I was wondering if there was any way to have GSB automatically run a simulation based on an input/output file system? Allowing for the creation of deployment files that could be edited and then automatically run against each other, with an output file showing the same stats you see at the end of the battles now. Basically to allow for a home made AI to design fleets by feeding them in and scoring them based on the results.
Currently there is no such system, but it is something I’ve considered coding in the past. Its non trivial to do (actually its fairly trivial to do, but likely a bit of a nightmare to test), so I’d be interested to know how many people would make use of something like this before I bump it up the todo list.
I was thinking a screensaver format for a launcher, which might have appeal for a larger audience than just those who want to play with AI and genetic algorithms. Just have it grab random challenge files and throw them together by default (cool looking screen saver for the masses) with a setting to allow picking a deployment and a challenge file for those that are interested.
I’d think the harder part for coding would be to make an auto-zoom type feature that tracked to where the action is on whatever map was popped up. It wouldn’t be much of a screen saver if the battle was somewhere off screen, and as a screen saver, moving the mouse to pan around isn’t really an option either.
Well, i would support this, except i see the stats at the end of the game as useless. You really need a snap shot in time, prehaps setable by the player. For real stats, then id like this.
I think this is a great idea.
I’m working on the survival challenges and I’ve seen little things like moving a ship a square or 2 can make the score change by a huge amount. I would love a way to test minute changes automatically and gain more insight to the game mechanics.
I just had a wacky thought…
Wouldn’t it be cool to have a whole bunch of PCs running something like this and collect data like FOLDING or SETI that could be used for balancing or to gauge what players like? This could be a new milestone for PC gaming and parallel computing.
I did start coding a genetic algorithm thing for auto-balancing the game during its development, but it’s a huge task and I ended up getting it done manually in the end.
We could call it Skynet. 