up possible solutions, so thanks.

 

[Wide Boy]

That said, pointing out potential problems with my idea is very useful as it helps me think up possible solutions, so thanks

Not really a problem if people want to make it easy to win every race why not let them? The majority would use the system as intended because it makes for a better game.
A small child though might like it simple as all he wants is to go round the track & the ability to buy the cars he likes.

The game as is really doesn't work because it sort of trys to follow real life in that slow cars get worse AI, than fast ones.
Making the assumption fast cars are generally harder to drive than slow ones this means if the game is pitched just right for you.
Slow cars & drivers are way to slow for you
Medium cars & drivers would be just right
Fast cars & drivers would be to fast

Only a small portion of the game is at your level
If you could adjust the AI you could make the whole game at your level.

Say once you win the option to let the AI increase either manually or as suggested
If you enter a race 10 times & lose you get the option to adjust the level.
Agree it should make you try first

Giving an example of what seems a hard race.
3rd Shifter Kart Race you would have the option to slow the AI down after 10 failed attempts to win.
PDs fix was to let karts not be karts & allow driver aids so you can beat the AI.

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[VBR]

I get that and I think online racing has been THE reason GT is still going...But question: Do the rooms you race in have boost turned off? If so, if they weren't your friends, would you stick it out after landing in the backfield after a bad corner? And don't you depend once in a while on your friends screwing up? Would your AI break off from your average laps to plant themselves into a wall once in a while? once a race? They'd have to really bump the payout for me to accept all the less-than-first finishes I'd rack up. It's a very sticky consideration, I grant you.

Boost is always off in any room I host or race in! I agree, online racing is the single most important thing that has kept my interest going in the GT series. However, I very rarely quit a race even if I make a severe mistake. Rage quitters are frowned upon in most online rooms. And yes, I'm quite happy not to finish first if I've made a mistake or been beaten by a better driver, & even if I've been given a bad car in a Shuffle race I'll happily trundle around in last place most times.

That said I do like winning, but in GT6 offline you're not winning if the AI are slowing down to let you win, & you're not winning if you car is more powerful than the opposition either. The AI is letting you win, or your car is winning the race for you because it has a higher PP. I'm not a very big fan of the PP system either. There is no racing in GT6, it just tries to create the illusion of racing, & fails badly at it.

Yes, it would be good if the AI made mistakes sometimes, & were generally better all round. That would add to the experience greatly. I did a few single make races in GT5 Prologue yesterday, the AI made many mistakes, & even though they were scripted it felt much better than what I've experienced in GT6 so far. If you want to win every race & drive around in P1 all the time I guess GT6 is the game for you, but you are in the minority, as the results of the poll in this thread clearly shows. Most people want some real competition from the AI, & seeing as we all have differing abilities, having a system of automatically adjustable AI would be the best solution for the majority of players.

...they already know how to implement the PP differential system. It boosts payout, allows you to lower your cars' ability to the AI without lowering your own driving involvement, and you the player decide just how close you want it to be.

And what would be simpler & less time consuming? Having to spend ages detuning your car & then entering a race over & over again trying to tailor it to be competitive with the AI? Or to have the game automatically adjust the AI for you during a few laps in Practice Mode before a race? That's a rhetorical question by the way!

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[86Debris86]

A very simple solution for those opposed to The Idea is to have it as an option or mode. "Race Sim" mode or something. And have "Classic" mode for people who want to have the racing we experience in GT6 at the moment.

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[86Debris86]

I just mean a solution for those who don't want to play that way. I vote they make the AI more capable of racing and harder to beat but I don't think that should be the only way to play GT. If someone is new to driving/racing games why should they have to put up with the difficulty level someone who has lots of driving/racing game experience wants? Or if they want a quicker fix due to time constraints on playing they should be able to have that instead of the longer process of practice and qualifying.

I don't think VBR is saying this is the only way the AI should be. Simply how it could be for those who want the full race experience.

I simply vote for what they already know how to do.

How would anything progress if they just kept doing what they're doing? Change for the sake of change is stupid but it has become time for the AI to be developed. It's been virtually the same for way too long.

 

[Squanto]

I just mean a solution for those who don't want to play that way. I vote they make the AI more capable of racing and harder to beat but I don't think that should be the only way to play GT. If someone is new to driving/racing games why should they have to put up with the difficulty level someone who has lots of driving/racing game experience wants? Or if they want a quicker fix due to time constraints on playing they should be able to have that instead of the longer process of practice and qualifying.

I don't think VBR is saying this is the only way the AI should be. Simply how it could be for those who want the full race experience.

I would love to see a Crushing/Veteran/Super-level in GT ... it would be awesome ...
And proper career attached to it and a nice HARD trophy as a cherry on the cake.

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[Wide Boy]

Slightly off topic here but in response to several posts.

Is it important for you to win because you want to win?
or
Do you want to win because the money is poor when you finish mid field?

If its more the second option the solution is easy, make the rewards better for finishing mid pack.
Lots of ways to do it.

They could & probably should revamp the whole way career mode works but most companies nowadays are scared to try a different formula in case it doesn't work.

 

[Squanto]

Slightly off topic here but in response to several posts.

Is it important for you to win because you want to win?
or
Do you want to win because the money is poor when you finish mid field?

If its more the second option the solution is easy, make the rewards better for finishing mid pack.
Lots of ways to do it.

They could & probably should revamp the whole way career mode works but most companies nowadays are scared to try a different formula in case it doesn't work.

If you ask me ... I want challenge, hard challenges ... and win after several attempts ... money is of no importance to me

 

[bluecharger]

Never mind then.

 

[86Debris86]

to think PD could EVER have time for a whole new concept given the existing problems and shortcomings of the current game is asking a heck of a lot though.

I think, due to these problems and shortcomings, that that's exactly what they should do, make time, lest the series stagnate.

I think it'd be more valuable to agitate for something they know how to do and that (as far as I know) had positive feedback than to have them completely rethink such a huge aspect of the game.

I disagree. I think the value is in catering to multiple types of players thereby increasing the amount of people who want to buy it and also in concentrating on areas that are getting negative criticisms. If it's getting positive feedback then leave that bit be, we're happy with that. It(the AI) is indeed such a huge aspect of the game, which is why I think it needs looking at. The way the AI behaves currently is almost archaic as far as racing games go.

I doubt they would even have time to rework and perfect such a system for GT7 (based on the supposed release date of 2014) if they haven't already predeveloped that way of thinking about AI.

I don't think 2014 is going to be when GT7 is released (maybe a prologue at the end of the year but I doubt it) so I think they'll have plenty of time to rework it should they choose to. Perfecting it may be another thing and a longer process but teething issues are to be expected when introducing something new.

Slightly off topic here but in response to several posts.

Is it important for you to win because you want to win?
or
Do you want to win because the money is poor when you finish mid field?

Probably the latter, but even more important is the challenge. Beating the AI at the moment is a hollow feeling for me. If I was actually being challenged then it would be about the win, about rising to that challenge and over coming it. If the money was poor for a lower position it wouldn't matter because If I don't win I'm going to go back and keep trying until I do.