Video games used to come preprogrammed with canned movements that expert players eventually could anticipate and figure out, but recent advancements in video game design and new game consoles with dazzling computing power, have endowed computer-controlled characters with a sense of self-preservation and unpredictability not seen even a year ago.

Game designers say this increasing sophistication is helping to put their medium on par with movies as a form of mainstream entertainment. Called Euphoria, the technology generates animation as the game is played so each moment is unique. This NaturalMotion technology grew out of research Reil and colleague Colm Massey did at Oxford University on the way animals and humans move. The resulting technology creates 3D character animation in real time, simulating the way the body moves so it looks authentic.

For example, Spore, from Sims creator Will Wright, immerses players in a world where not only the main character but the game universe itself is the product of their own imaginations. Players design a creature that evolves over several levels into beings capable of intergalactic travel. Because no two characters are the same, each will evolve in a different way. That’s a big contrast to traditional games, in which the main characters, be they James Bond or Lara Croft in Tomb Raider, were prebuilt by the developers.

Source: Fox News