Game Playing
Games constitute an effective platform for developing and testing artificial intelligence techniques: they are well defined and easy to implement, yet challenging and fun. Research in this area involves learning to play traditional games such as Othello and Go, on learning general game playing, and on developing intelligent behaviors for non-player characters in video games.
Subareas:
People
     [Expand to show all 37][Minimize]
Suhaib Abdulquddos Masters Alumni suhaib [at] cs utexas edu
Adrian Agogino Formerly affiliated Collaborator adrian k agogino [at] nasa gov
Timothy D. Andersen Undergraduate Alumni andert [at] alum rpi edu
Julian Bishop Formerly affiliated Ph.D. Student julian [at] cs utexas edu
Bobby D. Bryant Ph.D. Alumni bdbryant [at] cse unr edu
Chris Bush Undergraduate Alumni
Ryan Cornelius Undergraduate Alumni
James Craver Undergraduate Alumni
Matthew de Wet Undergraduate Alumni
Adam C. Dziuk Undergraduate Alumni
Olivier Francon Collaborator olivier francon [at] cognizant com
Aliza Gold Formerly affiliated Collaborator
Todd Greer Undergraduate Alumni
Matthew Hausknecht Formerly affiliated Collaborator mhauskn [at] cs utexas edu
Matthew Johnston Undergraduate Alumni
Igor V. Karpov Masters Alumni ikarpov [at] gmail com
Nate Kohl Ph.D. Alumni nate [at] natekohl net
Joel Lehman Postdoctoral Alumni joel [at] cs utexas edu
Dan Lessin Ph.D. Alumni dlessin [at] cs utexas edu
Alex Lubberts Formerly affiliated Visitor
Reza Mahjourian Ph.D. Alumni reza [at] cs utexas edu
Elliot Meyerson Ph.D. Alumni ekm [at] cs utexas edu
Risto Miikkulainen Faculty risto [at] cs utexas edu
German Monroy Masters Alumni gmonroy [at] cs utexas edu
David E. Moriarty Ph.D. Alumni moriarty [at] alumni utexas net
Arjun Nagineni Undergraduate Alumni arjun nagineni [at] utexas edu
Daniel Polani Postdoctoral Alumni d polani [at] herts ac uk
Joseph Reisinger Ph.D. Alumni joeraii [at] cs utexas edu
Joseph Reisinger Formerly affiliated Ph.D. Student joeraii [at] cs utexas edu
Norman Richards Undergraduate Alumni orb [at] toki dhs org
Jacob Schrum Ph.D. Alumni schrum2 [at] southwestern edu
Hormoz Shahrzad Ph.D. Student hormoz [at] cs utexas edu
Kenneth Stanley Postdoctoral Alumni kstanley [at] cs ucf edu
Anand Subramoney Masters Alumni anands [at] cs utexas edu
Cem C Tutum Formerly affiliated Research Scientist tutum [at] cs utexas edu
Shimon Whiteson Formerly affiliated Collaborator s a whiteson [at] uva nl
Chern Han Yong Masters Alumni cherny [at] nus edu sg
Publications
     [Expand to show all 84][Minimize]
Neuroevolution Insights Into Biological Neural Computation 2025
Risto Miikkulainen, Science, Vol. 387 (2025), pp. eadp7478.
Neuroevolution: Harnessing Creativity in AI Model Design 2025
Sebastian Risi, David Ha, Yujin Tang, Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In , MIT Press, Cambridge, MA 2025. MIT Press.
DIAS: A Domain-Independent Alife-Based Problem-Solving System 2022
Babak Hodjat, Hormoz Shahrzad, Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 2022 Conference on Artificial Life, 2022.
Generalization of Agent Behavior through Explicit Representation of Context 2021
Cem Tutum, Suhaib Abdulquddos, Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 3rd IEEE Conference on Games, , 2021.
Adapting to Unseen Environments through Explicit Representation of Context 2020
Cem C Tutum, Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 2020 Conference on Artificial Life (ALIFE 2020), pp. 581--588, Montreal, Canada, July 2020. The MIT Press.
Effective Reinforcement Learning through Evolutionary Surrogate-Assisted Prescription 2020
Olivier Francon, Santiago Gonzalez, Babak Hodjat, Elliot Meyerson, Risto Miikkulainen, Xin Qiu, Hormoz Shahrzad, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO-2020), 2020.
Discretization of Game Space by Environment Attributes 2019
Alexander Braylan and Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In The 2nd Knowledge Extraction from Games Workshop 2019. AAAI.
Object-model transfer in the general video game domain 2019
Alexander Braylan, Masters Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Dynamic Adaptation and Opponent Exploitation in Computer Poker 2018
Xun Li and Risto Miikkulainen, AAAI-18 Workshop for Imperfect Information Games (2018).
Hierarchical Policy Design for Sample-Efficient Learning of Robot Table Tennis Through Self-Play 2018
Reza Mahjourian, PhD Thesis, University of Texas at Austin.
Learning Useful Features For Poker 2018
Arjun Nagineni, Technical Report, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Opponent Modeling and Exploitation in Poker Using Evolved Recurrent Neural Networks 2018
Xun Li, PhD Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin..
Opponent Modeling and Exploitation in Poker Using Evolved Recurrent Neural Networks 2018
Xun Li and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of The Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2018), Kyoto, Japan, July 2018. ACM.
Evolving Adaptive Poker Players for Effective Opponent Exploitation 2017
Xun Li and Risto Miikkulainen, Technical Reports of the Thirty-first AAAI Conference of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-17) (2017).
Constructing Game Agents Through Simulated Evolution 2016
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, In Encyclopedia of Computer Graphics and Games, Newton Lee (Eds.), pp. 1--10 2016. Springer.
Discovering Multimodal Behavior in Ms. Pac-Man through Evolution of Modular Neural Networks 2016
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, IEEE Transactions on Computational Intelligence and AI in Games, Vol. 8, 1 (2016), pp. 67--81.
Object-Model Transfer in the General Video Game Domain 2016
Alexander Braylan, Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In Proceedings of the Twelfth AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment 2016.
Reuse of Neural Modules for General Video Game Playing 2016
Alexander Braylan, Mark Hollenbeck, Elliot Meyerson and Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In Proceedings of the 30th AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-16) 2016.
Solving Multiple Isolated, Interleaved, and Blended Tasks through Modular Neuroevolution 2016
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, Evolutionary Computation, Vol. 24, 3 (2016), pp. 459--490. MIT Press.
Evaluating team behaviors constructed with human-guided machine learning 2015
Igor V. Karpov, Leif M. Johnson and Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence in Games, August 31-July 2 2015.
Evolving Strategies for Social Innovation Games 2015
Erkin Bahceci, Riitta Katila and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2015), Madrid, Spain 2015.
Frame Skip Is a Powerful Parameter for Learning to Play Atari 2015
Alexander Braylan, Mark Hollenbeck, Elliot Meyerson and Risto Miikkulainen, In AAAI-15 Workshop on Learning for General Competency in Video Games 2015.
General Video Game Playing as a Benchmark for Human-Competitive AI 2015
Joel Lehman and Risto Miikkulainen, In AAAI-15 Workshop on Beyond the Turing Test 2015.
On the Cross-Domain Reusability of Neural Modules for General Video Game Playing 2015
Alexander Braylan, Mark Hollenbeck, Elliot Meyerson and Risto Miikkulainen, In IJCAI'15 Workshop on General Intelligence in Game-Playing Agents, pp. 7--14 2015.
Solving Interleaved and Blended Sequential Decision-Making Problems through Modular Neuroevolution 2015
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2015), pp. 345--352, Madrid, Spain, July 2015. Best Paper: Digital Entertainment and Arts.
Competitive Multi-Agent Search 2014
Erkin Bahceci, PhD Thesis, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving Multimodal Behavior Through Modular Multiobjective Neuroevolution 2014
Jacob Schrum, PhD Thesis, The University of Texas at Austin. Tech Report TR-14-07.
Evolving Multimodal Behavior With Modular Neural Networks in Ms. Pac-Man 2014
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2014), pp. 325--332, Vancouver, BC, Canada, July 2014. Best Paper: Digital Entertainment and Arts.
Boosting Interactive Evolution using Human Computation Markets 2013
Joel Lehman and Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on the Theory and Practice of Natural Computation, pp. 18 pages 2013. Springer.
Evolutionary Feature Evaluation for Online Reinforcement Learning 2013
Julian Bishop and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of 2013 IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG2013), pp. 267-275 2013.
IJCNN-2013 Tutorial on Evolution of Neural Networks 2013
Risto Miikkulainen, To Appear In unpublished. Tutorial slides..
Believable Bot Navigation via Playback of Human Traces 2012
Igor V. Karpov, Jacob Schrum, Risto Miikkulainen, In Believable Bots, Philip F. Hingston (Eds.), pp. 151--170 2012. Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
Evaluating Modular Neuroevolution in Robotic Keepaway Soccer 2012
Anand Subramoney, Masters Thesis, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin. 54 pages.
Evaluation Methods for Active Human-Guided Neuroevolution in Games 2012
Igor Karpov, Leif Johnson, Vinod Valsalam and Risto Miikkulainen, In 2012 AAAI Fall Symposium on Robots Learning Interactively from Human Teachers (RLIHT), November 2012.
Evolving Multimodal Networks for Multitask Games 2012
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, IEEE Transactions on Computational Intelligence and AI in Games, Vol. 4, 2 (2012), pp. 94--111. IEEE.
Humanlike Combat Behavior via Multiobjective Neuroevolution 2012
Jacob Schrum, Igor V. Karpov and Risto Miikkulainen, In Believable Bots, Philip F. Hingston (Eds.), pp. 119--150 2012. Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
HyperNEAT-GGP: A HyperNEAT-based Atari General Game Player 2012
Matthew Hausknecht, Piyush Khandelwal, Risto Miikkulainen, Peter Stone, In Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO) 2012 2012.
Multiagent Learning through Neuroevolution 2012
Risto Miikkulainen, Eliana Feasley, Leif Johnson, Igor Karpov, Padmini Rajagopalan, Aditya Rawal, and Wesley Tansey, In Advances in Computational Intelligence, J. Liu et al. (Eds.), Vol. LNCS 7311, pp. 24-46, Berlin, Heidelberg: 2012. Springer.
Assisting Machine Learning Through Shaping, Advice and Examples 2011
Igor Karpov, Vinod Valsalam and Risto Miikkulainen, In 2011 IJCAI Workshop on Agents Learning Interactively from Human Teachers (ALIHT), July 2011.
Creating Intelligent Agents through Shaping of Coevolution 2011
Adam Dziuk, Technical Report HR-11-01, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Creating Intelligent Agents through Shaping of Coevolution 2011
Adam Dziuk and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Congress on Evolutionary Computation, New Orleans, LA 2011. IEEE.
Evolving Multimodal Networks for Multitask Games 2011
Jacob Schrum and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG 2011), pp. 102--109, Seoul, South Korea, September 2011. IEEE. (Best Paper Award).
Human-Assisted Neuroevolution Through Shaping, Advice and Examples 2011
Igor V. Karpov, Vinod K. Valsalam and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 13th Annual Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2011), Dublin, Ireland, July 2011.
UT^2: Human-like Behavior via Neuroevolution of Combat Behavior and Replay of Human Traces 2011
Jacob Schrum, Igor V. Karpov and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG 2011), pp. 329--336, Seoul, South Korea, September 2011. IEEE.
An Analysis of Automated Decision Making Methodologies in Role Playing Video Games: Centralized Approach 2010
Christopher Bush, Technical Report HR-10-03, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
An Analysis of Distributed Decision Making Methodologies in Role Playing Video Games 2010
Matthew Johnston, Technical Report HR-10-09, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Coevolution of Role-Based Cooperation in Multi-Agent Systems 2010
Chern Han Yong and Risto Miikkulainen, IEEE Transactions on Autonomous Mental Development, Vol. 1 (2010), pp. 170--186.
Hierarchical Neural Networks for Behavior-Based Decision Making 2010
David Robson, Technical Report HR-10-02, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving Adaptive Intelligence: Using NeuroEvolution with Temporal Difference Methods in the Game Domain 2009
Nathaniel Tucker, Technical Report HR-09-04, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin..
Evolving Controllers for Simulated Car Racing using Neuroevolution 2008
Aravind Gowrisankar, Masters Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin. 85 pages.
Evolving Opponent Models for Texas Hold 'Em 2008
Alan J Lockett and Risto Miikkulainen, In IEEE Conference on Computational Intelligence in Games, Perth, Australia 2008.
Transfer of Evolved Pattern-Based Heuristics in Games 2008
Erkin Bahceci and Risto Miikkulainen, In IEEE Symposium On Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG 2008), pp. 220-227, Perth, Australia, December 2008.
Acquiring Evolvability through Adaptive Representations 2007
Joseph Reisinger and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceeedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference, pp. 1045-1052 2007.
Acquiring Visibly Intelligent Behavior with Example-Guided Neuroevolution 2007
Bobby D. Bryant and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Twenty-Second National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Menlo Park, CA 2007. AAAI Press.
Coevolving Strategies for General Game Playing 2007
Joseph Reisinger, Erkin Bahceci, Igor Karpov and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the {IEEE} Symposium on Computational Intelligence and Games, pp. 320-327, Piscataway, NJ 2007. IEEE.
Coevolution of Neural Networks using a Layered Pareto Archive 2006
German A. Monroy, Kenneth O. Stanley, Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference, pp. 329-336, Seattle, Washington, July 2006. New York, NY: ACM Press.
Computational Intelligence in Games 2006
Risto Miikkulainen, Bobby D. Bryant, Ryan Cornelius, Igor V. Karpov, Kenneth O. Stanley, and Chern Han Yong, In Computational Intelligence: Principles and Practice, Gary Y. Yen and David B. Fogel (Eds.), Piscataway, NJ 2006. IEEE Computational Intelligence Society.
Creating Intelligent Agents in Games 2006
Risto Miikkulainen, The Bridge (2006), pp. 5-13.
Evolving Stochastic Controller Networks for Intelligent Game Agents 2006
Bobby D. Bryant and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 2006 Congress on Evolutionary Computation, Piscataway, NJ 2006. IEEE.
Evolving Visibly Intelligent Behavior for Embedded Game Agents 2006
Bobby D. Bryant, PhD Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin. Technical Report AI-06-334.
Exploiting Sensor Symmetries in Example-based Training for Intelligent Agents 2006
Bobby D. Bryant and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the {IEEE} Symposium on Computational Intelligence and Games, Sushil M. Louis and Graham Kendall (Eds.), pp. 90-97, Piscataway, NJ 2006. IEEE.
Integration and Evaluation of Exploration-Based Learning in Games 2006
Igor V. Karpov, Thomas D'Silva, Craig Varrichio, Kenneth O. Stanley, Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the {IEEE} Symposium on Computational Intelligence and Games, Reno, NV 2006. IEEE.
Academic AI and Video Games: A Case Study of Incorporating Innovative Academic Research into a Video Game Prototype 2005
Aliza Gold, In Proceedings of the IEEE 2005 Symposium on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG'05) 2005. Piscataway, NJ: IEEE.
Coevolution of Neural Networks Using a Layered Pareto Archive 2005
German A. Monroy, Masters Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving Keepaway Soccer Players through Task Decomposition 2005
Shimon Whiteson, Nate Kohl, Risto Miikkulainen, and Peter Stone, Machine Learning, Vol. 59, 1 (2005), pp. 5-30.
Evolving Neural Network Agents in the NERO Video Game 2005
Kenneth O. Stanley, Bobby D. Bryant, and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the IEEE 2005 Symposium on Computational Intelligence and Games (CIG'05), Piscataway, NJ 2005. IEEE.
Incorporating Advice into Evolution of Neural Networks 2005
Chern Han Yong, Kenneth O. Stanley, and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2005) 2005. Late Breaking Papers.
Real-Time Learning in the NERO Video Game 2005
Kenneth O. Stanley, Ryan Cornelius, Risto Miikkulainen, Thomas D'Silva, and Aliza Gold, In Proceedings of the Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment Conference (AIIDE 2005) Demo Papers 2005.
Real-time Neuroevolution in the NERO Video Game 2005
Kenneth O. Stanley, Bobby D. Bryant, and Risto Miikkulainen, IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation (2005), pp. 653-668. IEEE.
Retaining Learned Behavior During Real-Time Neuroevolution 2005
Thomas D'Silva, Roy Janik, Michael Chrien, Kenneth O. Stanley and Risto Miikkulainen, Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment (2005). American Association for Artificial Intelligence.
Efficient Evolution of Neural Networks Through Complexification 2004
Kenneth O. Stanley, PhD Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving a Roving Eye for Go 2004
Kenneth O. Stanley and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO-2004), Berlin 2004. Springer Verlag.
Neuroevolution for Adaptive Teams 2003
Bobby D. Bryant and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the 2003 Congress on Evolutionary Computation (CEC 2003), pp. 2194-2201, Piscataway, NJ 2003. IEEE.
Neuroevolution through Augmenting Topologies Applied to Evolving Neural Networks to Play Othello 2002
Timothy Andersen, Technical Report HR-02-01, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Applying ESP And Region Specialists To Neuro-Evolution For Go 2001
Andres Santiago Perez-Bergquist, Technical Report TR-01-24, Department of Computer Science, University of Texas at Austin.
Co-Evolving A Go-Playing Neural Network 2001
Alex Lubberts and Risto Miikkulainen, In Coevolution: {T}urning Adaptive Algorithms Upon Themselves, Birds-of-a-Feather Workshop, Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference ({GECCO}-2001), pp. 6 2001.
Online Interactive Neuro-Evolution 2000
Adrian Agogino, Kenneth O. Stanley, and Risto Miikkulainen, Neural Processing Letters (2000), pp. 29-38.
Evolving Hierarchical Neural Networks to Play Go 1998
Todd Greer, Technical Report HR-94-01, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving Neural Networks To Play Go 1998
Norman Richards, David Moriarty, and Risto Miikkulainen, Applied IntelligenceThomas B{"a}ck (Eds.) (1998), pp. 768-775. San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufmann.
Symbiotic Evolution Of Neural Networks In Sequential Decision Tasks 1997
David E. Moriarty, PhD Thesis, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin. 117. Technical Report UT-AI97-257.
Discovering Complex Othello Strategies Through Evolutionary Neural Networks 1995
David E. Moriarty and Risto Miikkulainen, Connection Science, Vol. 7 (1995), pp. 195--209.
Learning Sequential Decision Tasks 1995
David E. Moriarty and Risto Miikkulainen, Technical Report AI95-229, Department of Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin.
Evolving Neural Networks To Focus Minimax Search 1994
David E. Moriarty and Risto Miikkulainen, In Proceedings of the Twelfth National Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-94), pp. 1371-1377, Seattle, WA 1994. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Evolving Finite State Behavior using Marker-Based Genetic Encoding of Neural Networks 1991
Brad Fullmer, Technical Report HR-91-01, Department of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin.
Projects
The Role of Emotion and Communication in Cooperative Behavior 2013 - 2016
The OpenNERO AI Research and Education Platform 2009 - Present
Learning Strategic Behavior in Sequential Decision Tasks 2009 - 2014
Coevolution of Competitive and Cooperative Agent Behavior 2009 - Present
Constructing Intelligent Agents in Simulated Worlds 2008 - 2010
Human-like Bots in Unreal Tournament 2008 - 2012
NERO: NeuroEvolving Robotic Operatives 2003 - 2009
Diverse Behavior in Teams of Homogeneous Agents 2001 - 2007
Software/Data
ContextSkillFlappyBall Download at GitHub.

Context-skill model for extrapolati...

2021
BBMS BBMS is software for Brian Boyles's Masters thesis on evolving scout agents for military simulations. It includes a simu... 2015
MM-NEAT Download at GitHub

Modular Multiobjective NEAT is a software fra... 		2014
UT^2: Winning Botprize 2012 Entry The Botprize Competition is an annual competition to program bots that appear human-l... 2012
BREVE Monsters BREVE is a system for designing Artificial Life simulations available at http://spiderlan... 2010
OpenNERO OpenNERO is a general research and education platform for artificial intelligence. The platform is based on a simulatio... 2010
Demos
Multimodal Behavior in Isolated Ms. Pac-ManJacob Schrum2015
Multimodal Behavior in Imprison Ms. Pac-ManJacob Schrum2014
Multimodal Behavior in One Life Ms. Pac-ManJacob Schrum2014
Multimodal Behavior in Multiple Lives Ms. Pac-ManJacob Schrum2014
UT^2: Winner of 2012 BotPrize in Unreal Tournament 2004Jacob Schrum, Igor Karpov2012
Evolving Cooperation in Multiagent SystemsChern Yong2007
Neuro-Evolving Robotic Operatives (NERO)Kenneth Stanley2007
Adaptive Teams of Agents in the Legion II gameBobby Bryant2006
Labs
Neural Networks