AIIDE'07 Conference Announces Invited Speakers

Author: by Beth A.

The Third Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Entertainment (AIIDE'07), taking place June 6-8, 2007 at Stanford University in Stanford, USA, has announced its invited speakers. AIIDE'07 is intended to be the definitive point of interaction between entertainment software developers interested in AI and academic and industrial AI researchers. Sponsored by the American Association for Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), the conference is targeted at both the research and commercial communities, promoting AI research and practice in the context of interactive digital entertainment systems with an emphasis on commercial computer and video games. AIIDE'07 will include invited speaker sessions, paper presentation sessions, demonstration sessions, and exhibits. In addition to these peer reviewed sessions, the following industry professionals and academics will be presenting as invited speakers: Bruce Blumberg leads Blue Fang’s Synthetic Animal Team, which is focused on creating the technology, tools and processes that will enable Blue Fang to create expressive, intelligent and engrossing animal characters that will set the bar for the next generation of digital entertainment experiences. Wolff Dobson works for AiLive Inc., a startup devoted to next-generation artificial intelligence in games. Working as a designer, producer, engineer, and artist Wolff has been instrumental is developing two commercial products, LiveMove and LiveCombat, that bring ground breaking real-time machine learning technology to the computer entertainment industry. Quinn Dunki is an AI programmer at Pandemic Studios. She was born and raised in Canada, but has been living and working in California for the past 8 years. She has been making games for a little over 20 years, the last 11 of which have been professional. Richard Evans is senior AI engineer on The Sims 3 at Electronic Arts, where he is responsible for the AI architecture, but also gets involved in game design. John Funge is a co-founder and one of the lead scientists at AiLive Inc. At AiLive he is part of the team that developed LiveMove and LiveCombat, two commercial products that bring ground breaking real-time machine learning technology to the computer entertainment industry. John previously worked at Sony Computer Entertainment America's (SCEA) research lab. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Toronto and also holds degrees from the University of Oxford and King's College London. Chris Hecker, Maxis/Electronic Arts, focuses on solving hard game design and technical problems found at the intersection of gameplay, aesthetics, and engineering. He is an outspoken advocate for pushing the current boundaries of design and interactivity, in the hope that games will achieve their full potential as an art and entertainment form. To this end he helps organize the yearly Indie Game Jam and the Experimental Gameplay Workshop, and his recent work at Maxis has centered around using advanced proceduralism to enhance player creativity and agency. Soren Johnson, Lead Designer and AI Programmer, Firaxis Games, served as the project lead, lead designer, and AI programmer for Sid Meier's Civilization IV, which was Gamespy’s Game of the Year for 2006. He also programmed the AI and co-designed Civilization III. He joined Firaxis in 2000, after serving an internship at Electronic Arts working on Knockout Kings for the PSX. Peter Molyneux, Lionhead Studios, co-founded Bullfrog Productions in 1987 and created a new genre of computer games, “ the god game” with the release of Populous. Since then Peter has been responsible for a string of massive selling games including Powermonger, Theme Park, Magic Carpet and Dungeon Keeper. Ken Perlin is a professor in the Department of Computer Science and the Director of the Media Research Laboratory, both at the New York University. Perlin received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from New York University in 1986 and a B.A. in Theoretical Mathematics from Harvard University in 1979. His research interests include graphics, animation and multimedia. He has developed and been involved with developing techniques such as Perlin noise, Hypertexturing and Computer-User interfaces, including Zooming User Interfaces and Stylus-based input. Ken is the proud recipient of an Academy Award for developing Perlin Noise. Most recently, he has been consulting with Will Wright of Maxis on “Spore”. As Vice President and General Manager of EA Los Angeles (EALA), Neil Young oversees all aspects of the studio that is responsible for the blockbuster franchises, Medal of Honor, Command & Conquer and Lord of the Rings. Prior to taking the helm of EALA, Young was General Manager of the award-winning Maxis studio, where he was responsible for delivering The Sims 2, the sequel to the best selling PC game of all time. AIIDE'07 is accepting papers until January 22, 2007. For more information, interested parties can visit the conference website.