A patent filed by Sony suggests the company is working on a form of AI capable of emulating a player should they quit or get disconnected.
Every player to have ever played online has been there. Whether it be during a game of Smash Bros., a fight in Mortal Kombat 11, or a match on FIFA 20. The opponent can’t quite match up, and after they’ve had enough, they quit. On the one hand, it can be quite a satisfying feeling, especially if it’s a game that will still count the result in the non-quitter’s favor.
On the other hand, it can also be incredibly frustrating. Performing so well only for the conclusion to be taken away. There are also occasions where it happens even though neither side has quit. Someone’s connection might not be strong enough, or drop out completely, and lead to the matchup being dubbed null and void.
Well, if a patent filed by Sony is anything to go by, that might one day become a thing of the past. The abstract for the patent describes a form of artificial intelligence that would be capable of emulating a real-life player after they quit or leave a game. It reads that the player will be “replaced by a computer-simulated version of the first player that selects its actions based on probabilities calculated from the tracked actions of the first player.”
That means the AI learns how the player plays a certain game and even if they were to disconnect, or rage quit due to a poor performance, the matchup would continue. The other player may not even be told that the AI has taken over, and if it’s effective enough, won’t be able to tell that there has been a switch.
As should always be the case with patents such as this one, it’s best that gamers don’t get their hopes up at this early stage. Even if AI taking over for rage quitters is a feature that comes part and parcel of PlayStation’s online games one day, chances are that day is a long way off into the future. For now, we can remain quietly satisfied every time we beat someone so bad they can’t even face the thought of finishing a match.
Source: IGN
