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Input Reading Ai is absolutely the worst

T

TheSpecialOne

Banned
Honestly, this thread is a direct result of my frustration with sports games (yes I know). I just turned off my ps4 a few minutes ago because of this. Now I'm going to reference sports games in my examples but I'm sure it applies to other genres as well. I noticed that this issue began to rear it's ugly head in the ps360 generation and it has only gotten worse. This particular issue is going to make me stop playing games because it makes games generic.

Nba 2K and Madden have this issue to varying degrees but the two biggest offenders are ea's nhl series and the fifa series. Honestly, this kind of lazy rubbish ai makes single player modes annoying to play and it's kills the game imo. Rule number one of these two sports games is that all players play the same. There is no differentiation between players. No character specific animation sets, no character specific traits, no team specific traits, no coach specific traits. In fact, there is very little differentiation in these games at all. The ai conveniently ignores the stats in an attempt to artificially increase difficulty. Heat seeking defenders, unbelievable player reactions, and God-like mind reading abilities are traits of these games.

If my memory serves me right, back in the ps2 days, developers tried to introduce "personality" to their games. The pes franchise stands out in my mind because it was praised for its player individuality. People always praised the player differentiation. The idea that the character you were controlling felt like the real life counterpart was seen as ground breaking. The ps360 era introduced generic input reading ai and we haven't looked back since then.

A lot of time is spent developing irrelevant features that do nothing to advance the genre forward. These features don't improve the gameplay and are mostly superficial. As a result, we're left with fantastic presentation, decent visuals, poor ai and poor gameplay. There used to be a popular joke about sports games being nothing more than a roster update and now it has come to pass. Shame on EA sports for their anti competitive practices and shame on 2K sports. Both companies are solely responsible for the stagnation and regression of an entire genre.
 
SoulUnison

SoulUnison

Banned
The Dissidia: Final Fantasy games are the worst about this.

The game is sort of limited in attack and movement options, so the "harder" the enemy AI gets, the more it relies on simply perfectly reading your button inputs and always making the exact right counter-attack.
Trying to finish some of the high-level single player content is like bashing your head against a wall until the CPU makes a rare mistake and dodges into a wall, or something.

And that's not even getting into the game's weird idea of equipment balance. You can be up against a same-level opponent and be wearing the best gear it's possible for you to have at the time, but the enemy will be able to do an amount of damage to you in a single attack that you can't match in several back-to-back combos. You can unload all over the enemy for a minute or two and have it all instantly reversed when they tap you once in return.
 
K

KraytarJ

Member
This shit makes smash 4 against bots incredibly pointless and dull. So damn annoying for sure, I don't know why this shit is even used.
 
H

Hasney

Member
Dahaka said:
I came here for FIFA :D
Click to expand...

FIFA is less input reading and just fucking with you to keep the game "balanced", even in multiplayer.

v3CzP72.gif


Think that guy was already leading somehow?
 
T

TheSpecialOne

Banned
Turrican3 said:
AAA annual sequels industry in a nutshell.
Click to expand...
Yep, it's pretty sad unfortunately. I've learned my lesson this gen. I'm not jumping in head first next time. I will also only purchase very few games on day one from now on. People keep getting hyped with new tech, visuals, etc while fundamental rage inducing problems like these are continually ignored. Like honestly, enough is enough.
 
B

Breads

Banned
Fighting games and moba bots make it apparent how bullshit input reading is. Frame perfect instant execution and instant targeting/ queuing, blocking/ countering/ denies/ kiting are the worst. There is no way a human can react to stimuli on frame 1 and perfectly counter it on frame 2.

We are at the programmers mercy at that point at can get pretty ridiculous.
 
D

Dahaka

Member
does the player personality of PES still exist today?

I never read about it BUT the manager mode of Fifa never feels like PES did during the days I played it last. That was PES 08 and 09.

Some players that were very good stats-wise wouldn't fit into the team and players that were around 75-80 and overshadowed by star players sometimes had excellent days where they would decide matches and be on fire. That was amazing.
 
G

Gentle Rodriguez

Member
Hasney said:
FIFA is less input reading and just fucking with you to keep the game "balanced", even in multiplayer.

v3CzP72.gif


Think that guy was already leading somehow?
Click to expand...
I've seen this happen irl several times, it's like people going "how did I lose 0-1 when I had 50 chances and my opponent just one?" pretending that that doesn't happen irl when it does.
 
T

TheSpecialOne

Banned
Dahaka said:
does the player personality of PES still exist today?

I never read about it BUT the manager mode of Fifa never feels like PES did during the days I played it last. That was PES 08 and 09.

Some players that were very good stats-wise wouldn't fit into the team and players that were around 75-80 and overshadowed by star players sometimes had excellent days where they would decide matches and be on fire. That was amazing.
Click to expand...
Nope, pes has declined. It's not on that level anymore.
 
H

Hasney

Member
Shuggananas said:
looks fake as fuck
Click to expand...

The last part probably is. It was mainly the gameplay part of it for the point of this thread because that happens far, far too often.

Gentle Rodriguez said:
I've seen this happen irl several times, it's like people going "how did I lose 0-1 when I had 50 chances and my opponent just one?" pretending that that doesn't happen irl when it does.
Click to expand...

It totally happens in real life. It doesn't happen as constantly or as many times within the same match as it does when you're winning in FIFA before making your defences cock up and losing 5-4.

TheSpecialOne said:
Nope, pes has declined. It's not on that level anymore.
Click to expand...

Nah, it was back from 2015 and easily on the same level as FIFA on a pure gameplay standpoint.

Found 16 from both of them to be steps backward though.
 
M

matrix-cat

Member
Some of the bosses in Yakuza games get pretty bad about this. I don't know if they're definitely reading my inputs, but it gets to the point where they'll just block everything, or dodge your attack, stomp you flat, and then dodge the counter-attack you trigger on hitting the ground just to rub it in.

Yakuza combat kind of operates like that schoolyard game where you're pewpewpewing with lasers, but your friend declares he's wearing laser-proof armour, but you have special lasers that go through laser-proof armour, but nu-uh because he has special special laser-proof armour, and on and on. Early enemies can be combo'd mercilessly, then they start blocking, then they start dodging, then they start counter-attacking, and by the time you get to the final boss you just have to hope you brought enough Staminan Royales to outlast him.
 
R

Rudimental

Member
Hasney said:
The last part probably is. It was mainly the gameplay part of it for the point of this thread because that happens far, far too often.
Click to expand...

Last part is from a different game, if you look at the colour of the kits. Looks like Liverpool (all red) vs Tottenham (white top, black shorts), where Liverpool just scored.
 
T

Turrican3

Member
TheSpecialOne said:
Yep, it's pretty sad unfortunately. I've learned my lesson this gen. I'm not jumping in head first next time. I will also only purchase very few games on day one from now on. People keep getting hyped with new tech, visuals, etc while fundamental rage inducing problems like these are continually ignored.
Click to expand...
100% agree.

The way I see it, there's far too many awful, awful trends going on in this industry... I guess that's one of the reasons I've been primarily resorting to Nintendo games on day one for a good while, leaving the vast majority of the - admittedly few - other interesting stuff for when they reach bargain-bin status (when they'll also likely have fixed a decent amount of bugs).

Backlog also doesn't help, and being a single player guy I guess there's no reason to be in a hurry either: a good game is worth playing even if you don't play it when the hype is going like crazy.
 
F

Famassu

Member
Turrican3 said:
100% agree.

The way I see it, there's far too many awful, awful trends going on in this industry... I guess that's one of the reasons I've been primarily resorting to Nintendo games on day one for a good while, leaving the vast majority of the - admittedly few - other interesting stuff for when they reach bargain-bin status (when they'll also likely have fixed a decent amount of bugs).

Backlog also doesn't help, and being a single player guy I guess there's no reason to be in a hurry either: a good game is worth playing even if you don't play it when the hype is going like crazy.
Click to expand...
Nintendo is about the last place to go for fair & good AI...
 
D

Doc_Drop

Member
Yep, scripting/input reading/rubber banding in FIFA is infuriating. It only takes a minute to know whether the game decides it's gonna be a fuck you game or not. When I can't outrun John Fucking Terry with Gareth Bale you know you're in for a shit show. Or when you're playing Morecombe in the cup and one of their players dribbles past 6 players of level 80 or above and scores in the 89th minute I feel the rage.

It's why I've spent a long time tweaking the CPU settings in order to introduce mistakes when the AI is having one of those days

Edit: Also, it's even more infuriating when the AI starts affecting how your players are playing or straight up ignores your button inputs
 
D

Dahaka

Member
Doc_Drop said:
Yep, scripting/input reading/rubber banding in FIFA is infuriating. It only takes a minute to know whether the game decides it's gonna be a fuck you game or not. When I can't outrun John Fucking Terry with Gareth Bale you know you're in for a shit show. Or when you're playing Morecombe in the cup and one of their players dribbles past 6 players of level 80 or above and scores in the 89th minute I feel the rage.

It's why I've spent a long time tweaking the CPU settings in order to introduce mistakes when the AI is having one of those days

Edit: Also, it's even more infuriating when the AI starts affecting how your players are playing or straight up ignores your button inputs
Click to expand...

This. Always tweaking AI settings in Fifa using "world class" as with professional the AI is only aggressive during "cheat mode" and mostly too lethargic.
 
Jawmuncher

Jawmuncher

Member
Not sports but SFV AI in survival does this the last few rounds. On normal difficulty I shouldn't have the CPU blocking everything I'm doing.
 
D

Doc_Drop

Member
Dahaka said:
This. Always tweaking AI settings in Fifa using "world class" as with professional the AI is only aggressive during "cheat mode" and mostly too lethargic.
Click to expand...

As soon as they score a goal though, pure flat passing along the back four and wasting time up the wings. I'm glad I'm able to let it go, if it had been like this when I was a kid I don't know how many controllers I would have got through
 
L

Ludens

Banned
Jawmuncher said:
Not sports but SFV AI in survival does this the last few rounds. On normal difficulty I shouldn't have the CPU blocking everything I'm doing.
Click to expand...

Normal is OK and easy except for the last two fights, in which difficulty has an insane spike.
Hard turns out to be impossible after 15 fights or so.
 
S

SpiceMelange

Member
Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo is the absolute worst on this. Total coin muncher if you don't abuse the AI in some way. They will instantly react and counterhit anything you poke out.
 
D

Dahaka

Member
Doc_Drop said:
As soon as they score a goal though, pure flat passing along the back four and wasting time up the wings. I'm glad I'm able to let it go, if it had been like this when I was a kid I don't know how many controllers I would have got through
Click to expand...

I don't know if the time wasting starting from minute 80 is worse than what you mention. I mean it happens in football all the time but it can really be rage inducing when they do it, especially the ball shielding. That's where I sometimes go into a maximum ultraaggressive tackle.
 
S

SeeNoWeevil

Member
It really pisses me off how little effort is put into fighting game AI. Some people were excusing the lack of an arcade mode in SFV because the AI is so shit, why would you ever want to play it!! Good, human like AI would be great for casuals to prep for playing online opponents and fill in the gaps when they can't be matched with someone of equal skill online. Fighting game AI has not changed one little bit in years, across dozens of games. The same shitty traits exist in most/all. AI that doesn't know when to not push buttons, gets frametrapped over and over. AI will reversal through every gap at higher levels, risk free, obviously.
 
D

Devil

Member
Thought this was going to be another Street Fighter V thread, but sports game fit this just fine, too. SFV Survival Mode sadly became a joke partly because of that mind reading AI.
 
D

Doc_Drop

Member
Dahaka said:
I don't know if the time wasting starting from minute 80 is worse than what you mention. I mean it happens in football all the time but it can really be rage inducing when they do it, especially the ball shielding. That's where I sometimes go into a maximum ultraaggressive tackle.
Click to expand...

It's mostly because of cheat mode throughout the game, they score, then all the defenders turn into god-tier passing and refuse to move forward (unless the decide to cheat another goal). But yes, I'll happily take a red card in order for them to hoof the ball my end so I can at least try and score (of course all my shots then inexplicably miss)
 
L

Lusankya

Member
Gentle Rodriguez said:
I've seen this happen irl several times, it's like people going "how did I lose 0-1 when I had 50 chances and my opponent just one?" pretending that that doesn't happen irl when it does.
Click to expand...

I think the problem aren't the wasted chances, but rather when the game just fucks with you. E.g. stealing your defender, refusing to get the ball, passing in the opposite direction you pressed the analog stick...
 
G

gelf

Member
Hasney said:
Fighting games at higher difficulties in general really. Making AI that behaves like a real opponent is haaarrrrd.
Click to expand...

Those early Mortal Kombats were another level though. Some moves were completely unusable against the AI as they would be instantly countered even on very easy. By comparison Street Fighter's AI was generally beatable by anyone on low levels.
 
Link_enfant

Link_enfant

Member
Kinda related to input reading although not exactly the same thing; does anyone recall this annoying IA in Pokémon Colosseum?

You know, when the opposing Pokémon seem to know what you're going to do during your turn (switching is a good example) and choose their move at the last moment accordingly?
Like, they used to do super effective attacks right I after I switched and it happened multiple times to me.
Really, really annoying and unfair, almost stopped playing the game because of that (among other things).

It doesn't seem to occur in handled games, or I never noticed it. May be the case in XD but I haven't played it.
 
N

Narroo

Member
SoulUnison said:
The Dissidia: Final Fantasy games are the worst about this.

The game is sort of limited in attack and movement options, so the "harder" the enemy AI gets, the more it relies on simply perfectly reading your button inputs and always making the exact right counter-attack.
Trying to finish some of the high-level single player content is like bashing your head against a wall until the CPU makes a rare mistake and dodges into a wall, or something.

And that's not even getting into the game's weird idea of equipment balance. You can be up against a same-level opponent and be wearing the best gear it's possible for you to have at the time, but the enemy will be able to do an amount of damage to you in a single attack that you can't match in several back-to-back combos. You can unload all over the enemy for a minute or two and have it all instantly reversed when they tap you once in return.
Click to expand...

Oh lord, I remember in the first game I trapped a computer in a corner in Kefka's tower and trapped them inside Terra's Tornado. The computer just spammed "dodge" in place for the entire duration of Tornado and came out completely unharmed. Game sucks,
 
E

Espada

Member
KraytarJ said:
This shit makes smash 4 against bots incredibly pointless and dull. So damn annoying for sure, I don't know why this shit is even used.
Click to expand...

Oh my goodness, Smash 4 against bots is infuriating. The perfect dodges, guards, the insanely squirrelly hopping, etc... I don't know how folks like Maximilian put up with high level AI for so long. Watching the AI just block the instant I press the button (despite being nowhere near them) just makes me shake my head.
 
T

TsuWave

Member
if you played enough fifa, you can tell which games you're gonna get fucked the most by this from the kick-off, i swear the ball/touch/players feel different.

it's a terrible mechanic and probably the reason i stopped playing fifa altogether.

edit - someone else said the same
 
I

Into

Member
MK2 and MK3 were very obvious in this. Even as a kid who knew nothing about vidya or AI, i thought it looked real funny
 
M

Metal B

Member
I wish more games had Perfect Dark's "Special Simulants". You could choose bots in multiplayer, which had different behaviours. There were most the time very strange and separated from the difficulty settings, but they made playing the multiplayer alone or with less people very fun. They pretty much become "characters", which you liked to play against. More games should have them, since not all players like playing online and they are useful to create some special challenges for single-player (similar to Perfect Dark).

---Special Simulants---

PeaceSim
As the name implies, this Sim hates violence. In fact, the PeaceSim will goaround hoarding weapons so people don't pick them up, and disarm people for their weapons. Therefore, they'll drop a payload of weapons when you kill them. Just don't let them sneak up on you…

ShieldSim
Like some human players I know, this Sim is a shield addict. It will always go for the shield, even if it has no weapons! In fact, if you damage its shield in the least bit, it will retreat to get another shield! My advice is don't let it.

RocketSim
This is the pyromaniac of the Simulants! The RocketSim will always pursue the explosive weapons, and will set them off, even if doing so would spell death for itself! Avoid this Sim, or kill it before it can get an explosive.

KazeSim
This is fearless, suicidal menace. It will make suicidal runs, even with no weapons, to try and destroy you. It fears nothing, and that makes it a dangerous enemy.

FistSim
Unlike the PeaceSim, the FistSim is violent. Like the PeaceSim, though, it will hoard weapons and try to engage you in hand-to-hand combat. It won't use weapons, but it will do good damage with its hands.

PreySim
This Sim truly feels that honor is a minor detail in a fight to the death. The PreySim dislikes competition, so it will hunt down the easiest targets to gain an easy kill. Its favorite targets include weakened opponents that are unarmed or armed with a weak weapon, and enemies that have just spawned. The PreySim also loves to cloak, so beware.

CowardSim
This is the SimWussy. It flees to safety at the mere sign of confrontation, and will only confront you if it has a superior weapon. Carry a big gun, and you will rarely meet this Sim. Hide out and try to catch the coward off its guard.

FeudSim
Stay out of this Sim's way! If the FeudSim goes after you, it will hunt you until the end of the game! It will mercilessly hunt its target, even if you kill it.

SpeedSim
As the name suggests, this Sim is extremely fast. It's definitely faster than you, so it's difficult to hit with standard weaponry. It's impossible to flee, so stand and fight like a man.

TurtleSim
This Sim is the opposite of the SpeedSim. It moves at a much slower rate than most players, but it has a shield that is twice as strong as the standard shield! Fortunately for you, it has restricted mobility due to its shield.

VengeSim
This is a psychopathic Sim! This Sim will completely ignore other players just to attack the player that last killed it! It attacks with a vicious rage; so to avoid its rage, just leave it alone.

JudgeSim
This is the only decent Sim. The JudgeSim acts like the judge of the battlefield, going after the winning player to even out the odds. That means if you are an expert playing against some young rookies, expect this Sim to come after you!
Click to expand...
Source: http://www.gamefaqs.com/xbox360/960632-perfect-dark/faqs/8452
 
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