Start of funding 01.01.2009

COSINA: COnversional Skills for Interactive NArrative

Prof. Dr. Elisabeth André
University of Augsburg
Lehrstuhl für Multimediakonzepte und ihre Anwendungen

Prof. Dr. Michael Mateas
University of California, Santa Cruz
Computer Science Department



The possibilities to interact with non-player characters using natural language are still very constrained - even in modern computer games. Most commercial games nowadays rely on pre-fixed menus from which the player has to select a limited number of options. In most cases, the player may only determine the order of the dialogue contributions and is forced to go through all options to make progress in the game. The major limitation of all these approaches is their little flexibility and prefixed structure. Within the planned BaCaTeC cooperation, we will investigate how to combine robust natural language processing and plot-based drama control within the context of computer games. On the one hand, we will explore how knowledge regarding the plot may be used to disambiguate natural language utterances. On the other hand, we will address the challenge of how to provide a narrative structure to a game, but still enable great flexibility regarding a player’s interactions.