Component-based hierarchical state machine — A reusable and flexible game AI technology

Finite State Machine (FSM) is the most common used technique to create intelligent character behaviors in video games. But conventional FSM technique has many limitations in game development. The main innovation of this paper is the introduction of software component technology to the implementation of FSMs in game development, which modularizes the states and transitions of FSMs completely. Compared with the conventional FSMs, this technique has three advantages. First, high-level and complex intelligent behaviors can be constructed from a set of low-level and simple behavior rapidly. Second, high-level game designing can be decoupled from low-level game AI programming. Third, game characters equipped with this AI system can exhibit more flexibility and adaptability to the changing game environment.