Chapter 33

Infected AI in The Last of Us

Mark Botta

33.1 Introduction

In The Last of Us a fungal infection has devastated human beings. The pandemic corrupts the mind and has left most of the population grotesquely disfigured and relentlessly aggressive. The survivors have been forced to struggle not only against those overcome by the fungus (known as the Infected) but also against predatory groups of survivors (known as Hunters). This chapter will focus on the AI behind the Infected. Subsequent chapters will discuss the AI for Hunters and buddy characters.

It was our goal to make the Infected feel fundamentally different than Hunters, despite the fact that they use the same AI system. This was done with a modular AI architecture that allows ...

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