Skip to content

NPCs may be smart enough to have anxiety in GTA6

A new patent filed by Take-Two talks about a new way to give NPCs more divergent AI for future games like GTA6.

Hope Corrigan
Hope Corrigan
1 min read
NPCs may be smart enough to have anxiety in GTA6

Generally speaking, most non player characters, or NPCs in games are the endlessly entertaining soulless little folk that populate your city. You know the ones, the people you knock down, crash into, or generally treat as moving scenery rather than actual characters.

With every leap in technology these thankless digital individuals get a little better, but they still always feel like seeing the code in the matrix. Repeated models, textures, low poly faces, the same walk animations and other technical limitations means these characters basically never feel alive, and when you start to notice it, neither do their worlds.

While I highly doubt this is going to be completely solved by the time the not even announced sixth Grand Theft Auto game is released, a patent filed by parent company Take-Two hints that at least, they're really working on it.

The patent which was filed back in October 2020 was recently posted to Reddit (spotted via VG247) and talks mostly about making NPCs feel a little more alive by using new AI systems that delegate personalities to these NPCs.

From the patent, it seems this would make a cautious or nervous NPC drive differently than someone more boisterous. They may take different routes, have different aggression levels, maybe different animations all linked to their personality - which may even change depending on things like weather conditions or time of day.

The patent also specifically references modern day sounding traffic ideas, which is why most fans are thinking this points to a new GTA, rather than more Red Dead related content.

It sounds a little like the way Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs: Legion assigns traits mixing among characters which may give them different workplaces and schedules. (Though it seems people who’ve played Watch Dogs: Legion found this varying levels of successful.)

While Take-Two’s patent does sound like an interesting way to handle the weird ghost world of NPCs, it’s worth noting that it is just a patent, at least for now.

I just hope these new innovations in all things AI still lead to hilariously wonderful mistakes.

PoliticsGamesAI

Hope Corrigan

Secretly several dogs stacked on top of one another in a large coat, Hope has a habit of getting far too excited about all things videogames and tech. She loves the new accomplishments and ideas huma


Related Posts

Can Sunderfolk thread the needle to make RPG strategy fun for the whole family?

It's pretty, it's friendly, and you play it with your phone – but not 'on' your phone. Sunderfolk is shooting for an interesting Goldilocks zone for couch co-op we haven't really seen before.

People in a living room with a large TV. One is standing pointing at a hex-grid map on the screen. The others are sitting and looking at phones as part of how they're playing.

Which Way Up is full of fresh gravity bending mayhem

Australia's own Turtle Flip has just released its Galaxy meets Party game and it's a real treat.

Which Way Up is full of fresh gravity bending mayhem

Byteside gift guide 2024: fun, weird, wonderful, nerdy gift ideas

Lets skip the obvious and explore some clever ideas, shall we?

A pink gift box with gold ribbon photographed from above, with little golden heart glitter all over.