Artificial intelligence learns teamwork in a deadly game of capture the flag

DeepMind's bots work in pairs to capture the opposing team's flag on indoor and outdoor maps in Quake III Arena. Human gamers know just how hard it is to win a new spin on the classic computer game Quake: In a mazelike arena, they must work with other players to capture floating flags--all while dodging deadly gunfire. Now, for the first time, artificial intelligence (AI) has mastered teamwork in a complex first-person video game, coordinating its actions with both human and computer teammates to consistently beat opponents. "The scale of the experiments is remarkable," says Michael Littman, an AI expert at Brown University. Getting AI agents to work together is incredibly tough, he says. Although AI can drive cars and easily defeat the world's greatest chess and Go players one on one, researchers have struggled to get it to master teamwork.