Next Step in Artificial Intelligence: Diplomacy Computer Learning Board Game

Much research has been done on two-player games, such as checkers and chess. These types of games can be perfectly learned by computers. “Diplomacy is a completely different game,” says de Kleijn.

“Bee Diplomacy for example, players must negotiate via chat messages. This makes learning much more complex for a computer. Language needs to be interpreted, as other players don’t always tell the truth. People understand that, but for computers it’s an extra layer.”

Credible chat message

It is remarkable that the computer can now play this complicated social game without other players noticing that a computer was playing the game. “The computer system has analyzed tens of thousands of games that have been played. The system has also analyzed the chat messages and in this way the computer learned to compose a believable chat message”, explains Kleijn.

“This discovery shows us that many things that we now think computers could never do can possibly be done by computers. I don’t believe there is anything a human can do now that a computer will never do.”