• Game_Technology

Game Technology

In our group, the research area of Game Technology focuses on advanced modeling, visualization and interaction techniques for the next generation of entertainment and serious games. This research is supervised by Rafael Bidarra.

We are investigating techniques aimed at automating the generation and consistency maintenance of virtual worlds. In this research, we are very interested in the development and application of procedural and semantic modeling techniques for the specification and generation of both virtual worlds and gameplay.
The ultimate goal in this work is to effectively assist game level designers in expressing their vision of the game world, and consistently maintaining all intent specified throughout the numerous iterations of the design process.

Other ongoing research projects in this area include GPU-based manipulation of realistic terrain, path-finding algorithms for multi-core platforms, semantic navigation algorithms, procedural destruction of objects and smart integration of real objects within virtual worlds.
Many of these projects are (or were) done in close cooperation with renowned Dutch game developers, as you can find out by browsing through their page links below. We also work together with our colleagues of the TUDelft Centre for Serious Gaming in a number of projects on serious gaming, and with the Modelling, Simulation and Gaming Department of TNO, in The Hague, on research in virtual world modelling and interaction techniques.

The research team currently consists of Ricardo Lopes, Tim Tutenel, Pedro Silva and Rafael Bidarra, and a whole lot of enthusiastic MSc and BSc students who are currently working in some of our projects, as you can see in these pages.

If you happen to be a BSc/MSc student looking for really cool new projects, you probably shouldn't want to miss our list of currently available projects below.

Research projects

PhD

• Generation of adaptive game worlds, Ricardo Lopes

• Node-based procedural modeling, Pedro Silva

MSc

• Procedural geometry generation of roads, Asmar B. Arsala

• Procedural generation for modern RPGs, Roland van der Linden

• Procedural ornamentation, Joey van den Heuvel (in collaboration with University of California, Santa Cruz)

BSc

• Adaptive game world interactions, Marlon Etheredge

• Alex Kolpa

• Dirk Schut

Available projects

MSc

• Procedural generation of traffic signs

• Styles for procedural ornamentation, in collaboration with University of California, Santa Cruz

• User-controlled procedural modelling of virtual worlds

BSc

• Procedural Vessel Generator, in collaboration with TNO The Hague.

• Shape grammar editor

PhD Alumni

• Semantics in game worlds, Dr. Tim Tutenel (2012)

• Declarative modeling of virtual worlds, Dr.ir. Ruben M. Smelik (2011)

Completed projects

• Evolutionary city generation for games, Rick de Ridder (MSc) (2012)

• Semantic Building Blocks for Declarative Virtual World Creation, Jassin Kessing (GATE Knowledge Transfer project) (2012)

• Semantic crowds, Nick Kraayenbrink (MSc) (2011)

• Semantics of room interiors, Fernando Marson (Exchange PhD student) (2011)

• Specifying semantics of large sets of 3D models, Xin Zhang (Exchange PhD student) (2011)

• Enriching geo-specific terrain with procedural details, Joel van Neerbos (GATE Knowledge Transfer project) (2011)

• Living natural environments, Quintijn Hendrickx (BSc Honours) (2011)

• Realistic rendering of virtual worlds, Korijn van Golen, Zhi Kang Shao, Mattijs Driel, Quintijn Hendrickx (BSc) (2011)

• Rapid and efficient procedural building generation, Johannes Bertens, Joachim Boers (BSc) (2011)

• Procedural destruction of objects in computer games, Joris van Gestel (2011)

• Visual modeling of instance-based procedural specifications for architectural structures, Jerke Boers (2010)

• Scenario authoring for simulation games, Casper van Est (2010)

• Procedural filters for game worlds, Roland van der Linden, Marnix Kraus, Bart Bollen (BSc) (2010)

• Procedural level design using environmental features, Remco Huijser (2010)

• Real-time path-finding in video games, Sandy Brand (2009)

• Simulating interactions between tracked real-world objects and user-controlled virtual objects, Rene van den Berg (2009)

• Services in game worlds, Jassin Kessing (2009)

• Procedural city layout generation based on urban land use models, Saskia Groenewegen (2009)

• Enhancing video game characters with emotion, mood and personality, Robert Schaap (2009)

• Semantic navigation in video games, Leonard van Driel (2008)

• Effective GPU-based synthesis and editing of realistic heightfields, Giliam de Carpentier (2008)

• A flexible UI engine for video games, Thijs Kruithof (2007)

Publications

• Lopes R, Tutenel T and Bidarra R (2012) Using gameplay semantics to procedurally generate player-matching game worlds. Proceedings of the The third workshop on Procedural Content Generation in Games (PCG 2012), May 29, Raleigh, NC (link)

• Kessing J, Tutenel T and Bidarra R (2012) Designing Semantic Game Worlds. Proceedings of the The third workshop on Procedural Content Generation in Games (PCG 2012), May 29, Raleigh, NC

• Zhang X, Tutenel T, Mo R, Bidarra R and Bronsvoort WF (2012) A Method for Specifying Semantics of Large Sets of 3D Models. Proceedings of the International Conference on Computer Graphics Theory and Applications (GRAPP 2012), February 24-26, 2012, Rome, Italy

• Smelik RM (2011) A Declarative Approach to Procedural Generation of Virtual Worlds. PhD Thesis, Delft University of Technology, ISBN 978-90-8570-597-0 (pdf)

• Lopes R and Bidarra R (2011) A semantic generation framework for enabling adaptive game worlds. TBP in Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment technology (ACE 2011), Lisbon, Portugal (link)

• Kuijper, F, Smelik, RM, van Son, R (2011) A Declarative Instructor-centered Approach to Modeling Synthetic Environments. TBP in Proceedings of the I/ITSEC 2011 Conference, November 28 - December 1, Orlando, Florida, USA

• Tutenel T, Smelik RM, Lopes R, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2011) Generating consistent buildings: a semantic approach for integrating procedural techniques. IEEE Transactions on Computational Intelligence and AI in Games, vol.3, no.3, pp.274-288, September 2011. (link)

• Lopes R and Bidarra R (2011) Adaptivity challenges in games and simulations: a survey. IEEE Transactions on Computational Intelligence and AI in Games, vol.3, no.2, pp.85-99, June 2011. (link)

• Tutenel T, van der Linden R, Kraus M, Bollen B and Bidarra R (2011) Procedural filters for customization of virtual worlds. Proceedings of PCGames 2011 - workshop on Procedural Content Generation in Games, co-located with the Sixth International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, 28 June - 1 July, Bordeaux, France

• Smelik RM, Galka KA, de Kraker KJ, Kuijper F and Bidarra R (2011) Semantic constraints for procedural modelling of virtual worlds Proceedings of PCGames 2011 - workshop on Procedural Content Generation in Games, co-located with the Sixth International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, 28 June - 1 July, Bordeaux, France

• Smelik RM, Tutenel T, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2011) A Declarative Approach to Procedural Modeling of Virtual Worlds. Computers & Graphics, Volume 35, Issue 2, Pages 352-363, Elsevier. (link)

• Lopes R, Tutenel T, Smelik RM, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2010) A constrained growth method for procedural floor plan generation. Proceedings of GAME-ON 2010, 17-19 November, Leicester, United Kingdom

• Tutenel T, Smelik RM, Bidarra R and de Kraker KJ (2010) A Semantic Scene Description Language for Procedural Layout Solving Problems. Proceedings of AIIDE 2010 - 6th conference on artificial intelligence and interactive digital entertainment, October 11-13, Stanford, CA, USA

• Kuijper, F, van Son, R, van Meurs, F, Smelik, RM, and de Kraker, KJ (2010) Techniques for Automatic Creation of Terrain Databases for Training and Mission Preparation. Proceedings of the IMAGE 2010 Conference, 12-15 July 2010, Scottsdale, Arizona, USA

• Bronsvoort WF, Bidarra R, van der Meiden H and Tutenel T (2010) The Increasing Role of Semantics in Object Modeling. Computer-Aided Design and Applications 7(3): 431-440 (link)

• Smelik RM, Tutenel T, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2010) Integrating procedural generation and manual editing of virtual worlds. Proceedings of the 2010 Workshop on Procedural Content Generation in Games - Fifth International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games, 19-21 June, Monterey, CA (acm)

• Smelik RM, Tutenel T, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2010) Interactive creation of virtual worlds using procedural sketching. Proceedings of Eurographics 2010 - Short papers, 3-7 May, Norrköping, Sweden

• Smelik RM, Tutenel T, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2010) Declarative terrain modeling for military training games. International Journal of Computer Games Technology 2010 (link)

• Bidarra R, de Kraker KJ, Smelik RM and Tutenel T (2010) Integrating semantics and procedural generation: key enabling factors for declarative modeling of virtual worlds. In: Proceedings of FOCUS K3D Conference on Semantic 3D Media and Content, 11-12 February, Sophia Antipolis, France, pp. 51-55 (pdf)

• Hendrickx Q, Smelik RM and Bidarra R (2010) Real-time rendering of river networks. In: Proceedings of I3D 2010 - ACM SIGGRAPH Symposium on Interactive 3D Gaphics and Games, 19-21 February, Washington DC, USA

• Tutenel T, Smelik RM, Bidarra R and de Kraker KJ (2009) Using semantics to improve the design of game worlds. In: Proceedings of AIIDE 2009 - 5th conference on artificial intelligence and interactive digital entertainment, October 14-16, Stanford, CA, USA

• Kessing J, Tutenel T, and Bidarra R (2009) Services in Game Worlds: A Semantic Approach to Improve Object Interaction. In: Proceedings of ICEC 2009 - international conference on entertainment computing, September 3-5, Paris, France.

• Smelik RM, de Kraker KJ, Tutenel T, Bidarra R (2009) A case study on procedural modeling of geo-typical southern Afghanistan terrain. In: Proceedings of the IMAGE 2009 Conference, July 13-16, St. Louis, MO, USA (pdf) (video (xvid))

• Tutenel T, Bidarra R, Smelik RM, and de Kraker KJ (2009) Rule-based layout solving and its application to procedural interior generation. In: Proceedings of the CASA workshop on 3D advanced media in gaming and simulation (3AMIGAS), June 16, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (pdf)

• Smelik RM, de Kraker KJ, Tutenel T, Bidarra R, and Groenewegen SA (2009) A survey of procedural methods for terrain modelling. In: Proceedings of the CASA workshop on 3D advanced media in gaming and simulation (3AMIGAS), June 16, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (pdf)

• de Carpentier GJP and Bidarra R (2009) Interactive GPU-based procedural heightfield brushes. In: Proceedings of fourth international conference on the foundations of digital games, April 26-30, Port Canaveral, FL, pp. 55-62 (link)

• Groenewegen SA, Smelik RM, de Kraker KJ, and Bidarra R (2009) Procedural city layout generation based on urban land use models. In: Proceedings of Eurographics 2009, March 30 - April 3, Munich, Germany (pdf)

• Schaap R and Bidarra R (2008) Towards emotional characters in computer games. In: Entertainment Computing - ICEC 2008 , Stevens SM and Saldamarco SJ (Eds.), LNCS 5309, Springer, ISBN 978-3-540-89221-2, pp. 167-172 (special issue: Proceedings of the International Conference on Entertainment Computing, September 25-27, Pittsburgh, PA) (pdf)

• Tutenel T, Bidarra R, Smelik RM and de Kraker KJ (2008) The role of semantics in games and simulations. ACM Computers in Entertainment 6(4):a57 (link)

• Smelik RM, Tutenel T, de Kraker KJ and Bidarra R (2008) A proposal for a procedural terrain modelling framework. In: Proceedings of Eurographics Virtual Environments symposium, May 29-30, Eindhoven, The Netherlands (pdf) (bibtex) (endnote)

Upcoming conferences

Conferences webpage

News