by Horace Wai-Kit, Chan. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-112). / Acknowledgement --- p.i / Abstract --- p.ii / Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Overview --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Objective --- p.3 / Chapter 1.3 --- Organization of This Thesis --- p.3 / Chapter 2 --- Background --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1 --- Definitions --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Theoretical Definition of Solving a Game --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1.2 --- Definition of Computer Go --- p.7 / Chapter 2.2 --- State of the Art of Computer Go --- p.7 / Chapter 2.3 --- A Framework for Computer Go --- p.11 / Chapter 2.3.1 --- Evaluation Function --- p.11 / Chapter 2.3.2 --- Plausible Move Generator --- p.14 / Chapter 2.4 --- Problems Tackled in this Research --- p.14 / Chapter 3 --- Application of TD in Game Playing --- p.15 / Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction --- p.15 / Chapter 3.2 --- Reinforcement Learning and TD Learning --- p.15 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Models of Learning --- p.16 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- Temporal Difference Learning --- p.16 / Chapter 3.3 --- TD Learning and Game-playing --- p.20 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- Game-Playing as a Delay-reward Prediction Problem --- p.20 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Previous Work of TD Learning in Backgammon --- p.20 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- Previous Works of TD Learning in Go --- p.22 / Chapter 3.4 --- Design of this Research --- p.23 / Chapter 3.4.1 --- Limitations in the Previous Researches --- p.24 / Chapter 3.4.2 --- Motivation --- p.25 / Chapter 3.4.3 --- Objective and Methodology --- p.26 / Chapter 4 --- Deriving a New Updating Rule to Apply TD Learning in Multi-layer Perceptron --- p.28 / Chapter 4.1 --- Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP) --- p.28 / Chapter 4.2 --- Derivation of TD(A) Learning Rule for MLP --- p.31 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Notations --- p.31 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- A New Generalized Delta Rule --- p.31 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- Updating rule for TD(A) Learning --- p.34 / Chapter 4.3 --- Algorithm of Training MLP using TD(A) --- p.35 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Definitions of Variables in the Algorithm --- p.35 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Training Algorithm --- p.36 / Chapter 4.3.3 --- Description of the Algorithm --- p.39 / Chapter 5 --- Experiments --- p.41 / Chapter 5.1 --- Introduction --- p.41 / Chapter 5.2 --- Experiment 1 : Training Evaluation Function for 7 x 7 Go Games by TD(λ) with Self-playing --- p.42 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Introduction --- p.42 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- 7 x 7 Go --- p.42 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Experimental Designs --- p.43 / Chapter 5.2.4 --- Performance Testing for Trained Networks --- p.44 / Chapter 5.2.5 --- Results --- p.44 / Chapter 5.2.6 --- Discussions --- p.45 / Chapter 5.2.7 --- Limitations --- p.47 / Chapter 5.3 --- Experiment 2 : Training Evaluation Function for 9 x 9 Go Games by TD(λ) Learning from Human Games --- p.47 / Chapter 5.3.1 --- Introduction --- p.47 / Chapter 5.3.2 --- 9x 9 Go game --- p.48 / Chapter 5.3.3 --- Training Data Preparation --- p.49 / Chapter 5.3.4 --- Experimental Designs --- p.50 / Chapter 5.3.5 --- Results --- p.52 / Chapter 5.3.6 --- Discussion --- p.54 / Chapter 5.3.7 --- Limitations --- p.56 / Chapter 5.4 --- Experiment 3 : Life Status Determination in the Go Endgame --- p.57 / Chapter 5.4.1 --- Introduction --- p.57 / Chapter 5.4.2 --- Training Data Preparation --- p.58 / Chapter 5.4.3 --- Experimental Designs --- p.60 / Chapter 5.4.4 --- Results --- p.64 / Chapter 5.4.5 --- Discussion --- p.65 / Chapter 5.4.6 --- Limitations --- p.66 / Chapter 5.5 --- A Postulated Model --- p.66 / Chapter 6 --- Conclusions --- p.69 / Chapter 6.1 --- Future Direction of Research --- p.71 / Chapter A --- An Introduction to Go --- p.72 / Chapter A.l --- A Brief Introduction --- p.72 / Chapter A.1.1 --- What is Go? --- p.72 / Chapter A.1.2 --- History of Go --- p.72 / Chapter A.1.3 --- Equipment used in a Go game --- p.73 / Chapter A.2 --- Basic Rules in Go --- p.74 / Chapter A.2.1 --- A Go game --- p.74 / Chapter A.2.2 --- Liberty and Capture --- p.75 / Chapter A.2.3 --- Ko --- p.77 / Chapter A.2.4 --- "Eyes, Live and Death" --- p.81 / Chapter A.2.5 --- Seki --- p.83 / Chapter A.2.6 --- Endgame and Scoring --- p.83 / Chapter A.2.7 --- Rank and Handicap Games --- p.85 / Chapter A.3 --- Strategies and Tactics in Go --- p.87 / Chapter A.3.1 --- Strategy vs Tactics --- p.87 / Chapter A.3.2 --- Open-game --- p.88 / Chapter A.3.3 --- Middle-game --- p.91 / Chapter A.3.4 --- End-game --- p.92 / Chapter B --- Mathematical Model of Connectivity --- p.94 / Chapter B.1 --- Introduction --- p.94 / Chapter B.2 --- Basic Definitions --- p.94 / Chapter B.3 --- Adjacency and Connectivity --- p.96 / Chapter B.4 --- String and Link --- p.98 / Chapter B.4.1 --- String --- p.98 / Chapter B.4.2 --- Link --- p.98 / Chapter B.5 --- Liberty and Atari --- p.99 / Chapter B.5.1 --- Liberty --- p.99 / Chapter B.5.2 --- Atari --- p.101 / Chapter B.6 --- Ko --- p.101 / Chapter B.7 --- Prohibited Move --- p.104 / Chapter B.8 --- Path and Distance --- p.105 / Bibliography --- p.109

This project included the development of a multi-user game that takes place in a 3 dimensional world of the computer science department. Basically, the game allows prospective students to meet existing students and faculty in a virtual open house that takes place within the third floor of Jack Brown Hall. Users can walk around Jack Brown Hall and type text messages to chat with each other.

This thesis examines single-player video gaming. It is an analysis of video game play: what it is, how it functions, and what it means. It is an account of how players learn to play. This is done through a set of close readings of significant video games and key academic texts. My focus is on the mechanisms and forces that shape gameplay practices. Building on the existing fields of ludology and media-studies video-game analysis, I outline a model of video game play as a cultural construction which builds upon the player's existing knowledge of real world and fictional objects, scenarios and conventions. I argue that the relationship between the video game player and the software is best understood as embodying a precise configuration of power. I demonstrate that the single-player video game is in fact what Michel Foucault terms a 'disciplinary apparatus'. It functions to shape players' subjectivities in order to have them behave in easily predicted and managed ways. To do this, video games reuse and repurpose conventions from existing media forms and everyday practices. By this mobilisation of familiar elements, which already have established practices of use, and by a careful process of surveillance, examination and the correction of play practices, video games encourage players to take on and perform the logics of the game system. This relationship between organic player and technological game, I suggest, is best understood through the theoretical figure of the 'Cyborg'. It is a point of intersection between human and computer logics. Far from the ludological assumption that play and culture are separate and that play is shaped entirely by rules, I show video game play to be produced by an array of complex cultural and technological forces that act upon the player. My model of video game play differs from others currently in circulation in that it foregrounds the role of culture in play, while not denying the technological specificity of the video gaming apparatus. My central focus on power and the construction of player subjectivities offers a way to move beyond the simplistic reliance on the notion that rules are the primary shaping mechanism of play that has, to date, dominated much of video game studies.

The domestic playing of videogames is examined through a series of extended dialogues with male adolescents. The research process was grounded in a theorisation of audience activity in communication studies which sees meanings emerging from the boys’ engagements with kinetic texts in terms of refigurative activity. This encapsulates reading, interpretation, and a cultural productivity whereby the kinetic text is returned to the everyday world, primarily through a relation of mimicry. The cultural fertility of videogames is traced through this mimicry to reveal a series of themes: a de-stabilising of the distinction between work and play spaces; the fragmentation of audiences of the small screen in the home through the establishment of gendered playspaces; the instilling of competitive relations within male community; and the melding of fantasy and discipline. An investigation of the significance of soundtrack to videogame play leads to the conclusion that in videogame playing a new cultural competency is taking shape in the form of a postmodern literacy, which lays stress on a continuous circumlocution, a destabilizing of narrative time, and middles rather than beginnings or endings. The findings contradict many ideas regarding videogame playing: that players are addicts; that videogame play is mindless; or that players are fickle. Videogame playing is implicated as an identity-making discursive project considered central to the business of being a male adolescent. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This work undertakes a systematic study of various elements from differing fields which apply to the construction of computer-aided instructional systems. Drawing upon these works, the potential for instruction in computer adventure games is recognised, and previous work in the area analysed with respect to the theoretical findings. Based both on this theory and the germane advice of practicing game designers, a methodology for the design of educational computer adventure games is laid out in detail. The method described is then used to construct a sample game with basic programming skills as the pedagogical content, and this sample game is tested and the results examined. An informed approach to the design of computer-assisted instruction must begin with an understanding of how people acquire and store new information or skills. Cognitive psychology provides a number of conflicting models of the human information processing system, but these differing theories have a common basis which can be exploited in an attempt to make material more accessible. Instructional design describes a methodology for the analysis of pedagogical goals and demonstrates methods of learning support which can and should be incorporated into the new setting. In this field also is a judgement of different media, including computers, and their ability to provide the necessary elements of learning. By understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the medium the limits of what is possible within it can be catered to, and its failings augmented with supplemental materials. Both educational psychology and instructional design indicate benefits to learning from a correctly motivated learner, and the theory of engagement is therefore also scrutinised for elements helpful to the educational designer. The convergence of the knowledge gleaned from these various fields leads to one possible match to the desired criteria for computer-mediated instruction; the computerised fantasy adventure game. This being the case, other work in the field is examined for relevance, and it is found that a detailed methodology for the construction of such games does not exist. Existing material is combined with the aforementioned theoretical work and a survey of what is known about practical game design to create such a framework. It is proposed that through its use the systematic inclusion of educational content in an engaging environment will be facilitated. The hypothesis is examined, and an action research approach found to be called for. As such, the proposed methodology is used to create a sample game, and the process of its design used to inform the proposed methodology. The final form is described in detail, and the process of its application to the sample game elucidated. A prototype of the game is used with a number of test subjects to evaluate the game?s level of success at both engagement and the imparting of content material.

This thesis investigates the use of machine learning techniques in computer games to create a computer player that adapts to its opponent's game-play. This includes first confirming that machine learning algorithms can be integrated into a modern computer game without have a detrimental effect on game performance, then experimenting with different machine learning techniques to maximize the computer player's performance. Experiments use three machine learning techniques; static prediction models, continuous learning, and reinforcement learning. Static models show the highest initial performance but are not able to beat a simple opponent. Continuous learning is able to improve the performance achieved with static models but the rate of improvement drops over time and the computer player is still unable to beat the opponent. Reinforcement learning methods have the highest rate of improvement but the lowest initial performance. This limits the effectiveness of reinforcement learning because a large number of episodes are required before performance becomes sufficient to match the opponent.

We consider the problem of strategic adversarial planning in a Real-Time Strategy (RTS) game. Strategic adversarial planning is the generation of a network of high-level tasks to satisfy goals while anticipating an adversary's actions. In this thesis we describe an abstract state and action space used for planning in an RTS game, an algorithm for generating strategic plans, and a modular architecture for controllers that generate and execute plans. We describe in detail planners that evaluate plans by simulation and select a plan by Game Theoretic criteria. We describe the details of a low-level module of the hierarchy, the combat module. We examine a theoretical performance guarantee for policy switching in Markov Games, and show that policy switching agents can underperform fixed strategy agents. Finally, we present results for strategy switching planners playing against single strategy planners and the game engine's scripted player. The results show that our strategy switching planners outperform single strategy planners in simulation and outperform the game engine's scripted AI. / Graduation date: 2013

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 149-159).

<p>The topic of this thesis is “Gender Differences in Computer games/ Video games Industry”. Due to rapid development in technology and popularization of computers all around the world, computer games have already become a kind of common entertainment. Because computer games were designed especially for boys at the very beginning, there are still some remaining barriers when training female game designers and expanding game markets among female players.This thesis is mainly based on two studies which have enormous contributions to gender issue in computer games area. A simple model is established by summarizing factors mentioned and discussed in those two books. The main purpose consists of two comparisons under Gender Differences: one comparison is between the current data with the previous one, in order to check whether there are any changes during the past 10 years. The other one compares the young people in two regions, Sweden and China, in computer games perspective.Model designing, test, questionnaire and interview methods are used in this paper aiming to collect and categorize the data, which facilitates to analyze the results of the comparisons. The results reflect that although computer becomes a familiar “friend” in modern daily life, there are not obvious changes of girls‟ perspectives in computer game industry. Certainly, there are some differences between the young people coming from two regions which will be expounded in the thesis.</p>

This study investigates the effectiveness of two computer games as learning tools in comparison to established learning tools teaching two different topics in the course Social Studies 1b of the Swedish Upper Secondary School Curriculum. The use of computer games in education is placed in the context of changing ideas of the aims for education systems in the 21st Century with regard to student skills rather than content, including digital skills. The findings indicated that using these particular computer games as learning tools for these topics was at least as effective as the alternative, more established, lessons. Focus group discussions with students after the study lesson indicated a preference for variation in teaching methods and the desire for learning activities that require active student participation.