Couple quick ideas

Falthron wrote:

I think I posted this in another thread but its basically his idea maybe less maybe more. Now I would say that the mutations occur when you press a specific button saying something like Evolve. Pressing that button looks at all the action you took throughout the lifespan(s) and runs some math. The math will calculate what the next creature will look like. by adding, subtracting, rescaling. Things according to your action in the game. That way we have the Lamarkian style thing disguised as a Darwinian. This is because the behaviors of your creature dictates which creature will live and die and will basically be Darwinian.

Mmm... I'm not sure i completely understand. So is it via selecting from random mutations or more Lamarkian?

US_of_Alaska wrote:

Falthron wrote:

I think I posted this in another thread but its basically his idea maybe less maybe more. Now I would say that the mutations occur when you press a specific button saying something like Evolve. Pressing that button looks at all the action you took throughout the lifespan(s) and runs some math. The math will calculate what the next creature will look like. by adding, subtracting, rescaling. Things according to your action in the game. That way we have the Lamarkian style thing disguised as a Darwinian. This is because the behaviors of your creature dictates which creature will live and die and will basically be Darwinian.

Mmm... I'm not sure i completely understand. So is it via selecting from random mutations or more Lamarkian?

Its kind of Lamarkian but not exactly. Its Lamarkian disguised as Darwinian. Using his giraffe example.

The Pre-Giraffe keeps trying to reach the leaves on a tree. This behavior is recorded by the game. When you press the evolve button. The ones who evolved longer necks to reach the leaves would have survived over X amount of years in game time. Thus your giraffe would evolve something to help reach the leaves, like a longer neck. It looks at your behavior and edits your creature according to said behavior. But only after X amount of years (in game) dictated by the complexity of the changes, the ones who evolved the changes would have survived according to the lifestyle that you created with your previous creature. That way it has a "Survival of the Fittest" "Natural Selection" You get it now?

We also have to remember that even though a species evolves it doesn't always get wiped out, look at fish, they evolved in us. We also need to calculate whether you present species would be able to survive on its own as well.

Falthron wrote:

Its kind of Lamarkian but not exactly. Its Lamarkian disguised as Darwinian. Using his giraffe example.

The Pre-Giraffe keeps trying to reach the leaves on a tree. This behavior is recorded by the game. When you press the evolve button. The ones who evolved longer necks to reach the leaves would have survived over X amount of years in game time. Thus your giraffe would evolve something to help reach the leaves, like a longer neck. It looks at your behavior and edits your creature according to said behavior. But only after X amount of years (in game) dictated by the complexity of the changes, the ones who evolved the changes would have survived according to the lifestyle that you created with your previous creature. That way it has a "Survival of the Fittest" "Natural Selection" You get it now?

We also have to remember that even though a species evolves it doesn't always get wiped out, look at fish, they evolved in us. We also need to calculate whether you present species would be able to survive on its own as well.

I'm pretty sure that was exactly the same as Lamarkian. It's just that in this example it calculates it rather than doing it by some sort of genetic memory.

I still just don't like the way this will affect Org. Mode. Just because I wandered off into the woods and climbed a tree shouldn't mean my entire species should evolve to climb trees!

Falthron wrote:

US_of_Alaska wrote:

Falthron wrote:

I think I posted this in another thread but its basically his idea maybe less maybe more. Now I would say that the mutations occur when you press a specific button saying something like Evolve. Pressing that button looks at all the action you took throughout the lifespan(s) and runs some math. The math will calculate what the next creature will look like. by adding, subtracting, rescaling. Things according to your action in the game. That way we have the Lamarkian style thing disguised as a Darwinian. This is because the behaviors of your creature dictates which creature will live and die and will basically be Darwinian.

Mmm... I'm not sure i completely understand. So is it via selecting from random mutations or more Lamarkian?

Its kind of Lamarkian but not exactly. Its Lamarkian disguised as Darwinian. Using his giraffe example.

The Pre-Giraffe keeps trying to reach the leaves on a tree. This behavior is recorded by the game. When you press the evolve button. The ones who evolved longer necks to reach the leaves would have survived over X amount of years in game time. Thus your giraffe would evolve something to help reach the leaves, like a longer neck. It looks at your behavior and edits your creature according to said behavior. But only after X amount of years (in game) dictated by the complexity of the changes, the ones who evolved the changes would have survived according to the lifestyle that you created with your previous creature. That way it has a "Survival of the Fittest" "Natural Selection" You get it now?

We also have to remember that even though a species evolves it doesn't always get wiped out, look at fish, they evolved in us. We also need to calculate whether you present species would be able to survive on its own as well.

See here is the problem with the lamarckian method- it will have to record a ton of data. Each system has its drawbacks- Darwinian's are complexity and beauty, and Lamarckian's are storage space and reality.

We'll be testing both extremes out in the game, probably, but we do need to find a really good happy medium.

Just a quick thought, maybe we should use Lamarkian evolution to describe the maximum limits of possible mutation.
I.E. Your teeth can only get so big because you only dug with it so much.

After calculating that, we should include some sort of random number generation within those limits, to spice the game up and give the players more possible outcomes.

Quote :

it will have to record a ton of data

I cant imagine collecting the data for EVERY NPC out there. The only useful data to collect would be player's data.

Quote :

I still just don't like the way this will affect Org. Mode. Just because I wandered off into the woods and climbed a tree shouldn't mean my entire species should evolve to climb trees!

That's definitely true, but to solve that I think we would force the player to play for a certain interval before they can 'age' so to speak, and take the average of the performed actions.

Also, I'm finding it hard to imagine programming the time shift of 1,000,000 years or so darwinianwise. The only way I would think to do it is by keeping track of your current population over time, and use the rate of change to estimate how many of your species to add in the next generation.

Maybe that wasn't such a quick thought.

Our Numbers Guy, El_Noumo suggested a great way to run evolution in the background using probability instead of active mutations.

How does it work? I looked through all his posts..

Hmmmm How about an in game dynamic auto-evolution system...
(Prepare for a very long and probably a not very deep and well thought out concept)

But ANYWAY

Every time you do perform an action, or spend a long amount of time in specific environment, or get predated by another species etc etc, you increase a progress bar for a concordant stat (No! don't run away this isn't exactly a stats system)
For example... Digging frequently will push up the dig speed, claw size, shoulder size and other alike progress bars. If you dig enough you can fill the progress bar and you get a nice friendly looking button, probably in a corner reading, say "Increase dig speed" Or "Increase claw length". You can either choose to add this trait, or not. Increasing dig speed for example will have slight effects on the look of your creature, but physical changes such as "Increase claw length" Will have a more focused and larger appearance effect on your creature.
BUT YOU DON'T HAVE TO APPLY THE TRAIT.
For example, you could read a dossier of the stat.
EG. Larger claw size will make the creature faster at digging but slower at moving on land.
OR
Increasing your resistance to cold environments will make you less resistant to heat. Slight Visual insulation will appear (Ie. Fur, blubber)
OR
Becoming amphibious will allow you to breathe indefinitely on land or in water, but it will decrease your respiratory efficiency, and lower stamina.

Some of these effects may not be to your liking... Maybe you don't want your species to become amphibious because you need to be able to sprint away from those lizards which keep nabbing you and you can't afford the stamina loss.
So For example, when you get the option "Specialize respiratory system: Amphibious" You click the little cross, and the progress bar will reset. If you spend more time in the water, eventually it will give you the option to turn amphibious again.

Now if you click yes, there will need to be physical, physiological and skill changes.


Heres two options of how it could be added in:


A) The physical/physiological change WONT happen instantly. It should take about five-ten minutes game play to see this physical trait appear, and you may just notice it gradually appearing. Same goes for digging speed, you shouldn't be able to dig faster straight away. The skill change should be noticeable about 10-15 minutes after clicking the tick. (About 5 minutes after the physical change.

OR

B) You could click a button, or mate etc to advance in several generations to incorporate these gained skills/traits. The traits increased will only show up when you advance through the generations.



Heres a break down of what I generally mean...


I am a frog like creature (Lets call him Frogling). I spend a lot of time near the water. I tend to swim in it a lot. In fact I get a lot of nutrition from plants which live at the bottom of the pond. These plants are better than the other plants that I can eat which grow on land because they have a positive effect on my species brain power. My goal is to become sentient one day.

However I cannot breathe properly underwater. I can only stay under for about thirty seconds. After swimming down several times to get this food, I eventually get a pop up button which reads "Increase swimming speed". Naturally, as I want to continue eating these plants, I click the tick. After about 5 minutes playing around I notice my froglings webbed feet getting larger and a there is a slight increase in the back leg muscles.

When I eat enough plants I get several pop ups, at different times, some include:
"Increase Specialized Digestion" <--- This would mean I would need to eat much less of these plants to get the benefits from them, but it would also mean I would get much less nutrients from other food sources. Because I want to keep my options open and gain an equal amount of nutrients from other plants, I click the cross. No changes are made to my species digestion system.
"Increase Brainpower" <--- Makes the creature smarter, I'm not quite sure how you guys are implementing it, but In clicking yes I would be further on the track to sentience, If I click no, I could prolong my species physical evolution.
More things could include: Increase fat, Specialize mouth, Decrease Nutritional neccesities I'm sure there are many more that could relate to the plant itself...

After about ten minutes, I notice that the frogling is beating his legs much quicker in the water and as a result is swimming faster. After spending more time underwater, I get a Physiological pop up which reads: "Increase Breath Threshold" Again, this is something I want so I click the tick Soon I notice that I can stay under for longer.

Lets say after an hour or so of not just eating plants, also a bit of running around on land, clambering over trees doing lost of intresting stuff, but it seems that the most repeated thing I do is to eat these plants because they are helping me acheive my supreme goal. Eventually I can hold my breath for a very long time, and My frogling has much larger feet and more pronounced leg muscles. I notice that he aint as fast on land as he once was...
Amazingly I get a pop up which reads: "Specialize respiratory system: Amphibious". If I click yes my Frogling would suffer a significant loss in energy (Ability to frequently sprint, attack, swim etc mainly due to a less effecient repspiratory system) but he'd be able to breath indefinitely in land and water.

If I clicked yes, and kept spending more time in the water I may develop something similar to gills. If I click no, I would still be able to work equally efficiently on land and water.


For option B, IE advancing to the next/advancing through several generations all the changes will be noticeable as soon as you hatch from the egg/fall out of the mother etc.

On a side note which could relate to a Darwnistic game-style...

Imagine later in the game you could see species which share a common ancestor with you. Species which clicked yes for what you clicked no. IE a fully aquatic and much different looking version of my Frogling that still shares some similar traits such as mouth size, limb config and feeding pattern. It lives in the pond, and its legs now resemble fins. Its MUCH faster at swimming than me too.
This would be cool to see what would of happened if you had gone down a different path.

Note that here I have not taking into account natural selection IE pressures from other species but I think it could be a similar process IE get killed by a species enough and you get a pop up that reads "Increase toxicity level" (Making you very slightly poisonous, develop slightly brighter colors and the species will not predate on you as frequently) OR "Increase skin thickness" (Increases health and makes you harder to kill)


Well...
PHEW! -_-

I think that this way a player would have more control over where their species is headed without the need for direct editing...
Its just a concept atm Im not sure if it could be smoothly integrated but Im no programmer

I hope this can help or develop into something much better.



I seriously cannot wait for this game, just typing about what I would do is fun

Thanks for reading (IF you did) =]

So essentially:

A path is generated by what you do most.

You then choose what you which way you want to go on this path. The key is that you DON'T have to choose. Ever.

You may eventually find that another species forked from your path.

I think it's brilliant. (I've never used that before...)

The only problem I see, is making the popup and action associated with said popup.


I would see it as the following:

We would create a list of built in popups, their effects, and what triggers them. It would be highly statistical, but I think it would be doable.

For example:

Our little frogling's data.
We have a list of nutrition gained from every plant eaten.
It would be an associative array of floats for each plant representing a nutrition factor.
We would also have a list of every plant he's eaten, and how many of each.

For example:
["Algae"] = 3
["Funky Seaweed"] = 10
["Grass-ish"] = 1

Then comes our popup.

Code:

Name = "Specialized Digestion"
Effect =
foreach(nutritionList as plant)
{
    if(plant != slectedplant)
    {
        Nutrition[plant] -= .1;
    }
    else
    {
        //WE HAVE TO MAKE UP FOR ALL THAT LOST NUTRITION SOMEHOW
        Nutrition[plant] += .15*(Nutrition.length);
    }
}
CauseFunction =

if(highestEaten - secondHighestEaten > 10)
{
    Effect();
}

(100% pseudo code)

Bam!

Oh and to answer our question about applying changes AFTER or BEFORE the next generation, I think it should be after. Otherwise, what's the point in generations?

that is too much lamarkian.... i thought we were going for a more darwinian path

Darwinian-ism could be implemented in each generation. We would count up the current numbers of each species, as well as the current rate of change of each species, constantly. After projecting 100,000 years or so, we could then approximate the new amount of species.

This would of course, be highly subject to adjustment.

The problem with true Darwinian-ism, is the fact that no player want's to play every day for millions of years. It's just impossible. We have to speed it up somehow.

Thanks

Yeah for Darwinism theres the alternative Generation Advance method, where you will get all the acquired traits in the generation at once... This could be achieved by clicking a button/mating or could automatically apply after a give time

And you could then instantly after advancing through the generations see changes in your world and forked-out species of your previous generations. I may find that my flourishing species has caused a rapid depletion in this particular plant so I have to move on to a new food source... Good thing I didn't click Specialize digestion

The main trouble I have with this method is that it all changing at once reminds me too much of the terrible evolution process in spore... one minute your a tiny little insect the next minute your a huge dragon blob.

To counter this maybe there could be a limit to stat advances in each generation, or your species automatically progresses through several generations after a given amount...

In the mean time, species around you could be numbered/evolved depending on what effect you are having on the wordl ie. What food sources are in big or small supply, how tasty/edible/numerous is your species etc

Hmm... yes that could be a problem. Too much change is unrealistic.

To solve that, we could have a certain change value associated with each popup/change.

Once your species has over 10 change points, there's no more popups, and you can't change anymore.

Some n00b wrote:

OH NOES HELLPS I CAN'T cHaNgE bAcK I DIDN'T MEAN TO CLICKS THATZZZZ!!!1

We could have a submenu that keeps track of your changes, and you would be able to add or remove them at any time before the next generation.

roadkillguy wrote:

We could have a submenu that keeps track of your changes, and you would be able to add or remove them at any time before the next generation.

That is excellent! I can imagine making a terrible mistake and spending the next million years of your species evolution turning back into a land animal for instance
Or maybe when you choose to advance through generations you could review your changes and click a confirm advancement
It would be a lot easier to play and code I would imagine than the gradual changes as you could go back on your decisions without affecting all the species around you as they will only change when you do... maybe...

<BIG EDIT>

roadkillguy wrote:

We could have a submenu that keeps track of your changes, and you would be able to add or remove them at any time before the next generation.

Actually, you won't be able to add changes. Only remove. You could really screw up that way
Except, of course, an undo would add a change back in.

</BIG EDIT>

The plus side is, it's a lot less manual on the player's part.

This way, you don't have to worry about your species dying off because you gave it the wrong legs or the wrong mouth in the editor. The game would manage the evolution. It would detect what you're doing, and know exactly what changes would benefit you.

Now we just have to see what other people think...

Quote :

darwinian evolution

Quote :

darwinianism

Quote :

darwinian..

Quote :

darwinian?

Quote :

darwinian darwinian!

Quote :

darwinian darwin darwin dinian darwin

HOW. DO. WE. POSSIBLY. IMPLEMENT. THAT.

I can see the response, yet again,

"well we see how it is in the game."

THAT DOESNT MAKE ANY SENSE.
We cant see how it works in the game if we don't know HOW TO GET IT IN THE GAME.

Stop shooting down all hybrid theorys of implementation simply because "It's too lamarckian." There's a reason people are coming up with these solutions. Because the problem is HOW DO WE IMPLEMENT DARWINIAN EVOLUTION?

</rant>

roadkillguy wrote:

<BIG EDIT>

roadkillguy wrote:

We could have a submenu that keeps track of your changes, and you would be able to add or remove them at any time before the next generation.

Actually, you won't be able to add changes. Only remove. You could really screw up that way
Except, of course, an undo would add a change back in.

</BIG EDIT>

The plus side is, it's a lot less manual on the player's part.

This way, you don't have to worry about your species dying off because you gave it the wrong legs or the wrong mouth in the editor. The game would manage the evolution. It would detect what you're doing, and know exactly what changes would benefit you.

Now we just have to see what other people think...

If the random mutations doesn't work then this sounds like a good backup plan. But I do 100% prefer random mutations, because pretty much ever other style of evolution only benefits your species, which is not realistic, and, in my opinion, therefore not as enjoyable. Just want to make that clear. Good backup, but I'm leaving it there.


EDIT: Aren't we going to have a algorithm or something?

The Uteen wrote:

EDIT: Aren't we going to have a algorithm or something?

That is the algorithm. The one Pezzalis and myself just described.


Actually, we're going to use E = mc^2 as our algorithm. It works for lot's of stuffs.


To respond to your question, this could be implemented for NPSs as well. (Non-player-species)
The randomness would come from randomly saying yes to an option, and instead of counting for one member of the species, we would tally data for the entire species over the last hour of gameplay. The only matter here is trying to make AI that plays close to how a player would.

Also,

Bashinerox wrote:

I can see the response, yet again,

"well we see how it is in the game."

THAT DOESNT MAKE ANY SENSE.

I have been wanting to say that for months. People need to get acquainted with programming. It's as simple as that. If it's not your forte, make it so. And, if you want to be truly scientific, write an extremely accurate atomic simulator, then wait 10 billion years.

Firstly, Bashinerox, could you list in an orderly manner what problems Darwinian Evolution would cause.

Secondly, if I think this current concept is going where I think I'm thinking it's going... Then it's sounding too much like a Spore-like game where you decide only whether to give yourself another set of legs or arms (OK, that was a bit of a Hyperbole). We need to have a current concept.

However this post might end up being entirely mute if I just overlooked some crucial bit of information.

It wont cause problems until we implement it. Which we can't do.

How do you suggest we implement it?

We cannot kill off one by one each member of the species for 1,000,000 years.

What reasons are there as to why we can't implement it. Darwinian Evolution is merely the Organism's Genetic Profile being modified by random mutation and then automatically being selected for survival by the very function of nature.

Random Mutations could be accomplished such as by moving limbs a few millimetres in a direction or changing the position of an organ or by splitting a bone in half to become two.

Yes, but how do we speed this up 1,000,000+ years?

We make a population simulation by factoring in the speed of the Organism, it's likeliness of tripping, the population of predators, the terrain, what environment it can survive in, any habits to return to a certain point, it's intelligence and more, and then we combine them all in some super simulation.

GamerXA wrote:

..and then we combine them all in some super simulation.

That's our point.