Random Conversations

Written by Springheel

Tired of your AI sitting and staring at each other in silence? There is a way to make them seem more responsive and alive.

When writing the newer vocal scripts, I included a random sequence of questions and responses that can be used to create generic conversations between AI. This is separate from the random greetings AI give, which are part of regular AI behaviour. Random conversations won't happen by themselves; mappers have to set them up in their map. The following vocal sets support random conversations (older ones do not):

1. vocal set_commander

2. vocal set_jack

3. vocal set_cynic

4. vocal set_drunk

5. vocal set_maiden

6. vocal set_moor

The sequence goes like this:

AI 1: "convo_question" vocal, ex, "So, how did the game go last night?"

AI 2: "convo_answer/response" vocal, ex, "Could have been better."

AI 1: "convo_close" vocal, ex, "Got it."

Each "convo_question" asks for a judgement response. "How was X? What did you think of X?" etc. Each vocal set has four or five questions/answers that are chosen from randomly. The overall effect is pretty good, I think, though some question/responses combinations make more sense than others.

The sitting AI in Mission 1: A New Job use this system. Basically, you create the conversation and then decide when and how you want to trigger it. A trigger_entityname could be used for patrolling AI. If the AI are sitting near each other, a trigger_sequencer could be used to have multiple conversations over time. In the latter case I would make two conversations to alternate between--one with AI 1 asking the questions, and the other with AI 2 asking the questions.