Self-adjusting Video Games

You go online and read all the reviews. Finally, you pick out a computer game that looks just perfect. After all, didn't the reviewers say it was clever, challenging and fun?

Then you pop it into your computer, Xbox, or PlayStation... and 10 minutes later, you're bored, bored, bored.

Now, Julian Togelius of Copenhagen, Denmark, thinks he has the answer to your gaming woes. According to New Scientist, it's "a new breed of game [that] aims to suit everyone by adapting to an individual's playing style."

This new, smart breed of game goes way beyond adding challenges as you improve your gaming skills. It actually learns something about your personality, decides whether you're in it for the fun or the challenge, and then tailors itself to meet your preferences.

So far, Togelius and colleague Georgios Yannakakis have conducted their experiments with that old chestnut of a game, Super Mario Brothers. They've varied the parameters and added algorithms to allow the game to learn from your gaming style.

Will the concept of a self-adjusting game catch on? It seems there's some resistance to the idea in the game development world. Says Ian Bogost at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, "Some wonder if this effort destroys the potential for art to produce the unfamiliar or disturbing."

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