The goal of this thesis was to develop a prototype of a need-based artificial intelligence (AI) for a computer game. The thesis wasn't commissioned by a third party, but was done out of my own interest and to improve my know-how.

The AI was developed for Spaceship Captain, a game I have been working on for some time. Spaceship Captain is a story focused, 2D-life simulation/role-playing game for PC. The game’s central feature is random generated non-playable characters and their social AI, highly reminiscent of the AI seen in The Sims. As the complete AI was going to be too complex subject for a thesis, I instead decided to only cover the need-based functionality.

The prototype was developed with Unity and Microsoft Visual Studio. The most important methods for developing the prototype were finite state machines, fuzzy logic, navigation meshes and smart objects. The AI of The Sims was used as a jumping-off as it's also need-based. Instead of taking the needs that The Sims uses though, Maslow's hierarchy of needs was used a base instead and later modified further.

The AI prototype was successfully developed, though not as expansively as first envisioned. Only a handful of the designed needs made their way into the prototype, but this ultimately wasn't a real issue, as implementing all of the needs as designed, they would've needed additional systems to accompany them. The core of the need-based functionality was however developed as planned.

During the writing of this thesis, a handful of points of improvement were discovered with the prototype, but as again they weren't something to be dealt with within the scope of the thesis, they were left for future development.