(11-30-2016 03:30 PM)Zervox Wrote: ... for all we know they support everything Eki One did(afterall it is supposed to be collective of functionalities), I am not sure what the ambient system you speak of is so this is an uncertain factor...
Unfortunately I do know first hand that not all the functionality from EKI One was transferred to Masa life as I had a fairly close working relationship with Artificial Technology's CEO and their Lead Developer whilst integrating EKI One into Leadwerks, both of whom went on to manage the fusion of EKI One technology and Masa technology to produce Masa Life. Presumably because not all elements of EKI One fitted the more focused/specific application Masa were aiming at.
However, Masa Life did benefit from the use of Behaviour Trees, as opposed to Hierarchical FSMs as was the case with EKI One, and does contain a lot of the core functionality of EKI One. So, as you rightly point out, is definitely worth evaluating and not simply dismissing!
The Ambience system in EKI One is a way of scripting islands of ambient behaviour for NPCs for representing everyday type behaviours which become active (as a whole) as the player gets within a certain configurable range. The system runs along side their more standard FSM system for building behaviours but is instead based on a series of scene, scenario and plot mechanisms in which roles and behaviours are defined for Actors based around configurable actions and NPC types assigned to these roles. No specific NPC is assigned to a particular role, instead NPCs with types that match the roles requirements will simply fill vacancies available to them at run time.
You can break NPCs out of their ambient roles at any time and have them switch to FSM scripted behaviour, say when under attack, and then drop back into the ambient system once the danger was over.
The system allows for quite sophisticated emulation of mass background behaviour and also using the Plot system allows great support for cut scene management.
Other interesting functionality includes configurable senses and reactions to sensory perception. So hungry NPCs for example can home in on the smell of food. Or Guards react to a nearby noise or disturbance.
EKI One of course supports its own pathfinding and steering system with configurable elements on an individual actor basis.
It is sad that the product development ended as the underlying design is so well implemented. But it's a hard industry for small companies to survive in!