Killzone Shadow Fall can handle 24 enemy AIs before “framerate drops,” says Guerrilla

OPM: Here’s the second part of my interview with Killzone Shadow Fall‘s lead designer Eric Boltjes. This focuses on the tech behind the game – building a PS4 engine, what next-gen brings to the action and just how many Helghans Guerilla Games can squeeze on the screen at once.

[fghtrer3fb5erg]

One of the things i love about this game is how detailed its draw distance looks.

[GuyThatPlaysGames]

Are you blind? All the interior levels or gunfights, the draw distance fogs after about 100 feet. That's impressive? Or are you referring to outside with nothing going on looking at overly shiny buildings?

[ThatCanadianGuy514]

You seem bitter about something.

[isa_scout]

Wuh??? Did you not see the forest level that starts with the player on a cliff ledge overlooking a vast,vibrant, and lush forest with an incredible draw distance??? Heres an idea, if you're that jelly why don't you just buy a PS4??? It's very obvious by your comment that you hate the fact that KZ looks so beautiful. Or you know, you could do what I'm going to do and just buy both consoles. One at launch, and the other at a later date...Pssst, get the PS4 first it has more to offer.

[MizTv]

Next time open your eyes when you watch it

[sync90]

Butt hurtin?

[TheOneEyedHound]

You are kidding?

[GuyThatPlaysGames]

Just tired of everyone praising the KZ series. It's like this with every Killzone game. Everyone goes crazy over the "amazing" graphics and the game ALWAYS sucks. Instead of looking at how good the game is, why not make the game actually play better?

[Skips]

"And there are other types of enemy AI, lots of destructibility, lots of dynamic objects."

Oh HELL YEA!!!

EDIT:

@DayZ

Fighting that MAWLR in Killzone 3 was pretty epic when I played it for the first time. lol...

Imagine fighting like 3-5 of them at the same time in Shadow Fall. XD I bet they could do it! Can't wait to see what the pull off towards the end of the gen.

[ThatCanadianGuy514]

Yeah man.I can't wait to see these big battles play out.

One thing KZ does so much better then other FPS is throw nonstop action at you.Every shootout is packed with explosions, debris, dust, bullet casings littering the ground and airships raining hell from above.Never a dull moment.

Can't freaking wait.

[Septic]

Wtf does draw distance have to do with this topic?

[KillrateOmega]

What are you? A Comment Cop?

[Shnooze]

Sometimes draw distance affects performance, and this article as it stands is kinda about that when it comes down to it, even the title. DatRamboX commented on how he appreciates the level of detail everything gets, and that's also a thing with draw distance since it's a lot more satisfying to see things detailed in the distance than a blurred texture.

[Septic]

@Schnooze, its not about the level of detail though. This article is about Artificial Intelligence and how the numbers of enemies on-screen affects that.

DatRambo X just posted a completely off-topic comment about draw distance that has little to no relevance at all to the topic at hand. It's hardly productive is it?

[Shnooze]

@Septic, It's about performance. Many things come into play, be it Artificial Intelligence or Detail. When a framerate drops, it can be for several reason. What is relevant is the detail and attention to Ai put into things in the game, and when focusing on a side topic: detail, we can also bring up draw distances and prop usage.

What's wrong with speculation and appreciation? There's room for both when this thread isn't meant to gather data. He is being productive by throwing his opinion out there, and bringing it up for speculation alongside the other factors, like Artificial Intelligence.

(EDIT)

Not to mention detailing being brought up in the article, and I quote.

“Now it’s x4, x8, because everything has to be higher resolution, has to have more details, more loading, more texture mapping."

"They’re all autonomous, they create their own effects."

it ties into performance and the ability to generate this many at one time, hence where detail comes from since they somehow manage to fit in so much all the while having the enemy ai in the mix.

[LackTrue4K]

Killzone has the best AI ever!!

[Angels3785]

I can't see how people don't agree with this....there are dedicated youtube videos just to how killzones ai works....its staggering how smart those bastards can get....especaially on the hardest difficulty..

[MizTv]

They are brutal

[iceman06]

I've always been impressed with how the AI will adapt to situations...given time of course. They try suppression fire, they flank, grenade at the right times...in the right places. I think I was most impressed by KZ2 because they would even climb to higher ground to get advantages.

[Destrania]

Can't wait to see the Killzone SF special tomorrow on GT.TV!

[Destrania]

Just in case you guys haven't seen this yet... http://www.abload.de/img/kk... (video quality sucks, but oh well, it's still awesome)

[LackTrue4K]

Did not know this "thanks"
*book marking this.

[THC CELL]

24 nice

[DeadlyFire]

Indeed. Most games last gen have 3-5 enemy AIs on the screen at max. 24 is pretty impressive. I bet they can scale that up to 32+ in the future with tech improvements over time.

[DoomeDx]

3-5 at once!? Seriously? What games are you playing man.

EVERY game I know handles more then 12+ AI on screen at once.

Here is a nice list without even thinking:

Rainbow Six Vegas 2
Killzone 2
GTA 5
Sleeping Dogs
Far Cry
Uncharted
All Halo Games
All Gears of War games
All Gran Turismo's
All Forza's
Doom 3
Quake 4
All Batman Games

Every game handles more then 3-5 AI's on at screen at once dude.

24 AI's on screen with graphics like that is indeed pretty impressive. But stop acting like its a magic

[Angels3785]

What games were you playing? Streetfighter? I can't think of any game that does 3-5 they all do more!!

[DeadlyFire]

I am talking Enemy AI. Its typically been a small number in every shooter game.

Not the drone brainless AI on the screen. I am talking about active enemy AI engaging you. Its always been small number. 3-5 is the typically number actively in your view engaging you in most games even if more AI is present they are not aware of you. I am skeptically I will ever see 24 AI actively engaged in finding me or shooting at me at any time in the game. I expect the norm. Having more AI does increase odds of having more active gameplay though.

[cell989]

guys there's abig difference between dynamic AI and full scale AI I can see Deadlyfire's point. Most games show many enemies on screen, except only 2-4 actually interact with you at any given time, the rest wait for their "turn". Thats dynamic AI, working to feel as if all characters on screen are "aware" of you, but only a few actually shoot at you, move around, avoid your bullets etc etc, In the background the others wait for your fixed point of view, before they show signs of interaction. If KZSF indeed does 24 individual AI packets at once, then thats a hell of an accomplishment, I can picture frantic fire fights where all enemies on screen and off screen are actively moving to make your life a living hell.

[Volkama]

24 is good. Most games have significantly less AI characters actively engaged with the player. They usually also run a low level script/AI to keep NPCs moving even when they aren't "thinking".

This is particularly evident in games like GTA and Dead Rising, but even the likes of Halo 4 are guilty of the occasional brain-dead on-looker in a firefight.

[Volkama]

Having said that, 24 AI is good but also provides a prime example of how cloud processing could be applied to make a better game.

[cell989]

dont know about cloud processing helping AI, since AI needs to work efficiently in real time, otherwise it would look scripted, but good point on your first paragraph

[sephiroth420]

ooo nice, still gutted about their being no splitscreen co op/splitscreen online.

[memots]

Same here , that's one thing my nephew and I did with kz , sometime we go back to resistance3 and blop2 for that splitscreen action

[sephiroth420]

haha yeah me too, gotta love a bit of co op resistance, i hope this trend doesnt continue, i miss the days of being able to have 4 people playing on the same console, what would only make that better is if it was 4 people on the same console and online aswell, have oyu played supersonic acrobatic rocketpowered battle cars?

[memots]

Yup , the soccer game is so much fun !!

[pyramidshead]

24 with those high res character models, I'm not surprised. 24 is more than enough, jesus lol.

[mhunterjr]

It looks like additional power may have solved what I think has been holding the killzone franchise back. IMO, the battles have been uninspiring do to the lack of enemy numbers and variety during encounters. I have yet to see the AI do anything impressive in the previews, but that's likely because they often demo in god mode. I'm looking forward to the reviews on this game.

[MizTv]

I always felt that the ai was very good in kz
On hard they are pretty smart

[mhunterjr]

I didn't think the AI was stupid, per se. But their was a lack of variety, and their interactions with each other was predictable. The developer said it himself, they were previously limited to two types of enemies, and seven total enemies on screen. It's tough to have a bunch of memorable encounters with those limitations.

Compare the previous killzone games to the competition. There were other shooters that had more AI on screen, more types of enemies on screen, multiple enemies in various vehicles, all with different strengths and weaknesses and working together in different ways in different situations. Other campaigns have simply been more dynamic than killzone.

I get the sense that killzone SF, will be a much more dynamic game than its predecessors and its largely thanks to the increase in power.

[bloodybutcher]

yeah, on hard they don't only roll away and change their position, they outflank you and charge at you.hate that:D

[Jovanian]

More and more we see next gen isn't as powerful as they've claimed it to be. Not surprising, honestly.

[KillrateOmega]

So, what? Is 24 not enough for you?

[DoomeDx]

"Previously we were limited. You could
have six or seven guys on screen, only two
types, and it had to be at a specific range”

What is this bullshit? Killzone 2 and 3 had more AI on screen that this.

[Bellcross]

They're talking about Ai routines, not characters.

for example Dynasty warriors had hundreds of enemies on screen but they all share the same 1 or 2 Ai routines, it's the same in most Zombie games.

24 AI routine is fucking insane, that means if they're a lot of enemy on screen the have 24 different Ai they could choose from which lead to less predictability.

[DoomeDx]

Aaah like that!

Thanks for clearing that up for me

[sibbor]

Insane? Agreed. It's amazing really. Man, we're in for a treat. Gaming has envolved!

[cell989]

bravo, great explanation, simple and stright to the poin Bubble for you

[GirlOnFire]

Kool beans :)

[kingduqc]

24 AI on the level, wow... Man it sure did evolve from half life 1 in 1999 with 15-20 AIs

14 years 7 more AI can be used at once.

[Sadist3]

Well, seeing how the AI in this game is generic, and they kinda just stand there from what I seen on the videos, I can see why that is possible

[akurtz]

The A.I. in this game are going to make me rage, but a beautiful rage on hard mode. My body is ready.

[buynit]

That's a big jump! But he didn't say anything about ai... Or did I miss it?