Artificial intelligence is everywhere these days. We utilise it in a broad selection of different devices and technological systems, but it is frequently employed in online and mobile games. When it comes to understanding how AI is utilised in these situations, people's understanding is often woefully lacking. This is a shame because artificial intelligence does play a broad role in online and mobile games. Let's take a look at exactly how this is the case.

With rampant developments in computer vision technology, there are many ways that machine learning is being used in the video game industry, especially in virtual reality. Developments in VR games are quickly changing the way we game and the way we socialize. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to say that VR is the future of gaming. At the same time, if you're a fan of classic console games, there are numerous ways that AI can make the console games we love even more interactive and immersive. In this article, we will give five predictions for the future of AI in gaming and how developments in machine learning can help developers build better games.

I've always wanted to like The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim more than I ever have in practice---a problem I had with Oblivion as well, and one that I have with lots of RPGs (as well as MMOs like The Elder Scrolls Online.) Skyrim is riddled with problems, of course, from bugs and glitches to uneven acting and quest design. But it's always been the lackluster combat that left me cold. And I hate that, because this is exactly the kind of game I dreamed about as a kid: Sprawling, epic, filled with secrets and quests and magical items, dark secrets and shadowy organizations. And yet every time I play the game I quickly get bored, or find myself switching to something else with more engaging mechanics like Dark Souls.

Serious games offer an opportunity for players to learn communication skills by practicing conversations with nonplaying characters (NPCs). To realize this potential, the player needs freedom of play to discover the relationships between its actions and their effects on the partner and the conversation. Scripting is currently the common approach to design in-game dialogue. Although scripting is a robust technique, the approach tends to produce deterministic conversations, allowing little control to the player. It is claimed that a Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) approach to model the behavior of NPCs allows greater freedom to the player, and delivers better scalability and re-use of dialogues. This claim is evaluated by using BDI in the development of a sales-talk training game in the real-estate domain. It is concluded that BDI enables representative NPCs that respond appropriately and the game allows the player its freedom of choice to explore. The results also showed that BDI brings about new challenges to address, in order to further increase the quality of in-game dialogue.