Hands-On Artificial Intelligence with Unreal Engine: Everything you want to know about Game AI using Blueprints or C++

Cover
Title Page
Copyright and Credits
Dedication
About Packt
Contributors
Table of Contents
Preface
Section 1: The Unreal Framework
Chapter 1: Making the First Steps in the World of AI
	Before starting...
	Prerequisites
	Installing and preparing the software
		Unreal Engine
		Visual Studio
	Becoming an AI Game Developer
		What it means to be an AI Game Developer
		AI in the game development process
	A bit of history
		What is AI?
		A glance into the past
		AI in games
		AI in games – Industry and Academia
	Planning our journey
		Technical terminology
		The bottom-up approach
		The agent schema
		Unreal Engine AI Framework
		A sketch of our journey
			Decision-making with Behavior Trees (chapters 2, 6, 8, 9, and 10)
			Navigation (chapters 3 and 7)
			Environment Query System (chapters 4 and 12)
			Agent Awareness (chapters 5 and 12)
			Crowds (chapter 7)
			Designing Behavior Trees (chapters 8, 9, and 10)
			Debugging methods for Game AI (chapters 11, 12, and 13)
			Going beyond (chapter 14)
		Enabling AI for C++ users
	Summary
Chapter 2: Behavior Trees and Blackboards
	How Behavior Trees work
		The structure of a Mathematical Tree
		Behavior Tree components
			Root
			Tasks
			Composite
			Decorators
			Service
	Blackboards and their integration with Behavior Trees
	Creating our AI project
	Starting Behavior Trees from AI Controllers
		Creating the Behavior Tree and the Blackboard 
			Creating the Blackboard
			Creating the Behavior Tree
		The AI Controller to run a Behavior Tree
			AI Controller in Blueprint
			AI Controller in C++
	Summary
Chapter 3: Navigation
	What to expect from a Navigation System
	Unreal Navigation System
	Generating the Navigation Mesh
	Setting parameters for the Nav Mesh
		Display settings
		Generation settings
		Project Settings
			Settings on the Character Movement Component
	Modifying the Navigation Mesh
		Nav Modifier Volume
		Nav Mesh Areas
			Creating a NavArea class in Blueprint
			Creating a NavArea class in C++
		Nav Link Proxy
			Creating a Nav Link Proxy
			Simple Links and Smart Links
				Both Simple and Smart Links
				Simple Links
				Smart Links
			Other settings of the Nav Link Proxy
			Extending the Nav Link Proxy
		Navigation Avoidance
		Navigation Filtering
			Creating a Navigation Filter in Blueprint
			Creating a Navigation Filter in C++
	Overriding the Navigation System
	Summary
Chapter 4: Environment Querying System
	Enabling the Environment Querying System
	Understanding the Environment Querying System
		The general mechanism of EQS
		The components of an Environment Query
			Environment Queries
			Contexts
			Generators
			Tests
			Visual representation of the components
			Running an Environmental Query within a Behavior Tree
		Not only Locations, but also Actors!
	Exploring the built-in nodes
		Built-in Contexts
		Built-in Generators
			Actors Of Class
			Current Location
			Composite
			Points: Circle
			Points: Cone
			Points: Donut
			Points: Grid
			Points: Pathing Grid
		Built-in Tests
	Visualizing Environment Queries
	Creating components for the Environment Querying System
		Creating Contexts
			Creating the Player Context in Blueprint
			Creating the Player Context in C++
		Creating Generators
		Creating Tests
	Summary
Chapter 5: Agent Awareness
	Perception of AI in video games
		Sound
			Footsteps
			Knocking over objects
		Position
			Zone of proximity
			Interacting with other enemies
			It isn't all about the "enemy"
			Perceptive AI isn't just humanoid or animalistic
			Impact of Players
	Overview of the Sensing System
	The AIPerceptionComponent
		AIPerceptionComponent in Blueprint
		Sense – Sight
		Sense – Hearing
		AIPerceptionComponent and Senses in C++
	Different Teams
	The AIStimuliSourceComponent
		All Pawns are automatically detected
		AIStimuliSourceComponent in Blueprint
		AIStimuliSourceComponent in C++
	Hands-on with the perception system – Sight AI Controller
		A Blueprint perception system
		A C++ perception system
		Testing it all
	Summary
Chapter 6: Extending Behavior Trees
	A quick recap on Behavior Trees
	Creating a Task
		Creating a Blueprint Task
		Creating a Task in C++
	Creating a Decorator
		Creating a Decorator in Blueprint
		Creating a Decorator in C++
	Creating a Service
		Creating a Service in Blueprint
		Creating a Service in C++
	Creating a Composite Node
	Creating new type of nodes or new types of Trees
	Summary
Chapter 7: Crowds
	Crowds in games
		Building believable crowds
		Animals
		Crowd movement
		Crowd dynamics and creating realistic behavior
			Flow-based
			Entity-based
			Agent-based
	Crowds in Unreal
	Reciprocal Velocity Obstacles (RVO)
		RVO in Unreal
		Advanced RVO settings
			RVO in Blueprint
			RVO in C++
		RVO observations
		RVO resources
	Detour Crowd
		How the Detour Crowd system works
		Using the Detour Crowd system
		Detour Crowd settings
		Debugging the Detour Crowd Manager
		More crowd resources
	Summary
Section 2: Designing and Implementing Behavior Trees
Chapter 8: Designing Behavior Trees - Part I
	The Expected Behavior
	Building the Nodes
		Nodes that already exist
		Decorator – check variable
			Check Variable Blueprint implementation
			Check Variable C++ implementation
		Task – Find Random Location
			Find Random Location Blueprint implementation
			Find Random Location C++ implementation
	AI Controller
		Implementing the AI Controller in Blueprint
		Implementing the AI Controller in C++
		Using the AI Controller
	Summary
Chapter 9: Designing Behavior Trees - Part II
	Setting up the environment for testing the Behavior Tree
		Creating the Player
		Creating the Chasing Agent
		Preparing the Level
	Service – Update Chasing Behavior
		Update Chasing Behavior Blueprint implementation
		Update Chasing Behavior C++ implementation
	Summary
Chapter 10: Designing Behavior Trees - Part III
	Building the Behavior Tree
		Setting up the Blackboard
		Building the Tree
	Running the Behavior Tree
		Running the Behavior Tree using the Blueprint controller
		Running the Behavior Tree using the C++ controller
	Bug Correction
	Improving further (C++ only)
		Node Name
		A better description for the Decorator
		Filtering Blackboard Keys
	Summary
Section 3: Debugging Methods
Chapter 11: Debugging Methods for AI - Logging
	Basic Logging
		Console Logging and on-screen messages in Blueprint
		On-screen messages in C++
		Console Logging in C++
		Creating a Custom Logging Category (C++)
	Summary
Chapter 12: Debugging Methods for AI - Navigation, EQS, and Profiling
	Debugging behavior trees
	Profiling and visualizing environmental queries
		Visualizing environmental queries with the EQS testing pawn
			Creating the EQS testing pawn
			Creating a test environmental query
			Settings of the EQS testing pawn to visualize environmental queries
		Profiling environmental queries
			Setting up the test assets for EQS profiling
			The environmental query profiler
			Saving and loading EQS stats
	Testing and visualizing the navigation mesh
		Visualizing the navigation mesh
		Navigation test actor
	Profiling AI
		Profiling with the console
		Creating a custom stat group
		Session frontend
	Summary
Chapter 13: Debugging Methods for AI - The Gameplay Debugger
	The anatomy of the Gameplay Debugger
		Gameplay Debugger Extensions
		Gameplay Debugger categories
			Category 0 – Navmesh
			Category 1 – AI
			Category 2 – Behavior Tree
			Category 3 – EQS
			Category 4 – Perception
			The Nav Grid Category
			Multiple Categories on-screen
			More Categories
		Gameplay Debugger settings
	Extending the Gameplay Debugger
		Creating a module with the use of a new plugin
		Setting up the module to work with the Gameplay Debugger
		Creating a new Gameplay Debugger Category
		Registering the Gameplay Debugger Category
		Visualizing the custom Gameplay Debugger Category
		Creating an Extension for the Gameplay Debugger
			The structure of the Extension
			Creating the Extension class
			Registering the Extension
	Summary
Chapter 14: Going Beyond
	Why is psychology an important consideration for AI?
		Psychology and AI in games
		Building better AI through psychology
		Machine learning
			Uses of AI and machine learning in games
				Uses for AI in games
				Uses for machine learning in games
		Adaptive behavior
	What we haven't covered in this book
		Motion and navigation (low level)
		Racing games
		Agent awareness
		Environment Query System
		Decision-making and planning
		Discrete games/board games
		Learning techniques
		Procedural Content Generation (PCG)
		Search and optimization
		Multi-Agent Systems
		AI and psychology
		Going beyond classical AI
		Much, much, much more!
	Some useful resources
	AI and philosophy
	Goodbye
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Index