The creators of AI pathfinding middleware PathEngine have announced that Rare (
Perfect Dark Zero, Viva Pinata) has licensed its pathfinding and collision middleware system for a yet to be announced Xbox 360 title.
The PathEngine SDK is built around an implementation of points-of-visibility pathfinding on three-dimensional ground meshes. The approach enables PathEngine to provide both pathfinding and collision in tight integration against a single agent movement model that takes agent shape into account and supports overlapping geometry, with dynamic obstacles directly integrated into this movement model.
In a recent Gamasutra Tooling Around column, PathEngine founder Thomas Young was
quick to note that the SDK is "more than just a pathfinding system," explaining, "We definitely don't aim to provide a generic solution to the overall problem of higher level game AI."
Most recently PathEngine
added to its list of clients by signing ArenaNet for
Guild Wars 2, NextPlay for
Firenze, and also Yedang online, MAIET entertainment, Ani-park. The PathEngine toolkit is currently being used in titles such as the Asian MMORPG
Granado Espada, as well as Ironlore Entertainment's
Titan Quest and B-Alive's
Wildlife Park 2.
