AlphaStar: Mastering the Real-Time Strategy Game StarCraft II DeepMind

There are several different ways to play the game, but in esports the most common is a 1v1 tournament played over five games. To start, a player must choose to play one of three different alien "races" - Zerg, Protoss or Terran, all of which have distinctive characteristics and abilities (although professional players tend to specialise in one race). Each player starts with a number of worker units, which gather basic resources to build more units and structures and create new technologies. These in turn allow a player to harvest other resources, build more sophisticated bases and structures, and develop new capabilities that can be used to outwit the opponent. To win, a player must carefully balance big-picture management of their economy - known as macro - along with low-level control of their individual units - known as micro.