WHAT IS A BOT?
A BOT in the First Person Shooter (FPS) world of Quake, Quake II, Half-Life, Quake III Arena, Unreal and the Unreal Tournament Series is a roBOTic computer controlled entity that simulates a human deathmatch opponent or even a cooperative player. The heart of the bot lies in its AI—artificial intelligence. There are several kinds of Bots that can be created to either fight for or against the individual player. This article and related web page will focus upon those Bots that are deathmatch opponents and only make passing reference to the Helper and Proxy Bots.
BOT BASICS: CLIENT AND SERVER TYPES
The CLIENT-SIDE (C/S) Bots are usually written in C or C++ as stand-alone, completely independent programs. They must connect to a server like a real Quake client (i.e., player) and perform the protocol of interpretation themselves. In the realm of C/S Bots are found the controversial Proxy Bots. (Not all Client-Side Bots are Proxy Bots but all Proxy Bots are Client-Side Bots.) A Proxy Bot "sits between" the Quake client and the Quake server and enhances the player's abilities (i.e., aiming and firing). These Proxy Bots effectively turn the individual player into a kind of "cyborg." Thus, Proxy Bots, like the famous Stanford StoogeBot, are usually considered "cheating." Other non-proxy Bots are generally called Quake C/S Bots. These Bots would include QuakeBot C/S, MikeBot, MysteryBot, TerminatorBot, ZaphBot, AdminBot, and JavaBot. All of these Bots are for Classic Quake. A Quake II proxy called ZBot has made its appearance and a Pandora C/S Bot is also available. (There is now even a proxy Bot for Quake III Arena, and one for Unreal Tournament.) Though this article and web site do not specifically deal with or focus on Quake Client-Side Bots, several links to major C/S Bot sites will be found on the CLIENT/PROXIES page. However, most of the C/S Bots are no longer in development and thus, most are no longer available. I must add that all Quake Bot lovers are indebted to the pioneering work done by the creators of the C/S Bots. It is here that the issues of and quest for "killer" AI finds its home in the Quake community. The sites that are devoted to the C/S Bots are usually maintained by the programmers themselves and thus make for some very interesting, even though technical, reading.
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