BioWare overhauling AI for Mass Effect 3

In an interview with CVG, BioWare gameplay designers Christina Norman and Corey Gaspur talked about the new and improved enemy AI players will find in Mass Effect 3.

“If there’s one thing the programmers always want to do better it’s definitely the AI, so we’ve done a lot of work on that,” Norman said. “We still have some more work to go, but we want you to feel that the enemies you’re fighting are more complex, that they have multiple behaviours, and that they’re reacting to what’s going on.”

Improved enemy AI isn’t the only aspect of combat being improved in Mass Effect 3, though. BioWare’s goal, Norman explains, is to promote tactical play over simply ducking behind cover, shooting at enemies and liberally making use of your powers.

“We really want to make mobility a factor – like, ‘Am I in the right position on the battlefield? Where are my enemies? How am I going to get from point A to point B? How are they going to get from point A to point B?’ So the player is never thinking, ‘I’m walking into this safe place with great cover, I’ll stay there and fight’ but more ‘how am I going to move through the battlefield as the enemies move through the battlefield against me?'”

Norman and Gaspur have plenty more to say about Mass Effect 3‘s improved combat, so head over to the CVG interview for even more details.