A zero-player game or no-player game is a

simulation A simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time. Simulations require the use of models; the model represents the key characteristics or behaviors of the selected system or process, whereas the ...

game that has no sentient players.

Types

There are various different types of games that can be considered "zero-player".

Determined by initial state

A game that evolves as determined by its initial state, requiring no further input from humans is considered a zero-player game.

Cellular automaton A cellular automaton (pl. cellular automata, abbrev. CA) is a discrete model of computation studied in automata theory. Cellular automata are also called cellular spaces, tessellation automata, homogeneous structures, cellular structures, tess ...

games that are determined by initial conditions including

Conway's Game of Life The Game of Life, also known simply as Life, is a cellular automaton devised by the British mathematician John Horton Conway in 1970. It is a zero-player game, meaning that its evolution is determined by its initial state, requiring no furt ...

are examples of this.' ''

Progress Quest ''Progress Quest'' is a video game developed by Eric Fredricksen as a parody of ''EverQuest'' and other massively multiplayer online role-playing games. It is loosely considered a zero-player game, in the sense that once the player has set up the ...

'' is another example, in the game the player sets up a artificial character, and afterwards the game plays itself with no further input from the player. ''

Godville ''Godville'' is a mobile and desktop browser zero-player role-playing video game developed by Mikhail Platov and Dmitry Kosinov. It was released as a Russian website in 2007 and as a mobile game in English on July 18, 2010. In the game, the player ...

'' is a similar game that took inspiration from ''Progress Quest'', in the game the player is a god that can communicate with a

non-player character A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster ...

hero, however the game can progress with no interaction from the player.

Incremental games Incremental games, also known as clicker games, clicking games (on PCs) or tap games (in mobile games), are video games whose gameplay consists of the player performing simple actions such as clicking on the screen repeatedly. This "grinding" ear ...

, sometimes called idle games, are games which do require some player intervention near the beginning however may be zero-player at higher levels. As an example, ''

Cookie Clicker ''Cookie Clicker'' is an incremental game created by French programmer Julien "Orteil" Thiennot in 2013. The user initially clicks on a big cookie on the screen, earning a single cookie per click. They can then spend their earned cookies upon p ...

'' requires that players click cookies manually before purchasing assets to click cookies in the place of the player independently.

AI vs AI games

In computer games, the term refers to programs that use

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech r ...

rather than human players,"Encyclopedia of Play in Today's Society"
Rodney P. Carlisle,

SAGE Publications SAGE Publishing, formerly SAGE Publications, is an American independent publishing company founded in 1965 in New York by Sara Miller McCune and now based in Newbury Park, California. It publishes more than 1,000 journals, more than 800 bo ...

. for example some fighting and

real-time strategy Real-time strategy (RTS) is a subgenre of strategy video games that do not progress incrementally in turns, but allow all players to play simultaneously, in "real time". By contrast, in turn-based strategy (TBS) games, players take turns to pla ...

games can be put into zero-player mode where multiple AIs can play against each other. Humans may have a challenge in designing the AI and giving it sufficient skill to play the game well, but the actual evolution of the game has no human intervention.

References

{{Reflist Game theory game classes Game artificial intelligence

Types

Determined by initial state

AI vs AI games

See also

References