Biological Systems

The Partridge Family were neither partridges nor a family. Discuss.
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DicheBach
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Biological Systems

Post by DicheBach » December 19th, 2017, 2:55 pm

I'm a biological anthropologist by training with a focus on the psychobiology of stress and addiction. Now that I'm retired, I've spent a couple years studying IT in general and the last year or so + studying programming with as much of a focus on C++ as I could manage. I did a couple semesters of course work at a local technical college and that was enough to get me moving on autodidactic study. Discovering Chili's channel was huge and I've been more engaged and enthusiastic pretty much than ever before.

So that is enough general info about me . . . the specific topic I'm raising in this thread is: modeling, or at least "representing" biological systems in an application. I find myself daydreaming about this pretty often, but have yet to really try to put stuff down in editor, primarily because I don't feel like I'm far enough along with Chili's beginner series to start letting my time get absorbed by that sort of stuff.

One could set out to model biological systems at varying levels (and indeed, most "games" that involve human entities in anything like a realistic context are actually doing this to some limited extent, though by leaving a large swath of biology in a black box of "constant / not salient to game play." For example: population levels in which individual organisms of one or more species and environmental characteristics are represented as objects; local group levels in which a smaller number of individual organisms of one or more species, AND more detailed information about each individuals trait/state characteristics (glucose/glucagon/fat, i.e., "energy reserves"; trauma status; hydration status; gut status [full of food or not]). Age, life history, reproductive biology, perception, etc., etc. I don't see any reason why all of that stuff could not be "modelled" in a program, though to what end I'm not sure.

Physiological level: model only one individual but with the most salient physiological systems represented.

Molecular level: model only a few organ systems (or perhaps even just one) but with molecular processes represented in detail.

One could even take it down to lower levels but that is where my own level of knowledge and degree of interest starts to wane.

So, you may be saying "WTF is this old man on about!" or you may be like "Whoa dude!" or somewhere in between, but here is the thing:
1. As far as I can tell, most "programmers" focus on graphics.
2. I have yet to determine any way that I can turn any of these ideas into a commercial product.

I know there have been games like "Spore" which were touted as "evolution simulators" but based on reading about the game (never bought it, never played it, don't really have any interest) it doesn't sound like any such thing to me. It sounds like a silly ass lego game with some incoherent notions of biology under the hood.
The greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies & drive them before him.
To ride their horses & take away their possessions. To see faces of those who were dear
bedewed with tears & clasp their wives & daughters to his arms.

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DicheBach
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by DicheBach » December 19th, 2017, 3:03 pm

Here is another thought: ballistics and gun shot trauma.

Firearms and "firearms trauma" (along with other modern weapons) are REPLETE in video games.

Not a SINGLE ONE OF THEM even tries half-heartedly to model actual ballistics (in which actual physical characteristics like bullet composition, muzzle velocity, rifling ratio [thus bullet stability] and length, etc. are modelled) and actual bullet trauma (penetration, cavitation, organ damage, blood vessel, lymph and nerve damage, bone damage, muscle damage, etc.) are modelled.

I find this both curious and disappointing.

It is the same for a wide range of other "biological processes" which are modeled in games, but just VERY superficially: hunger, thirst, fatigue, muscular power and endurance, perception, reaction, discrimination & inhibition, locomotion, etc., etc.

Might it be POSSIBLE to devise a game design in which a reasonable degree of naturalism were considered a "minimum threshold" and then develop a game that stuck to that, and still be a profitable venture?
The greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies & drive them before him.
To ride their horses & take away their possessions. To see faces of those who were dear
bedewed with tears & clasp their wives & daughters to his arms.

albinopapa
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by albinopapa » December 19th, 2017, 4:36 pm

Computing power is limited, which is why game devs go for estimations over realization. To simulate a bullet tearing through flesh and bone, heating up the molecules from the friction, shrapnel bouncing around inside the body carving a trail of destruction, blood oozing. This alone would be quite a bit of work for the computer, then multiply that by the number of bullets being fired off and the number of players firing those bullets, and the number of objects being shot. It's best to just estimate and move to the next frame. I think some games have mocked this type of bullet penetration, but only the penetration, no bouncing around the skull or ricocheting off a rib or anything.

Now, if you wanted to create simulations for non-realtime rendering for forensic purposes, that would probably get you some where.

I believe you must determine what are the essential parts of the game play, and then add depth as you go. You must make sure your frame rate is still playable, which will differ depending on the type of game it is, but mostly 30fps and above or 60fps and above for fast action games.
If you think paging some data from disk into RAM is slow, try paging it into a simian cerebrum over a pair of optical nerves. - gameprogrammingpatterns.com

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DicheBach
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by DicheBach » December 19th, 2017, 7:01 pm

Yes, excellent point albino: infrastructure is not infinite. But, it is substantially greater today than at any time in history, and it gets larger every year.

The make-believe 3D worlds one can readily see in many AAA published high-speed networked multiplayer games make me wonder "Just how much infrastructure does that shit use, and how close to the red line are they running things!?"

Also: one does not need to achieve 99.999% simulation reality to achieve a qualitative shift in gameplay. Simply taking one or two "steps" in that direction might well revolutionize how games play and the nature of the fun and edification they afford.

In sum: I suspect that the field is ripe for true revolutions and the fact is, most programmers, designers and developers in general do not seem to think outside the box (which is understandable given that simply mastering the crafts they need to master to be competent at their specific role in game creation is a major challenge in itself).
The greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies & drive them before him.
To ride their horses & take away their possessions. To see faces of those who were dear
bedewed with tears & clasp their wives & daughters to his arms.

albinopapa
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by albinopapa » December 19th, 2017, 9:43 pm

In regards to the designers/developers not thinking outside the box, I believe that is left for the indie scene to accomplish, as most AAA publishers are going to set tight deadlines therefore not allowing their teams time to think beyond the norm. I and Mat Pat from the Game Theorists Youtube channel agree, that a "revolution" needs to and is probably about to happen.
If you think paging some data from disk into RAM is slow, try paging it into a simian cerebrum over a pair of optical nerves. - gameprogrammingpatterns.com

MrGodin
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by MrGodin » December 19th, 2017, 11:16 pm

This channel has some good insights into game development. These talks can long but worth it in the end.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JB7T ... 6u6qH8y_MQ
Curiosity killed the cat, satisfaction brought him back

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DicheBach
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by DicheBach » December 19th, 2017, 11:59 pm

albinopapa wrote:In regards to the designers/developers not thinking outside the box, I believe that is left for the indie scene to accomplish, as most AAA publishers are going to set tight deadlines therefore not allowing their teams time to think beyond the norm. I and Mat Pat from the Game Theorists Youtube channel agree, that a "revolution" needs to and is probably about to happen.
Yep. That sounds very apt!
MrGodin wrote:This channel has some good insights into game development. These talks can long but worth it in the end.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JB7T ... 6u6qH8y_MQ
Kewl! Thanks MrGodin.
The greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies & drive them before him.
To ride their horses & take away their possessions. To see faces of those who were dear
bedewed with tears & clasp their wives & daughters to his arms.

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chili
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by chili » December 20th, 2017, 2:43 am

Yeah spore seems like bullshit. Overhyped.

In general I would say that good game simulations go into as much detail as required to achieve the desired result, and no more. There is a cost in detailed simulation in terms of processing, and there is another very real cost in terms of development manpower.

If you want to get into detailed biological simulations, some places to look would be protein folding / binding simulations for molecular biology and genetic algorithm search as applied to things like neural network topologies for evolution.
Chili

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DicheBach
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by DicheBach » December 20th, 2017, 1:53 pm

chili wrote:Yeah spore seems like bullshit. Overhyped.

In general I would say that good game simulations go into as much detail as required to achieve the desired result, and no more. There is a cost in detailed simulation in terms of processing, and there is another very real cost in terms of development manpower.

If you want to get into detailed biological simulations, some places to look would be protein folding / binding simulations for molecular biology and genetic algorithm search as applied to things like neural network topologies for evolution.
Cool I had heard of such things, and was aware that certain projects do make fairly extensive use of computer simulations, but never actually looked into it.

Heh, quick search on "protein folding" on YT turns up a lot! :o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFcp2Xpd29I

Whoa! . . . understood about 30% of this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnilIKN63to
The greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies & drive them before him.
To ride their horses & take away their possessions. To see faces of those who were dear
bedewed with tears & clasp their wives & daughters to his arms.

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krautersuppe
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Re: Biological Systems

Post by krautersuppe » December 20th, 2017, 9:17 pm

DicheBach wrote:Here is another thought: ballistics and gun shot trauma.
Might it be POSSIBLE to devise a game design in which a reasonable degree of naturalism were considered a "minimum threshold" and then develop a game that stuck to that, and still be a profitable venture?
No, it is not possible. The "complicated" calculations nowadays are just combinations of simple methods - like solving of millions of linear equation systems - possible to do because of improved computing power of modern computers.
In 3-dimensional case there are analytical methods for cuboids, cylinders and spheres. Furthermore there are methods for elliptical, parabolic and hyperbolic contours. However a screw with ridge and hexagonal head is beyond reach of analytical methods, the same goes for type lever of a typewriter or a crankshaft.
Besides that many of the problems you mentioned involve something called uncertain systems where moving forward in time one is unable to predict position or state of the object accurately.
DicheBach wrote: Whoa! . . . understood about 30% of this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnilIKN63to
Yes because there is nothing to understand. Bunch of bullshit speculations(in my opinion). No explanation of measurement methods involved(like those ramachandran angles or those speculative rotation angles that are "needed" to make hydrogen bonds possible) and gobbledygook about phenomenons and theories that cannot be measured or observed accurately.
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