Tech Report CS-98-10

Improving Behavior Efficiency in Virtual Worlds

Jeff White

October 1998

Abstract:

As the complexity of computer games grows, it becomes increasingly necessary to manage the computational cost of both geometry and behavior. Although there have been many advances in software and hardware for efficiently processing geometry, there are relatively few techniques for managing behaviors. In anticipation of the rising cost of behavior execution, we identify techniques for improving behavior efficiency and discuss how these techniques are applicable to specific properties of behavior. We present examples that we have implemented that demonstrate the use and effectiveness of these techniques. We also describe a framework that allows applications to reuse these techniques. Although we focus on game environments, we believe this work is applicable to other virtual environments, such as information visualization, animated films, and virtual walkthroughs.

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