Second Mind: A System for Authoring Behaviors in Virtual Worlds

Abstract

In this paper, we present a design solution that enables novice users to author the behaviors of non-playing characters in virtual worlds. We discuss the current authoring interface and the activities that the users need to conduct in order to generate behaviors. We also outline the system architecture, which we called Second Mind, with focus on the behavior execution system and the interface layer that connects it to the external virtual world. A series of user studies, show that our system can be successfully used by novice users to produce reliable behaviors while also improving the efficiency of the authoring task.