My project will explore the creation and behaviour of hostile NPCs in video games, using the Unity game engine and C# - this will be done in the 3D perspective. To start this project I will require extensive research into existing NPCs present in other games, I will analyse their movements and look closely at how they react to their environment. Key areas I will explore are: how NPCs react to each other and the player, how they react to different environments (whether peaceful or hostile) and finally I will look into how I can diversify these NPCs - thus allowing them to react differently to given situations. Whilst a lot of this research will be primary, gathered from me going into these games and analysing them myself, I will also look at pre-existing secondary research and studies into the NPCs of games.

Once I have gathered the majority of my research I can begin putting it into practice. With the newfound knowledge of what makes AI believable; looking into different ways they can react to stimuli and what will work well for my implementation, I can start the creation of my NPCs. To save time on researching my chosen topic, I will source many of my assets from free asset stores and scripts from previous projects as well as free script repositories. 

The first step will be creating the scenes in which I can test many of the NPC behaviours, these will be very minimalistic, consisting of many different setup scenarios. As I haven’t conducted my research yet, ideas for these scenarios are lacking. However some starter ideas for these are rooms featuring many covers for NPCs to hide behind and a scene big enough to experiment with the complex pathfinding of AI. I don’t foresee any difficulties with creating an environment as this won’t be a focus and quality won’t be a concern as long as the asset is functional for the project.

In terms of the NPCs I want to create, I will explore a variety of hostile NPCs; trying to employ some degree of individuality to offer different reactions to variables. To develop my NPCs beyond simplicity I will implement numerous activities they can carry out depending on the situation. For non-combat related activities, they may patrol a given area (thus making use of pathfinding) or stand guard at a specific point and if there are multiple NPCs in a given area they can begin to communicate and socialise. Now if they’re placed into a combat situation, they may actively hunt the enemy based on previous sightings, or if directly in combat they could take cover behind specific objects they can detect. Using sourced assets and animations I should be able to convey these, if I am unable to source animations I may attempt a simple animation myself; or likely I will just use the debug console to convey these. Managing to mimic human behaviour will prove a challenge due to the possible limitations of software, however I am confident through research of successful lifelike NPCs that I’ll manage to effectively achieve my goals. Due to the complexity of humans, it is imperative that I employ complex decision making in my NPCs; however as long as my research is thorough and my time dedicated this shouldn’t be a problem. 

Once research has begun and new ideas have been formed I may need to rethink my initial plans. Due to the influx of new ideas, previous plans may get replaced or simply rethought.