Chris Crawford on Game Design

AI

I had an excellent play-mechanic in hand, but now I needed some AI to control the computer people. How were they to respond to the gossip they heard?

At this point, it is worthwhile to point out the obvious: The solutions I describe never came quickly. I can't remember the many trials and errors I pursued, but there were quite a few. Weeks rolled by while I struggled with these problems. The gap between problem and solution in this book is often just a line of text, but in the real world it was much greater, and the eventual solution was nowhere near as clear as I present it here; most of the time I bumbled towards it in a reverse Drunkard's Walk (that's an old mathematical problem), eventually getting myself to the street light.

The solution ...