GTA 6 Could Introduce Much Smarter NPCs

NPCs are plentiful in video games, and you have to admit, they’re not really smart. That could change with advancements in artificial intelligence.

If you have ever played video games, you have most certainly already met NPCs (non-player characters). These make it possible to help the players, or to put obstacles in their way. But we have to admit that they are not really smart. With the progress made in artificial intelligence, we can however imagine much more successful games on this point.

Smarter NPCs in GTA 6?

Admittedly, the artificial intelligence that controls NPCs in video games isn’t the most perennial, but again, these non-player characters aren’t really designed to be smart. Usually, NPCs are just there to move the story forward or sell items to players, so that was never really a concern.

That being said, it looks like Take-Two is thinking about digging into this aspect a bit. Which led to think that, perhaps, the first results of this work could be found in the highly anticipated GTA 6 (Take-Two being the parent company of Rockstar, developer of the world-famous franchise). This is in any case what suggests a patent discovered recently and shared on Reddit.

Take-Two thinks hard about making these characters smarter

The patent in question describes “a system and method for virtual navigation in a video game environment”. Basically, this would be trying to make NPCs more alive and more natural. For example, in the real world, people walk at different speeds, drive at different speeds, and everyone is busy doing their little things.

With this patent, one could imagine seeing this effect replicate in games. Rather than having NPCs following limited commands which makes it very robotic in the game, each NPC could have their own unique personality, which would make things very interesting. The document does not explicitly mention GTA but does refer to a “high speed chase” and “ambient traffic”, which suggests that this could be used in a future GTA installment.