Synthesizing bots emotional behaviors through fuzzy cognitive processes

Video games are one of the most significative applications of the artificial intelligence. Ranging from simple games such as Space Invaders to modern complex first person shooters (FPSs), artificial and computational intelligence techniques have been widely exploited to design and develop virtual characters behaviors in order to provide them with a high degree of human-likeness. Our work tries to improve current bots' human-likeness by introducing an abstract collection of artificial components capable of synthetizing cognitive processes that usually allow intelligent natural entities to take autonomous decisions by dynamically analyzing environmental stimuli, emotions, personality and physical conditions. In particular, our proposal exploits some theories from psychological research area and introduces a novel kinds of fuzzy controllers, named Timed Automata based Fuzzy Controllers, in order to provide Non Player Characters with a more realistic and efficient behaviors. © 2010 IEEE.