The Scored Rule Engine: Next-Generation Social Physics

Despite being central to many game stories, dynamic social relationships in video games are difficult to make playable in meaningful ways. To help address this issue, this paper presents the Ensemble Engine (EE), the first publicly available “social physics” engine. The Ensemble Engine is inspired by the lessons learned from more than five years building the Comme il Faut (CiF) social physics engine, and a number of games employing it (including Prom Week). The Ensemble Engine retains the most successful aspects of CiF, while also making major improvements in areas such as the flexibility of its action structure and expressivity of its rules. The system is authored in an openstandard language (JavaScript) and includes an authoring tool to increase accessibility for game researchers and creators. Through these improvements and this dissemination strategy, the Ensemble Engine represents an opportunity for the potential of social physics to become much more broadly explored.