From LAN to SIMNET
If the career of Steven Woodcock illustrates the ways in which ideas, technologies, and personnel have flowed from military simulation efforts to the entertainment industries, doom II produced by Id Software, and falcon 4.0, one of Spectrum Holobyte’s videogames provide glimpses into how the exchange is being accelerated in the opposite direction at the present time.
The shift in culture of the military reflected in procurement policies discussed above is also evident in new military approaches to developing critical thinking. Emblematic of this shift is Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Charles C. Krulak’s directive 1500.55 issued in 1996 aimed at implementing improvements in what he termed “Military Thinking and Decision Making Exercises.” In his comments on the planning guidance Gen. Krulak wrote: “It is my intent that we reach the stage where Marines come to work and spend part of each day talking about warfighting: learning to think, making decisions, and being exposed to tactical and operational issues.” He identified an important way to exercise these skills:
The use of technological innovations, such as personal computer (PC)-based wargames, provide great potential for Marines to develop decision making skills, particularly when live training time and opportunities are limited. Policy contained herein authorizes Marines to use Government computers for approved PC-based wargames.
General Krulak directed furthermore that the Marine Combat Development Command assume responsibility for the development, exploitation, and approval of PC-based wargames. In addition, they were to maintain the PC-based Wargames Catalog on the Internet. With this incentive some Marine simulation experts from the Marine Corps Modeling and Simulation Management Office in the training and education division at Quantico, Virginia tracked down a shareware copy of the commercial game doom produced by Id Software, Inc. and began experimenting with it. This led to the adaptation of this game as a fire team simulation, with some of the input for the Marine version coming from Internet doom gamers employing shareware software tools. They then rewrote the code for the commercial game doom II. Instead of employing fantasy weapons to face down monster-like characters in a labyrinthine castle, real-world images were scanned into WAD files along with images of weapons such as the M16(a1) rifle, M-249 squad automatic weapon, and M-67 fragmentation grenades. The game was also modified from its original version to include fighting holes, bunkers, tactical wire, “the fog of war,” and friendly fire. marine doom trainees use Marine-issue assault rifles to shoot it out with enemy combat troops in a variety of terrain and building configurations. In addition to training fire teams in various combat scenarios, the simulation can also be configured for a specific mission immediately prior to engagement. For example, Marines tasked with rescuing a group of Americans held hostage in an overseas embassy could rehearse in a virtual building constructed from the actual floor plans of the structure. Users needed only to purchase version 1.9 of the commercial game and add the Marine rewrite code to run the new tactical simulation. The Quantico-based software could not run without the original commercial package, so no licensing violations occurred. Indeed, any personal computer owner with doom II can download the code for marine doom from the Modeling and Simulation Management Office’s web page. You too can become a military assault commando.
The success of the doom II simulation rewrite led the Marines to look ahead to the next step in commercial war gaming. Discussions with MÄK (pronounced “mock”) Technologies (Cambridge, MA), a commercial game manufacturer specializing in network simulation tools for distributed interactive simulations, lead to the design of a tactical operations game built to Marine specifications. According to the contract the Marine Corps would help develop the software code and in turn would receive a site license to train on this game, while MÄK would sell it commercially as an official Marine Corps tactical training game. This from-the-ground-up development would eliminate all of the nuances of the other adapted games that are not particular to Marine combat.
MÄK was founded in 1990 by two MIT engineering graduates, Warren Katz and John Morrison. After graduating from MIT both were original members of Bolt Beranek & Newman’s SIMNET project team from 1987 to 1990, which developed low-cost, networkable 3D simulators for the Department of Defense. MÄK’s corporate goal is to provide cutting-edge research and development services to the Department of Defense in the areas of distributed interactive simulation (DIS) and networked virtual reality (VR) systems and to convert the results of this research into commercial products for the entertainment and industrial markets. MÄK’s first commercial product, the VR-Link™ developer’s toolkit, is the most widely used commercial DIS interface in the world. It is an application programmer’s toolkit that makes possible networking of distributed simulations and VR systems. The toolkit complies with the Defense Department’s DIS protocol, enabling multiple participants to interact in real time via low-bandwidth network connections. VR-Link is designed for easy integration with existing and new simulations, VR systems, and games. Thanks to such products, MÄK was ranked 36th in the 1997 New England Technology Fast 50 and 380th in the 1997 National Technology Fast 500 based on revenue growth between 1992 and 1996.
In addition to its work in the defense community, the company’s software has been licensed for use by several entertainment firms, such as Total Entertainment Network and Zombie Virtual Reality Entertainment, to serve as the launching pad for real-time, 3D, multi-user video games. One such game, Spearhead, a multi-user tank simulation game released in mid-1998, was written by MÄK and published by Interactive Magic. Spearhead can be played over the Internet and incorporates networking technology similar to that used in military simulations.
MÄK’s products use technologies called Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) and High Level Architecture (HLA). Both technologies efficiently connect thousands of 3D simulations together on a computer network. Replacing the DIS standard for net-based simulations, HLA has been designated as the new standard technical architecture for all DoD simulations. All simulations must be HLA-compatible by the end of 1999. The transition to HLA is part of a DoD-wide effort to establish a common technical framework to facilitate the interoperability of all types of models and simulations, as well as to facilitate the reuse of modeling and simulation components. This framework includes HLA, which represents the highest priority effort within the DoD modeling and simulation community. MÄK intends to leverage its technology for both the military and commercial markets by taking advantage of the nearly $500 million a year spent by the US government on optimizing the speed and capabilities of DIS and HLA. State-of-the-art military DIS systems are now capable of running over 10,000 simulations simultaneously, networked together across far-ranging geographies. As low-cost commercial data services (bi-directional cable TV, ADSL, etc.) become more widely available to consumers, industry analysts project the market for on-line, 3D, multi-user simulations to reach $2 billion in the year 2000. The networking capabilities of distributed simulation technology developed by MÄK and other government suppliers will enable entertainment providers to create platforms for 3D worlds supporting up to 100,000 participants simultaneously. Katz has described his vision provocatively in a chapter for the book Digital Illusion: Entertaining the Future with High Technology. The chapter is titled “Networked Synthetic Environments: From DARPA to Your Virtual Neighborhood.” In the near future MÄK co-founders Katz and Johnson are betting that Internet-based populations the size of a mid-sized U.S. city will be able to stroll through an electronic shopping mall, explore and colonize a virtual universe, or race for prizes in cyberspace’s largest 3D road rally.
The contract awarded by the US Marine Corps to MÄK in 1997 will assist this vision of vastly shared virtual reality; it further erodes the distinction between military simulation technology and the technology available to ordinary users. The contract is for meu 2000, a computer-based tactical decision-making game for US Marines which will also be released simultaneously as a commercial computer game. The player of meu 2000 assumes the role of a Marine officer coordinating the actions of a “Marine Expeditionary Unit—Special Operations Capable [MEU (SOC)].” The player will see the battle from a 3-D tactical view, enabling him to select units, issue orders, and monitor the progress of his forces. meu 2000 will be a multiplayer game. Each player may assume a position in the command hierarchy of either US or opposing forces. (Players will only be able to command US equipment). Additionally, players of platform-level simulations will be able to assume their appropriate positions in the hierarchy. meu 2000 will be a real-time, networkable, 3D strategy game simulating modern US Marine Corps warfare, developed in cooperation with the US Marine Corps in order to ensure that a high level of realism is incorporated into the simulation. MÄK will use the same game engine in both its military and civilian versions. The military version will add more accurate details about tactics and weapons, while the civilian game will be less demanding. But both versions will allow multiple players to compete against each other over a local-area network or the Internet.
While a number of military simulations and commercial airline flight simulators have been adapted to the commercial game market, falcon 4.0 is the first flight simulation video game to be adapted to military training. falcon 4.0 is a network-based game which supports either single player or multiplayer modes. Multiplayer mode supports dogfights with up to four squadrons of four F-16s each. The game’s whopping 600-page manual suggests the seriousness of play involved and indicates why the military finds it attractive for its own training purposes. As producer Gilman Louie explains, the falcon 4.0 is a detailed simulation re-creating the feel of being an F-16 pilot operating over a modern battlefield. The simulation has a highly accurate flight model and avionics suite that incorporates flight parameters conforming to real-world specifications. falcon 4.0 accurately re-creates such effects as deep stall (to escape, the player must use the real-world procedure of flipping the Manual Pitch Override switch and “rocking” the aircraft out—the standard game trick of simply lighting the afterburners won’t restore normal flight in this simulation). Weapon modeling is equally realistic and, except for omitting a few classified details, provides an amazingly accurate representation of weapons deployment. The simulation is so detailed, in fact, that reviewers of the game report consulting a real-world “Dash 1″ manual for the F-16 when playing the game. The realism of falcon 4.0 is further enhanced by graphics generated from actual aerial photographs and map data from the Korean peninsula. In its current version, the game plays best on a computer with a processor of 400 MHZ or higher.
The extreme realism in this video game led Peter Bonanni, graduate of the F-16 Fighter Weapons School and pilot instructor of the Virginia Air National Guard, to work with Spectrum HoloByte Inc. to modify the falcon 4.0 flight simulator game for military training. According to Bonanni, falcon 4.0 mimics the look and feel of real military aircraft and allows users to play against computer-generated forces or, in a networked fashion, against other pilots, which facilitates team-training opportunities. Another reason for Bonanni’s enthusiasm is the virtual world around the player. Although the product features scripted Tactical Engagement missions as well as an Instant Action mode for newcomers, the heart and soul of the product is the dynamic campaign mode, where the player assumes the role of a pilot in an F-16 squadron during a conflict on the Korean peninsula. The campaign engine runs an entire war, assigning missions to units throughout the theater. A list (displayed either by priority to the war effort or by launch time) shows the missions available to the player’s squadron. The player can fly any of these missions, with the freedom to choose air-to-air or air-to-ground sorties. Unlike games with pre-scripted outcomes the campaign engine allows story lines, missions, and outcomes to be dynamically generated. Each play of the game influences the next. If a player is first assigned a mission to destroy a bridge but fails, the next mission may be to provide support to friendly tanks engaged by an enemy that just crossed the bridge.
Networked video games such as falcon 4.0 are emblematic of the calculated emergence of a military-entertainment complex but also of the fusion of the digital and the real happening around us. It is hardly surprising that Bonanni not only helps adapt the video game to military training needs but also writes a regular column for the www.falcon4.com website on tactics and has designed several of the 31 pre-built training missions included with the game. He is co-author of two best-selling books on falcon 4.0, one with colleague James Reiner, also an F-16 instructor pilot and graduate of the F-16 Fighter Weapons School, and like Bonanni a consultant on the game. Beginning with some basics on the game and the various gameplay options, falcon 4.0: Prima’s Official Strategy Guide gives readers a guide to instant action missions, multiplayer dogfights, and full-fledged campaigns. The book is a serious no-nonsense manual, devoting separate chapters to laser-guided bombs and even the AGM-65 Maverick missile. Bonanni’s second book, falcon 4.0 Checklist, is scheduled to appear soon and is already high on the Amazon.com sales list before it has even hit the bookstores. Recalling that Ender’s Game has been taught in flight schools, would-be Falcon pilots will probably want to add a copy to their Amazon.com shopping cart for inspirational reading.
Until the last two or three years these crossovers from military simulations and the entertainment industries have been unplanned and opportunistic. In December of 1996 the National Academy of Sciences hosted a workshop on modeling and simulation aimed at exploring mutual ground for organized cooperation between the entertainment industries and defense. The report stimulated the Army in August 1999 to give $45 million to the University of Southern California over the next five years to create a research center to develop advanced military simulations. The research center will enlist film studios and video game designers in the effort, with the promise that any technological advances can also be applied to make more compelling video games and theme park rides. The idea for the new center, to be called the Institute for Creative Technologies, reflects the fact that although Hollywood and the Pentagon may differ markedly in culture, they now overlap in technology. Moreover, as we have seen, military technology, which once trickled down to civilian use, now often lags behind what is available in games, rides and movie special effects. As STRICOM Chief Scientist and Acting Technical Director Dr. Michael Macedonia wrote in a recent article in Computer:
As Siggraph—the computer-graphics community’s showcase—has demonstrated over the past several years, the demands of digital film development are making way for computer games’ even more demanding real-time simulation requirements. As a mass market, games now drive the development of graphics and processor hardware. Intel and AMD have added specialized multimedia and graphics instructions to their line of processors in their battle to counter companies such as Nvidia, whose computer graphics chips continue breaking new performance boundaries.
By aggressively maneuvering to seize and expand their market share, the entertainment industry’s biggest players are shaping a 21st century in which consumer demand for entertainment—not grand science projects or military research—will drive computing innovation. Private-sector research-and-development spending, which now accounts for 75 percent of total US R&D, will increase to about $187.2 billion in 2000, up from an estimated $169.3 billion in 1999, according to Battelle Memorial Institute’s annual R&D forecast.
In opening the new Institute for Creative Technology Secretary of the Army Louis Caldera said, “We could never hope to get the expertise of a Steven Spielberg or some of the other film industry people working just on Army projects.” But the new institute, Caldera said, will be “a win-win for everyone.”
While putting more polygons on the screen for less cost is certainly one of the military’s objectives at the Institute for Creative Technologies and in similar alliances, other dimensions of simulated worlds are equally important for their agenda. Military simulations have been extremely good at modeling hardware components of military systems. Flight and tank simulators are excellent tools for learning and practicing the use of complex, expensive equipment. However, movies, theme park rides, and increasingly even video games are driven by stories with plot, feeling, tension, and emotion. To train for real world military engagements is not just to train on how to use the equipment but how to cope with the implementation of strategy in an environment with uncertainties, surprises, and participants with actual fears. As Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Charles C. Krulak’s directive on “Military Thinking and Decision Making Exercises” emphasized, decisions made in war must frequently be made under physical and emotional duress. The directive stated that the PC-based wargame exercises in peacetime should replicate some of the same conditions: “Imaginative combinations of physical and mental activities provide Marines the opportunity to make decisions under conditions of physical stress and fatigue, thereby more closely approximating combat.”
Early military simulations incorporated very rote behaviors. They did not capture “soft” characteristics well. An effort to go beyond this was launched in 1991 by the Institute for Defense Analyses in their effort to construct a computer-generated “magic carpet” simulation-recreation of the Battle of 73 Easting, based on in-depth debriefings of 150 survivors of a key battle that had taken place during the Gulf War. The goal of the project was to get timeline-based experiences of how individuals felt, thought and reacted to the dynamic unfolding of the events–their fears and emotions as well as actions–and render the events as a fully three-dimensional simulated reality which any future cadet could enter and relive. Going a step beyond the traditional “staff ride”–a face-to-face post-battle tutorial at the site itself in which a commander leads his staff in a verbal recreation of the skirmish–this tour of a battle site was a simulacrum of the war itself. Work on data gathering for the simulation began one month after the battle had taken place. The IDA brought the soldiers who had actually taken part and had them sketch out the battle. They walked over the battlefield amidst the twisted wreckage of Iraqi tanks, recalling the action as best they could. A few soldiers supplied diaries to reconstruct their actions. Some were even able to consult personal tape recordings taken during the chaos. Tracks in the sand gave the simulators precise traces of movement. A black box in each tank, programmed to track three satellites, confirmed its exact position on the ground to eight digits. Every missile shot left a thin wire trail which lay undisturbed in the sand. Headquarters had a tape recording of radio-voice communications from the field. Sequenced overhead photos from satellite cameras gave the big view. A digital map of the terrain was captured by lasers and radar.
With this data a team at the IDA Simulation Center spent nine months constructing a simulation of the battle. A few months into the project, they had the actual desert troops, then stationed in Germany, review a preliminary version of the recreation. The simulacra were sufficiently fleshed out that the soldiers could sit in tank simulators and enter the virtual battle. They reported corrections of the simulated event to the technicians, who modified the model. One year after the confrontation the recreated Battle of 73 Easting was demo-ed for high-ranking military in a facility with panoramic views on three 50-inch TV screens at the resolution of a very good video game.
The Battle of 73 Easting is an extremely accurate historical reconstruction of a battle whose outcome is known. It set the standard of a future genre of training simulations, something like the Saving Private Ryan of staff rides. Although the cost of creating the simulation is not available, it was undoubtedly expensive. As a computer simulation with programmable variables, however, the scenario could be replayed with different endings. Indeed the next logical step after creating this fantastically accurate simulation would be to use the data and behaviors of the simulation as inputs to a game engine, like marine doom, or a more current best-seller, quake. By making the simulation reprogrammable, the staff ride could become an adaptable tool for battle training. Embedded simulations involving real global-positional data, information on opposing forces and their capabilities could be built into the M1 tank units, attack helicopters, or F-16s themselves as real soldiers train for an impending mission right up to the hour of the engagement.
How might the interest in pursuing this line of development in new settings like the Institute for Creative Technology (ICT) proceed? At this early date we can only speculate. In light of the new military practice of forming product development teams consisting of military, industry and possibly academic partners, and in light of effort to merge military and entertainment projects for their mutual benefit, I would like to propose an imaginary scenario of teamwork involving elements from each of these sectors. Several of the members of the new ICT work on constructing semi-automated forces and multiple distributed agents for virtual environments, such as training programs. Others in the ICT work on building models of emotion for use in synthetic training environments. The work of professors Jonathan Gratch and Jeff Rickel are prototypical. Prior to the formation of the ICT these researchers had been working on the construction of intelligent agent technology for incorporation into state-of-the-art military simulation systems. More interested in modeling training behaviors, they have not been particularly interested in developing “believable agents” for video games or film. The goal of one of their projects is to develop command and control agents that can model the capabilities of a human military commander, where commander agents must plan, monitor their execution, and replan when necessary.
We could imagine lots of potential collaborations with commercial videogame companies that would leverage the skills and knowledge of both commercial and academic partners interested in artificial agents and historically accurate “staff ride” training scenarios that build in uncertainty, fear, emotion, and a gripping sense of story and narrative. I find Atomic Games an interesting candidate. Its personnel and company history map the trajectory from military to commercial applications we have explored above. Atomic Games is a company of ten persons founded in 1991 by Keith Zabalaoui. Today Atomic is a subsidiary of Microsoft Games. Before entering the video game business Zabalaoui and his colleagues worked for Rockwell International at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Zabalaoui worked on a space-based robotic retriever for recapturing astronauts, tools, or anything else that might become detached from the space shuttle. After the retriever project was canceled Zabalaoui shifted his activities full-time to what had been until then his recreation during breaks at the Center: a board game called atlantic wall with three boards set up in different rooms for the Allies, Axis and referees. Zabalaoui started bringing his Macintosh computer with him to the game and between moves began writing the first v for victory game that has become the trademark of Atomic Games. v for victory, utah beach, which was selected as Game of the Year by Strategy Plus in 1992.
Atomic Games’ most successful attempt to build an historically accurate game is close combat 2: a bridge too far. This game is based on an historically accurate rendering of a WWII German-American tank battle. The game has won many awards for its realism. In part this is achieved by the addition of sound and movie-like visual effects, but a key element is provided by models of the behavior of men under fire. This human aspect of combat has been provided by advisors, such as Dr. Steven Silver, who is a combat psychologist.
Whether or not this imaginary alliance between Atomic Games and AI researchers in the ITC is ever realized, my point is to illustrate how the Army’s goals of leveraging technology for its own purposes from the film and video game industry at sites like this incubator institute might be achieved. The military has contributed enormously to the development of the digital technologies that are transforming our world, but they have become a backseat player in the new digital economy. According to the Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA), the sale of game and edutainment software for computers, video consoles, and the Internet generated revenues of $5.5 billion in the U.S. alone, making it the fastest growing entertainment industry in the world. Video game rentals accounted for a further $800 million in 1998. The interactive entertainment software industry that created these products did so with only about 70,000 employees. Compare these figures with the motion picture business, which generated $6.9 billion, but employed more than 240,000 people in doing so. In 1998, software sales continued to skyrocket, increasing by 22 percent on a dollar basis, making it the third consecutive year the industry experienced double-digit growth. Video game sales racked up more than $3.7 billion, and computer game sales topped $1.8 billion. Retail sales remained strong throughout the year, with each month outperforming the same month a year ago. In addition, unit sales increased by 33 percent, selling 181 million units of PC and video games in the U.S. alone, or almost two per household. Through the first three quarters of 1999, video game unit sales were up 31 percent, and dollar sales were up 21 percent. Unit growth for computer games increased 22 percent and dollar sales increased almost 20 percent. Total sales reached $3.3 billion, a 19 percent increase compared to the same period in 1998.
What these figures suggest is that sufficient economic incentives exist alongside the policy and organizational structures I have been describing to fuel the continued rapid diffusion and improvement of military SIMNET technology through its fusion with videogame and film. Companies like Perceptronics, one of the original contractors for SIMNET, has been committed to the redeployment and further development of that technology into its Internet Collaborative 3D™ Framework (IC3D™) for mass-market, people-oriented 3D experiences on the web in which multiple users can interact fully, naturally, collaboratively and in real-time within virtual environments. For those who see such developments as contributing to the fusion of the digital and the real, and as I have argued, creating the precondition for a “posthuman” future, the ride isn’t over yet.
[...] Vote From LAN to SIMNET [...]
[...] Vote From LAN to SIMNET [...]