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Thread: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

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    EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    AI/ML driven system should increase player engagement and enjoyment, it says.
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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Basically, if you suck, the game will makes things easier so you believe you're totally Epic. You're not. You suck.

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Ha ha, I wonder what will happen to the algorithm when a speed runner completes an hour long level in 5 minutes xD

    "OVERLOAD, SCALE DIFFICULTY BY 300000%!"

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Well, I seem to recall Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion have this over 15 years ago... but go ahead EA, be a patent troll. And I remember some other games' AI was too advanced with difficulty they had to dumb it down (can't recall the name, but it was old)

    Imagine dying in a game! And having to restart! The HORROR! Seriously, this just sounds like more dumbing down of games to "attract more audience"... and knowing EA's history, they'll likely roll this out on if not all, MOST of their games.... I really DON'T want more rubber-banding AI in my driving games... wait a sec, that's another way devs made games easier in the past.... sure EA will patent that soon as well.
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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Quote Originally Posted by excalibur1814 View Post
    Basically, if you suck, the game will makes things easier so you believe you're totally Epic. You're not. You suck.
    Or if you have difficulties with particular aspects due to a disability or something, you will no longer be excluded from playing the games...

    The thing about games is that they're supposed to be fun, which in the majority of cases means you need a reasonable chance of winning it... otherwise it's just hard work and a pointless waste of time.
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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Quote Originally Posted by excalibur1814 View Post
    Basically, if you suck, the game will makes things easier so you believe you're totally Epic. You're not. You suck.
    Or if you really are epic, then it can make the game harder for you and leave it possible for me.

    It's a good idea, which is why it has been done countless times, and why that doesn't seem to be the patent here. The new bit is that this is cloud based, so before just the the local game would scale difficulty. Now they can look at player retention levels and work out which scaling works best for which people.

    It does mean that EA will know that I suck at a game. Perhaps I will see adverts for "Least Valued Player" T-shirts

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Quote Originally Posted by article
    User history in a range of games that use this Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system.
    I hope GDPR (or whatever it's replaced by) can prevent this. EA storing my gaming habits won't benefit anyone, much less me.

    I also get why they think this is good. A bunch of their games are iterative, so your gameplay style in FIFA 2019 can be the same as FIFA 2020. However, I doubt this will help in games that are not yearly releases and one offs like C&C Remastered; Or the Dragon Age series, in which the gameplay in DA:O was completely different to DAII which was different to DA:I. Same for Mass Effect to Mass Effect 2...

    This all sounds like an excuse to store more user data to me, while claiming it's to help gamers! I have to press "X" to Doubt their motives here.


    Also, difficulty sliders have existed in games for decades...
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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    They could easily do this client side with origin (even across games), but nooo it has to be on the cloud

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Here we go again with the dumbing down of video games. I guess making a good game isn't feasible anymore.

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Quote Originally Posted by Scryder View Post
    However, I doubt this will help in games that are not yearly releases and one offs like C&C Remastered; Or the Dragon Age series, in which the gameplay in DA:O was completely different to DAII which was different to DA:I. Same for Mass Effect to Mass Effect 2...
    I think you've missed the box where they group players, it wouldn't need or care about your previous games.

    Add some random (but recorded) variance to everyone's adjusted difficulty (because you are guessing at that point anyway), and notice who stops playing. If there is a trend for "it was all the players where we biassed it low" then bump everyone's difficulty up a bit. To work, it needs to learn from other players giving up and apply that to your game playing. That means working out which of the players which dropped out are in some way like you, but such a scheme should rapidly home in on the correct difficulty level to challenge people the right amount.

    I can see the idea, specially if you are looking with an esports bias. But it depends on the game. Automatic difficulty scaling is one of the things that pushed me out of World of Warcraft. Sometimes I want the game to be hard, sometimes I want to kick back and play in an easy zone. If all zones are the same experience, then that's boring and I'm out.

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Why do I see this being abused by companies (EA) that have things you can buy for real money....

    AI - Oh no, they're getting everything too easily and not buying 'credits' from the store, best ramp up difficulty to the point they crack and just spend real money...

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    I could've done with something like this in 1984 when I was playing Jet Set Willy on my Spectrum. That game was ridiculously difficult (or I just sucked at it). Either way, I never got close to completing it despite countless hours spent trying.

    Eventually I'd end up throwing the joystick across the room in frustration. My mum would usually then chime in with something unhelpful like "Don't play it if it's going to annoy you", to which my response would be "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!"

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    This reminds me too much of what Activision have started doing recently with "Engagement Based Matchmaking". That system (employed in COD MW and BO + Warzone) matches you up with players of a certain skill to keep you playing the game longer.

    It's based on "skill" (difficulty) and will adjust the lobbies you are placed into based on what they think will keep you playing. That can be super easy "bot" lobbies as they detect that when you win or kill a lot you play more...or it can be putting you in super sweaty high K/D lobbies because you are the kind of player that won't stop until you get a "good" game, so by constantly matching you with difficult opponents, you play more, invest more time into the game and are then more likely to invest money in it.

    That last part has got to be the crux of this - its not about making the games more "fun" for players, it's about keeping you engaged with the game for longer, making it feel like you are achieving something and will be more likely to pay for skins/DLC/whatever. Heck I get it - I tried Dark Souls, got punished constantly, and i've never picked it up again and have zero interest in the later titles of that series.

    I don't like it and I hate dynamic difficulty in any game - it removes a lot of the fun and challenge for me. I much prefer setting a fixed difficulty level and have the option to turn it down mid-game (at the expense of achievements, if they are to mean anything) if I am struggling...i.e. leaving it up to the player to decide.

    It will be interesting to see how they employ this in their upcoming games, e.g. BF6.

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    As my fingers and reflex ages I do want my games to be easy. Does feel like this is a solution looking for a problem though. My biggest concern will be what happens to the game in 10, 20 years time. Will it still be playable without a cloud server to connect too? Its worth considering as I tried playing a game called mercenaries (I think it was the second game but I'm not sure) about a year ago on a Ps3 and couldn't even start the game without disconnecting the ps3 from the network as it just sat waiting for a server connection! Game conservation is hard enough but all this permanent connection stuff is going to ruin it.
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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    Didn't Far Cry have an AI balancer setting back in the day? I made sure I completed the game both with it on and with it off just to make sure I wasn't getting an easy ride.

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    Re: EA patents Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system in games

    This sounds like a terrible idea. The whole point of a good game is to overcome a challenge. Anything else is just a pachinko machine. Which is EA's favorite kind of machine I guess.
    They will probably even add this to multiplayer so bad players deal more damage.
    But I love when games insult you by suggesting to lower the difficulty when you screw up two times xD

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