A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers

Samuel Mascarenhas; Manuel Guimarães; Rui Prada; Pedro A. Santos; Kam Star; Ben Hirsh; Ellis Spice; Rob Kommeren; João Dias

doi:10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers

Samuel Mascarenhas, Manuel Guimarães, Rui Prada, Pedro A. Santos, Kam Star, Ben Hirsh, Ellis Spice, Rob Kommeren, João Dias

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference Article in proceeding › Academic › peer-review

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Abstract

The design of serious games requires developers to tackle pedagogical challenges calling for advanced solutions that the entertainment industry might deem too risky to pursue. One such challenge is the creation of autonomous socially intelligent characters with whom players can practice different social skills.
Although there are several architectures in the field of virtual agents that are designed specifically to enable more human-like interactions, they are still not widely adopted by game studios that develop serious games, in particular for learning. In this paper, we present a virtual agent toolkit that was specifically
developed with the intent of making agent-based solutions more accessible and reliable to game developers. To this end, a collaborative effort was established with a game studio that has used the toolkit to develop two different serious games. Among other advantages, the toolkit facilitated the inclusion of a dynamic model of emotions that affects not just how the character looks and acts but also how the player’s performance is determined.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18)
Subtitle of host publication	Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018
Editors	Cameron Browne, Mark Winands, Jialin Liu, Mike Preuss
Place of Publication	Danvers, MA
Publisher	IEEE
Pages	332-338
Number of pages	7
ISBN (Electronic)	9781538643594
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399
Publication status	Published - 11 Oct 2018
Externally published	Yes
Event	2018 Conference on computational intelligence and Games - Maastricht, Netherlands Duration: 14 Aug 2018 → 17 Aug 2018 https://project.dke.maastrichtuniversity.nl/cig2018/

Conference

Conference	2018 Conference on computational intelligence and Games
Country/Territory	Netherlands
City	Maastricht
Period	14/08/18 → 17/08/18
Internet address	https://project.dke.maastrichtuniversity.nl/cig2018/

Keywords

Affective Computing
Authoring Tools
Interactive Storytelling
Serious Games
Virtual Agents

Access to Document

10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

VAT-CIGAccepted author manuscript, 2.19 MBLicence: CC BY-NC-SA

https://project.dke.maastrichtuniversity.nl/games/files/proceedings-CIG2018.pdfLicence: CC BY-SA

Rage: Realising an Applied Gaming Eco-system
Westera, W. (PI), Georgiadis, K. (CoI), Saveski, G. (CoI), van Lankveld, G. (CoI), Bahreini, K. (CoI), van der Vegt, W. (CoI), Berkhout, J. (CoI), Nyamsuren, E. (CoI), Kluijfhout, E. (CoI) & Nadolski, R. (CoI)
European Union
1/02/15 → 31/07/19
Project: Research

Cite this

Mascarenhas, S., Guimarães, M., Prada, R., Santos, P. A., Star, K., Hirsh, B., Spice, E., Kommeren, R., & Dias, J. (2018). A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers. In C. Browne, M. Winands, J. Liu, & M. Preuss (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18): Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018 (pp. 332-338). Article 8490399 IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

Mascarenhas, Samuel ; Guimarães, Manuel ; Prada, Rui et al. / A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers. Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18): Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018. editor / Cameron Browne ; Mark Winands ; Jialin Liu ; Mike Preuss. Danvers, MA : IEEE, 2018. pp. 332-338

@inproceedings{f93284b08ed24245b0238d3c10ad5047,

title = "A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers",

abstract = "The design of serious games requires developers to tackle pedagogical challenges calling for advanced solutions that the entertainment industry might deem too risky to pursue. One such challenge is the creation of autonomous socially intelligent characters with whom players can practice different social skills.Although there are several architectures in the field of virtual agents that are designed specifically to enable more human-like interactions, they are still not widely adopted by game studios that develop serious games, in particular for learning. In this paper, we present a virtual agent toolkit that was specificallydeveloped with the intent of making agent-based solutions more accessible and reliable to game developers. To this end, a collaborative effort was established with a game studio that has used the toolkit to develop two different serious games. Among other advantages, the toolkit facilitated the inclusion of a dynamic model of emotions that affects not just how the character looks and acts but also how the player{\textquoteright}s performance is determined.",

keywords = "Affective Computing, Authoring Tools, Interactive Storytelling, Serious Games, Virtual Agents",

author = "Samuel Mascarenhas and Manuel Guimar{\~a}es and Rui Prada and Santos, {Pedro A.} and Kam Star and Ben Hirsh and Ellis Spice and Rob Kommeren and Jo{\~a}o Dias",

year = "2018",

month = oct,

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doi = "10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399",

language = "English",

pages = "332--338",

editor = "Cameron Browne and Mark Winands and Jialin Liu and Preuss, {Mike }",

booktitle = "Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG{\textquoteright}18)",

publisher = "IEEE",

address = "United States",

note = "2018 Conference on computational intelligence and Games ; Conference date: 14-08-2018 Through 17-08-2018",

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Mascarenhas, S, Guimarães, M, Prada, R, Santos, PA, Star, K, Hirsh, B, Spice, E, Kommeren, R & Dias, J 2018, A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers. in C Browne, M Winands, J Liu & M Preuss (eds), Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18): Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018., 8490399, IEEE, Danvers, MA, pp. 332-338, 2018 Conference on computational intelligence and Games, Maastricht, Netherlands, 14/08/18. https://doi.org/10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers. / Mascarenhas, Samuel; Guimarães, Manuel; Prada, Rui et al.
Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18): Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018. ed. / Cameron Browne; Mark Winands; Jialin Liu; Mike Preuss. Danvers, MA: IEEE, 2018. p. 332-338 8490399.

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference Article in proceeding › Academic › peer-review

TY - GEN

T1 - A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers

AU - Mascarenhas, Samuel

AU - Guimarães, Manuel

AU - Prada, Rui

AU - Santos, Pedro A.

AU - Star, Kam

AU - Hirsh, Ben

AU - Spice, Ellis

AU - Kommeren, Rob

AU - Dias, João

PY - 2018/10/11

Y1 - 2018/10/11

N2 - The design of serious games requires developers to tackle pedagogical challenges calling for advanced solutions that the entertainment industry might deem too risky to pursue. One such challenge is the creation of autonomous socially intelligent characters with whom players can practice different social skills.Although there are several architectures in the field of virtual agents that are designed specifically to enable more human-like interactions, they are still not widely adopted by game studios that develop serious games, in particular for learning. In this paper, we present a virtual agent toolkit that was specificallydeveloped with the intent of making agent-based solutions more accessible and reliable to game developers. To this end, a collaborative effort was established with a game studio that has used the toolkit to develop two different serious games. Among other advantages, the toolkit facilitated the inclusion of a dynamic model of emotions that affects not just how the character looks and acts but also how the player’s performance is determined.

AB - The design of serious games requires developers to tackle pedagogical challenges calling for advanced solutions that the entertainment industry might deem too risky to pursue. One such challenge is the creation of autonomous socially intelligent characters with whom players can practice different social skills.Although there are several architectures in the field of virtual agents that are designed specifically to enable more human-like interactions, they are still not widely adopted by game studios that develop serious games, in particular for learning. In this paper, we present a virtual agent toolkit that was specificallydeveloped with the intent of making agent-based solutions more accessible and reliable to game developers. To this end, a collaborative effort was established with a game studio that has used the toolkit to develop two different serious games. Among other advantages, the toolkit facilitated the inclusion of a dynamic model of emotions that affects not just how the character looks and acts but also how the player’s performance is determined.

KW - Affective Computing

KW - Authoring Tools

KW - Interactive Storytelling

KW - Serious Games

KW - Virtual Agents

U2 - 10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

DO - 10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

M3 - Conference Article in proceeding

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BT - Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18)

A2 - Browne, Cameron

A2 - Winands, Mark

A2 - Liu, Jialin

A2 - Preuss, Mike

PB - IEEE

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ER -

Mascarenhas S, Guimarães M, Prada R, Santos PA, Star K, Hirsh B et al. A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers. In Browne C, Winands M, Liu J, Preuss M, editors, Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG’18): Department of Data Science & Knowledge Engineering, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 14–17 August, 2018. Danvers, MA: IEEE. 2018. p. 332-338. 8490399 doi: 10.1109/CIG.2018.8490399

A Virtual Agent Toolkit for Serious Games Developers

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